Running through the historic Brandenburg gate I see roughly 300 meters to go for the finish line of the Berlin Marathon and little over a minute on my watch. The immediate thought in my head, it’s fine even if I finish in a little over 4 hours. Won’t really change the world and I should be happy as this is the closest I have ever come to a sub-4 in my last 10 full marathons. As I am slowly convincing myself to take it easy, there is another very emotional voice which urges me to give it my all for this one last minute and see what happens…

But more than my marathon timing this post is about decision making. I think there are always these two voices in our head: (i) the wise/analytical thinker which urges us to think logically and consider all the pros and cons before making a decision and (ii) the impulsive/emotional which is driven by our sub-conscious. If you observe carefully you will be able to identify both these voices. I keep thinking about how we can best use them in our decision making. I don’t think there is an easy framework (or black and white solution) to solve this and I don’t claim to have one. Using health as an example I am sharing my thoughts on how we could use these voices in our decision making.

Health is one thing which we all want to prioritize on a daily basis. Let’s say we plan our day/week at a time when we have more mental space (wise voice overpowers). Most of us will include daily exercise/fitness time in the schedule. However, as the day progresses only few of us are able to stay true to the prioritization. Once the work, family and other responsibilities take over we tend to forget the wise voice and follow the impulse. Lower mental space/stress makes us go towards our instinctive behavior. For example, you made that decision to go for the evening run/walk each day. But there is an upcoming leadership review and therefore you decide to prioritize the work today (I will go for the run tomorrow, nothing changes in a day), then the next day something else comes up and our impulsive self is able to talk us out of the decision we made with our wise/logical self. And then slowly the habit which was starting to build, breaks. I am not saying that the work isn’t important but what I am saying is that work (or upcoming review) slowly becomes an excuse for us to deprioritize health. In my opinion, this happens since our mental training through our formative years has been to prioritize career/work over other things. Unless we make a conscious and deliberate choice to change this pattern, we will most likely falter.

I think it is ultimately down to the habits/systems we build for ourselves. If you have made physical and mental fitness part of your daily routine just like brushing your teeth or sleeping, then emotions will play a limited role. No matter how busy your schedule, you will find a way to do what needs to be done. This is when our “wise” and “impulse” selves are in harmony. In my opinion this is the state each one of us should aim to reach with respect to our priorities. For the rest of the stuff I think it is fine to let emotions run the show once in a while. After all we are humans not robots!

Getting back to the final stages of the Berlin marathon. Running through the Brandenburg gate that September day in 2019 was one such time I didn’t listen to the logical/wise voice. I went with my emotions and ran for my life for that last one minute. Not really caring about the time but just wanting to give my best. That day I realized that sometimes it’s wise to go with the flow and let the emotions take over. I finished 3:59:59.