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Three Lenses to Guide Your Decisions and Actions

March 16, 2022

If you have already read this same article on Medium, you can skip it.

Three Lenses to Guide Your Decisions and Actions

1. What would the person I’m trying to become do in this situation?

There are times we feel like giving up on our dream. At times we might have been consistent with a habit for a while and then stopped it midway. It could have been with regards to working out, writing a blog, creating art or taking regular quizzes.

At these times if we could sincerely ask ourselves, “What would the person I’m trying to become do in this situation?” This will help us to act and decide according to the identity we aspire to be.

If you have the habit of Journaling, writing a brief answer to this question might be quite helpful.

2. What would the person I’m trying to avoid becoming do in this situation?

The compound effect of our daily actions results in our habits and personality. So a simple inversion of the previous question can make us conscious of what we don’t want to become.

As a Student, my answer to this question would be:

  • Don’t make a plan for preparation

  • Don’t review the plan

  • Don’t take mock exams before the main exam

  • Waste time watching random YouTube videos. (I stand guilty of this 🙈)

  • Doomscrolling (Yes. It is an actual word. Oxford named it as the word of the year in 2020)

  • Start the day, Fill the day and End the Day with Social Media

I believe that the average person preparing for a competitive exam would be doing this. By deciding to avoid doing this, I will be able to make progress.

3. Will I regret doing this (or not doing this)

Jeff Bezos in an interview describes his Regret Minimization Framework which he used before deciding to start Amazon. Bezos says:

I knew that when I was 80 I was not going to regret having tried this. I was not going to regret trying to participate in this thing called the Internet that I thought was going to be a really big deal. I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not ever having tried.

This framework can be applied to long term life goals or short term daily decisions.

  1. For Long term goals: “In 80 years will I regret doing this (or not doing this)?”

  2. For Short term goals: Is there anything I did today, that I regret doing. Can I avoid doing it tomorrow?

Spending some time in the day to reflect on these questions can help us to understand ourselves better.

What questions do you ask yourself? Do you have a habit of Journaling? How has your experience been?

Do let me know your thoughts!

This article is inspired by a Twitter Thread written by Dickie Bush