My Decision Damage

We're all damaged goods. Let's talk about it.

WHAT’S MY DAMAGE?

I buckle under the weight of decisions.

When anyone asks me “Where should we eat?” or “What should we watch?” my go-to reply is “I don’t know, I don’t care, you pick.” This is not ambivalence. It's that I know as soon as I utter an opinion I will obsess over how much it was the wrong option to suggest.

I obsess over how much you’ll hate that decision, and I’ll immediately be overcome with the impulse to apologize and insist we do something other than whatever I suggested, because obviously that was the stupid and wrong answer. I know it’s annoying that I never offer suggestions, and I’m sorry. It’s not that I don’t care, it’s just too hard sometimes.

It’s why I don’t wear patterns, unless it’s something vintage—because someone else already “picked it” and therefore approved it. It’s why I can spend hours in front of the cereal aisle in the grocery store arguing with myself over the “right” one to pick. I know that one is backwards, that the “right” answer is whichever one I pick by virtue of it being the one I picked; it’s not predeterminedly right, it becomes right because I picked it. But knowing that doesn’t help me when I’m staring helplessly at a seemingly endless selection of flavored puffs. Seriously, how is a perfectionist ever supposed to make a decision or pull the trigger on something when there isn’t even a “perfect” answer? 

TAKEAWAY

I don’t try to fight it. If I really don’t have a preference, I don’t force one out of me. Sometimes I let myself run from the decision because it really is too much. I’m trying to get better at expressing preferences when I do actually have them, but that is a whole other kind of damage. 

SOMETHING NICE

Speaking of cereal, my cat (Kitty) loooooves oat milk. Not regular milk, not even cream or half & half. Only oat milk. She’ll hover and poke at you if you’re eating cereal with oat milk, because she loves lapping up the little sip that is left over at the bottom of the bowl. It’s super weird, but also the cutest.

So tell me . . . What’s YOUR damage?