On Happiness & Decision Making

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Are your decisions a sum total of the meaning you ascribe to them? Are some decisions 'right' and others 'wrong'?

Looking back at my last thoughts I think that the time has come for more spiritual considerations: we must forget such things as skeletons and feet and dedicate ourselves to higher matters. But as you know, I am not a believer, so do not expect from me a sermon on virtue. All that I will try to attempt is to tell you about one of the mental props I have always used to avert unhappiness. And unhappiness very often stems from taking a decision that goes pear-shaped.

And gloom ensues.

In Britain it is common to diagnose a person as gloomy if he or she sees a glass of wine half consumed and regards it as half empty; an optimist instead will say that the glass is half full. This may be very clever, but the reality is that anyone that worries about glasses of wine being full or empty is in severe need of advice.

Decision taking, instead, is something that everybody (with the exception of the British Prime Minister Mrs May) has at some stage to confront. I must qualify before I go any further the type of decisions that I am talking about, which are personal decisions. I cannot cope with the heroic problem that politicians face where they have to take decisions that will affect millions of people.



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