How To Recover from a Bad Decision

Our lives are a series of choices.

Everyday life choices:

• What time should I set for my alarm?
• Will I exercise in the morning?
• Almond milk latte or jasmine tea?
• Jeans or leggings?
• Green smoothie or grilled cheese sandwich?
• Red or white wine?

Enormous life changing choices:

• Will I have children? 
• How many?
• What is my career focus?
• Do I quit my job to follow my dream?

Whether big hairy OMG-like events, or simply getting yourself presentable to walk out of the house in the morning, our lives are built one choice at a time.

Sometimes our choices result in exceptional outcomes!!  I love those days.

But sometimes our choices leave behind an aftermath of regret, frustration and loss.

My optimistic, coach oriented, reframe loving self would call those choices life lessons. My reality based sometimes truck driver mouthed alter ego would call those AFGO moments.  (Another F**!!ing Grow Opportunity)

Rj and I are recovering from an AFGO. 

There is quite a long story here, but I’ll keep it as short as I can without leaving out the fun parts.

We bought a 32 foot travel trailer that we tow behind a box truck transporting art/set up for Rj’s art shows.

We drove that colossal arrangement from Portland, Maine to Cape Cod to Rhode Island to Connecticut, to Colorado.  Then all the way back again.

We did six Fine Art Shows in a row.  Three were new to us (in Colorado).

One show consisted of two days of 100+ degree temperatures.

Three shows were at 9,000+ feet altitude (reminder – we live at sea level).

In between shows, I travelled to New York, North Carolina and Pennsylvania for my Thrive Global work.

And we ate the best BBQ in Kansas City on the way home.

We were hoping that the cost, effort, new art show venues and adventure travel would result in a cornucopia of riches, wildly amazing stories and no regrets for having left our new condo home in Portland during the summer.

Well….not so much. 

Riches?  We broke even.

Stories? Oh, we have stories – mostly about stress!

Regrets?  We heard it was the most beautiful summer they’ve had in Portland in years.  So there’s that.

But we would have never known the outcome unless we made the choice to try.  (Said while in my optimistic, coach oriented, reframe loving self mode).

UGH!  What have we done?  (Said while in my AFGO self mode).

Bad choices resulting in AFGOs are a fact of life.  We all have them.  We’ve all made them.  And for those who stretch themselves, take risks, jump off life cliffs and otherwise reach for big goals in life, AFGOs seem to be bigger, happen more often and get really annoying!

So how do you keep from drowning in the wallow of regret, hindsight over-analysis, beating yourself up for bad decisions and blaming the world for being so unfair?

You take the following three steps:

First:  You take a moment to cry, moan, swear, get pissed off, agonize, blame the world – do whatever you need to do to express your disappointment.  Within reason – don’t go hurting anyone!

We need to let go of our negative emotions before we jump into the positive reframe.  We need to acknowledge our feelings.  We need a moment to just be sad, angry, frustrated or regretful. 

Then we need to let those go because they will NOT help you to move forward.  Left to linger for too long, these feelings will simply fester, wear on you, create stress and cause you to shut down. 

Life only moves forward by picking ourselves up from a fall, patching ourselves up, wiping our tears, and figuring out what is next.

Second:  Reflect on the situation without emotion. 

Wipe those tears and runny nose and put on your stoic face.  Don’t let happy face come out yet though!  No positive affirmations or rah rah sessions.  We want logic, data, robot mode for a moment.

We run the business of our lives.  In the business world CEOs will reflect on performance and make decisions using data and logic. Time to act like the CEO of your life.

After our pity party, Rj and I sat down with our numbers.  And here’s what we found.

Our investment costs on trailer and truck are long term costs – and we’ll realize them eventually.

Colorado was not our target audience or target show level. Just not our scene.

We did a show in 100+ degree heat!  That fact alone impacted turn out for the show – and there is no changing Mother Nature’s mind, no matter how many bills need to be paid.

There was no way to know how things would turn out without trying.  That is the nature of the business.

We really didn’t suck – in fact, we had one record book show in that group!

While pulling the travel trailer was a bit stressful, having the travel trailer as our home away from home was a very good decision – financially and personally.

The BBQ in Kansas City was worth every cent we paid, every hour we waited in line, and every pound we gained.

Looking at our situation with a business lens allowed us to regain perspective, separate decision making from emotional baggage, and frankly, made us feel like real adults!

Lastly:  Make your next choice.

Use your data to drive what happens next.  What decisions will you make based on what you’ve learned?  What will you do again?  What won’t you do again?  How do you set yourself up for success?

In our case, we decided not to do the Colorado shows again next year and instead, stay closer to home and find some new shows here in New England.

This decision alone will create a new action plan.  We made another choice.  We’ll start our research.  We’ll move in a different direction.  We won’t let this one situation leave us reeling.  Onward and upward!

We will, however, go back to Kansas City for BBQ.

There are many of us out there who are quietly surviving their lives because we are afraid of making a bad choice.  And I get that.

Because failing is scary.

Losing makes us ‘less than’ others.

Taking big steps could mean taking a big fall.

Making a bad choice may set us back financially, socially or emotionally.

But as far as I’m concerned, surviving just isn’t enough. We aim to thrive at life.  And thriving requires taking that AFGO and using it as just that – a growth opportunity.

Are there others out there who have survived a bad choice?  Who’ve had AFGO and seen growth from that experience?  Misery loves company and stories create community – so please, comment and share your story.  There are many people reading this who’d love to hear from you.