Our current-day technology is exponentially advancing; we are now presented with more options at a rapid pace. The more options and or variety we encounter our choice-making can become complex. There are fascinating case studies on the psychology and paradox of choice and how our satisfaction levels are diluted when we are presented with more options. Though I am not a behavioral scientist, I have found some fascinating practical day-to-day reasons fewer options may be better.
1. Gain more satisfaction with what you have
Would we have added that new thing to our list if we woke up today and did not scroll through our phones? Before social media, television, and advertising, there was word of mouth. If it worked for your neighbor and they found value in the item, they would share the information. Our circles have grown substantially in the past decade through handheld devices, and more information is being presented.
In past generations, humans were once exposed to new ideas and products on a lesser scale, lessening our choices. The overload of information parallels the paradox of choice, causing anxiety and distress. Having some options gives us a sense of freedom; having too many, we feel bound and unable to decide. Having fewer options would inadvertently minimize our wants and maximize our satisfaction with what we already have.
2. Less Decision Making
Fine-dining restaurants and high-end clothing stores tend to present customers with fewer choices. Why? People are more likely to follow through with a decision when given fewer options. Dr. Vishton offers the counterintuitive tip that you should, whenever possible, reduce the number of options you have to a relatively small number. Across various studies, human decision-making functions more optimally when the choices are limited. When given many options, people experience choice overload: the tendency for people to get overwhelmed when presented with a large number of options. When presented with too many options, we experience decision fatigue. The four elements of decision fatigue are procrastination, impulsivity, and avoidance. Having fewer options help aid us in less decision-making, functioning at a higher frequency, feeling lighter, and more at ease (physically and emotionally).
Derek Sivers takes a deeper look at the psychology of choices written in Paradox of Choice.
3. More time
We have heard it before, from the most outstanding innovators to the CEOs – they wear the same thing daily. They know what they are comfortable in and wear it repeatedly. More decisions should be made at the start of their day. Their time is spent creating. While our lifestyles might not be that of a CEO’s, we can gain some knowledge from this practice. How do we want to spend our time? Using your brainpower for decisions like what to wear and eat in the morning means you could be out of energy later in the day to make more meaningful choices.
4. Social Media becomes Irrelevant.
Social media came in like wildfire and spread quicker than we could control it. Have we asked ourselves what it is offering us as humans? To sum it up, more choices all around. Let’s quickly list the options on social media: fashion, music, workouts, nutrition, body types, dating, home décor, vacation ideas, etc. It is just overload, advertising at its finest. If we consume less advertising or limit it, social media becomes irrelevant. We may soon discover social media is less social than we think and instead a giant billboard selling us the next best thing or idea. Giving us a problem we never had and the solution we never asked for. The less we consume the advertising bait, the more satisfied we are.
5. Healthier Lifestyle
Food & fitness are a great place to start when focusing on a healthier lifestyle. If we put our blinders on at the grocery store and stick to our list (assuming our inventory contains the whole, primarily nutrition-dense foods), we would automatically be presented with fewer options. Adding some processed, non-nutritional convenience food would be limited to the items we have planned for. In other words, forget all the options and stick to the list.
The same goes for fitness; if we block out all the noise and the latest and greatest fitness workout fad, we can optimize our time. We are often bombarded with the newest workout trends, feeling defeated and quitting before we even start. Keeping it as simple as possible, using the tried-and-true workouts, equals more time to spend on active lifestyles.
Final Thoughts
The ability to weigh choices is remarkably advantageous but can also have drawbacks. The drawbacks can be so naturally woven into our lives that we barely see them. This list is merely to spark a thought as to what area we could reduce options in our daily lives—having an abundance of possibilities requires more effort to decide and leave us unsatisfied with our choice. By limiting our options, we can maximize our time and focus, making choices that lead us to a more intentional, purpose-driven day.
“Learning to choose is hard. Learning to choose well is harder. And learning to choose well in a world with unlimited possibilities is harder still, and perhaps too hard.” -Barry Schwartz
Photo by Stephanie Harvey on Unsplash