During our core workshops, we often warn participants about eight common “decision traps” that can keep us stuck in limiting beliefs and prevent us from broadening our perspective and making choices that bring us more of what we want in life (and less of what we don’t).
- The anchoring trap leads us to give disproportionate weight to the first information we receive.
- The status quo trap biases us towards keeping things as they are, even when we know better alternatives exist.
- The sunk-cost trap inclines us to perpetuate mistakes of the past in the belief that our previous efforts will have been wasted if we don’t persist.
- The confirming-evidence trap leads us to seek out information that supports an existing belief and to discount information that contradicts it.
- The framing trap occurs when we misunderstand the true nature of a problem and proceed from a false premise.
- The overconfidence trap makes us overestimate the accuracy of our assumptions.
- The prudence trap makes us overcautious when predicting the outcomes of uncertain events.
- The recallability trap prompts us to give undue weight to recent, dramatic events.
These traps can prevent you from seeing things in perspective as they truly are and making wise choices that help you get the outcomes you want in life.
So as you consider your options, protect yourself from these traps by asking, “Why do I think this?”
When you explore your own assumptions and the underlying reasons for your beliefs – and seek out diverse perspectives to expand your understanding – it becomes so much easier to recognize your own thought distortions and correct errors in judgment that could result in choices that don’t bring the joy and fulfillment you desire.