Decisions
The most important part of our life - decisions. How do they change our lives each and every single day?
Introduction
Most of our decisions in life are binary, meaning there are only 2 choices like the paths in the image above. As some would say, 50/50. But, not all decisions are equally as easy and not all decisions are worth it.
The Butterfly Effect
The most powerful and important effect in the world, how one small change can change the course of your life or someone else's.
In life we make choices every single day. The most common ones are our basic necessities - what should we eat today, what should we drink and where are we going today, if anywhere at all? But some decisions are more impactful than others, what you will eat today and what you will drink will likely not impact your life significantly, although in the long term, consistently eating good or consistently eating bad will have big consequences, either good or bad. But that doesn’t quite fit the butterfly effect, as it is not a single decision.
Now let’s take a look at arguably the single most important decision in human history. But first let’s take a look at the man who made the decision.
Petrov enrolled at the Kiev Military Aviation Engineering Academy of the Soviet Air Forces, and after graduating in 1972 he joined the Soviet Air Defence Forces. In the early 1970s, he was assigned to the organization that oversaw the new early warning system intended to detect ballistic missile attacks from NATO countries. Petrov was married to Raisa, and had a son, Dmitri, and a daughter, Yelena. His wife died of cancer in 1997.
From the description of his life some of you can already guess what he did - he decided to not trust the computer systems’ detection of incoming ballistic missiles from the USA, having had the confidence that the detections were false positives. It turned out that he was right, but if he hadn’t made that decision, the USA and the Soviet Union would likely have had an all-out Nuclear war, which would have been the worst disaster in human history, perhaps ending our species as a whole. This is what I consider the single most important decision in human history, and had it gone the other way the butterfly effect would have been the worst one in known history. But because of this man’s pure confidence in the detections being false-positives, the world as we know it continued.
After leaving the military in 1984, Petrov was hired at the same research institute that had developed the Soviet Union’s early warning system. He later retired so he could care for his wife after she was diagnosed with cancer. During a visit to the United States for the filming of the documentary “The Man Who Saved the World”, Petrov toured the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site in May 2007 and commented, “I would never have imagined being able to visit one of the enemy’s securest sites.”
Some other decisions of this magnitude and importance are, for example, the invention of the Nuclear Bomb and other weapons such as bombs, guns, etc. An interesting discussion is, did these inventions change the world for the better or worse, do they contribute to peace or not? Because they are very effective at defending and deferring attacks, but if they fall in the wrong hands, that is when problems arise, as history has shown many times. There is a saying that those who don’t learn from history are destined to repeat it.
What has been your most important decision in your life, that changed your life forever in the long-term? Was your most important Butterfly Effect a positive or a negative one?
The Theory
First of all let me lay out some facts for you.
You can make every correct decision in your life, choose every decision perfectly like you were cheating in a Poker game, yet you could still fail to reach your goals in life. This is because life is not fair, it never will be fair and it never has been fair. Someone will always have an advantage over another person, just as if they were cheating in a Poker game.
Someone born into poverty may fight their entire life trying to progress into the middle class to live a modest normal life, but they may never reach it despite their best efforts. One especially sad fact is, that when people that live in poverty fall into health issues, it is likely that they will not visit the doctor, because they can not afford it. And even if they can afford it, it is difficult to take time out of your schedule during a 40 hour work week. Of course, there are some countries that deal with this better like the west and north of Europe, but that is an exception not the norm.
That was just an example of someone having a goal - the reality is that everyone wishes to achieve something, yet on the internet you will only ever hear of the winners. Social media paints a perfect life, that not even the creators creating the posts themselves live, because they need to put a facade on to get views and generate traction.
Another factor to consider is, not everyone gets the same odds and chances on decisions. Someone born into wealth is much likelier to succeed in life and in education, because they will have everything paid for and even get a place to live for free post-education. But someone born into a normal family will likely have to work alongside their studies and possibly even take out a loan to make it through education. Don’t get me started on mortgages ripping money out of your paycheck, just so you can call a place your own. So, let’s take a look at two lives and how differently they get to live after completing their University studies:
- Person 1: Parents paid for everything during college, after graduation their parents bought them a brand new car and an apartment. They have no debts, they don’t have to pay rent or a mortgage. They never worked a day in their life.
- Person 2: Grew up in poverty and worked since they were very young to save up for education, and still had to work during High School and University to make ends meet. Also had to take out a personal loan to get through University, because the tuition was simply too high. After this person graduates, they have a personal loan debt, no car, no savings, and even if they pay off their personal loan they are unlikely to get approved for a mortgage unless they get a very lucrative job.
So, we’ve got the fact covered that life is not fair. But there are things we can do, to lean the odds our way. Increase our chances of success. Some of these are ethical and moral, some less so. But one thing is for sure, when a person has nothing left to lose they often take risks that they otherwise would not have.
Failure
Don’t be afraid of making so called “wrong” decisions. Whether it is dating someone that you probably should not have dated when looking back, taking a job you should not have, or any other decision - don’t be afraid of failure. In most cases, if you were to go back in time to that very same moment, without knowledge of what would have happened, you would make the very same decision every single time. This is why I believe it is a waste of time crying about your past and instead you should learn from it and think about how you can improve your future from the lessons learned in failure.
But, make sure your decisions align with your ethics and morals. Don’t stray away from these very important factors, because once you lose your moral compass it is very easy to go down a dark, lonely and sad path.
Selfishness
On the topic of morals and ethics, I believe in most decisions you should think about how your decisions will affect not only you, but also other people. I’m quite happy about this by myself, I believe most of the time I consider this factor.
With that being said, I think it is crucial to be selfish when it comes to your professional life , feel free to be as generous as you’d like in your free time, but time after time many people have made the mistake of being too generous in business (for example giving distant family free services while the business is operating at a loss or nearing a loss and then the business going under because of no income generated during these charitable moments) and in their jobs (for example working unpaid overtime), just to get thrown under the boat later on. The question is, is it really selfish wanting to take care of yourself and your own family and not put them in potential financial hardship? I don’t believe so, but some people will definitely disagree with this take, and that is okay. I truly believe it is important to listen to others’ opinions and take them into consideration when making decisions in life, but you should always be the one calling the shots (making the final decisions), do not let other people lead your life .
Charity
How often have you helped someone just because you felt like helping or doing a good deed? I’ve done this numerous times, especially in University. I’ve helped probably nearly a thousand people with numerous queries about the study and University. But some people do not help you just to help you, they help you because they want you to “owe them one” , guilt-tripping you with “but remember when I did that for you?”. And while I do believe in reciprocation of such help, are you really a good person and was your decision to help made out of the good of your heart, if you expect something in return? I’m not sure on the answer here, because I understand both sides of the opinion - one side arguing that you are a bad person for not giving back the same deed that someone did for you, and the other side arguing that it was not a good deed, but a selfish decision, if you only helped in expectance of getting something in return.
Nevertheless, if there is good in your heart, don’t be afraid to show it - but don’t forget to take care of yourself; it is very rarely worth it to set yourself on fire to keep others warm. Most of the time you just end up with burns and an unthankful person that you kept warm.
Decisions of Utmost Importance
Some of the most important decisions that cause massive Butterfly Effects in our lives:
Education choices - where to attend High School and University. For most people, these two are the biggest turning points in their life, bad or good choices when it comes to education will very likely dictate the rest of your life. Many people that drop out of High School and University live to regret that decision later in their life.
Friendship choices - As the saying goes, you don’t get to choose who your family is, but you do get to choose with whom you’d like to be friends with. Friends are in my opinion the single most crucial factor in developing someone’s life, there is no influence quite like a friend, and unfortunately for some people they forget to think with their own head and just follow their friends’ decisions blindly.
Dating choices - Arguably the most important decision after Education is your life partner. Choosing a person that does not share the same values as you, or failing to discuss important topics with a person due to getting lost in lust are some of the easiest ways to ruin your life. I will discuss this in great detail and my views on this volatile topic in an upcoming post dedicated to dating.
Location choices - Whether it is choosing where to settle down or choosing where to get a job, a location binds you to so many things in life - opportunities, goods availability, services availability, quality of life, health care availability, cost of life, air quality, etc. Choosing a suboptimal country or city can be a hard decision to change after settling down, so make sure you consider every single thing when thinking of settling down or moving to a new location.
When does a decision make sense?
I think it is important to think about every medium and big decision in your life thoroughly. Often times, the decision that you feel better about and the one that your gut says is right - will indeed be the right decision, even in hindsight. But, don’t stop listening to yourself and your gut even if some decisions, that should have gone right, have gone wrong instead. People often get dazzled in failure and stay down instead of learning from it and getting back up stronger than ever.
I fucked up, what now?
We’ve all been there. You’ve made a decision that turned out terribly and you wish you hadn’t done that. You have possibly even gone against all your morals and ethical values, that you thought you stood for. Maybe you feel sick to your stomach, maybe you feel nauseous. First, take a deep breath and go for a long walk. Just walk and think about what you’ve done. If you can’t get yourself to go out, drink a glass of water and then listen to some of your favorite music. After you’ve thought about it, make sure you apologize sincerely (fake apologies and insencere apologies are WORSE than no apology at all!), and do anything and everything to correct what was done wrong, whether a person was wronged or something else that can be fixed or amended. If absolutely nothing can be done to fix it, no apologies can be made, or you’ve already done everything that can be done, then move on with your life, you only have one life, do not spend it living in the past for too long, you blink twice and 20 years have gone by in the blink of a moment.
Music
All rights of the music belong to the original copyright owners. This content is shared for educational purposes only, you can support the artist directly by buying the song on your platform of choice by clicking the buttons next to the song.
Once again, on the topic of this post, I invite you to close your eyes and enjoy some melodies and let your thoughts and emotions take the lead.
I had all, and then most of you, some, and now none of you...
I often bit off more than I could chew, but through it all, when there was doubt - I did it my way. I often think whether this is my favorite song of all time, because doing things your way and making decisive moves in your life despite the fear of it going wrong is what separates a person who is willing to fight through failure to reach success, and someone who lets other people dictate their life at each and every step. Truly, a timeless masterpiece by Frank.
Closing Thoughts
Decisions are the biggest factor in how our life turns out. Make sure you think twice or thrice, or even more times if you are in doubt about a decision that could cause a big Butterfly Effect on your life. But, don’t be too scared. Find a good balance, don’t live your life in fear, you may wake up on day and wish you had taken more risks, I believe it is better to have a book of stories, even if filled with only failure and sorrow, instead of numerous “what if”’s. Is it better to try and fail, or to not try at all? I believe the thrill of potential success is always worth it, if the decision makes sense. But many people live their lives taking barely any risks and choosing all the safe choices, and that is also one way to live your life.