“In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.” ― Theodore Roosevelt
There’s nothing more frustrating (and annoying) than sitting around waiting for people to make a decision.
Yes, there are certainly varying degrees of the decision making process – what to have for dinner is far less difficult than where you should invest your money.
But as Roosevelt said, doing nothing has it’s own ramifications.
For starters, progress can never be made without some kind of decision (good or bad) to move you forward. Decisions are actions and actions lead to change. But change will never occur if you rarely make choices or take chances.
The other thing that happens when people fail to make concrete decisions is more personal.
Let’s say you’ve become friendly with someone at work, or through your local church, gym or recreational center. As with any kind of relationship, you try to make plans to grab a bite to eat or a cup of coffee at a local café. Sounds normal so far, right?
But despite your best attempts at planning, the other person is often non-committal based on a host of reasons and excuses they ramble off repeatedly.
So what does that inability to make a decision do? It forces you to make the decision for them.
People often fail to realize that their inability to make a decision IS like making a decision. The message is clear folks – they assign little or no value to you or the relationship.
Give people the respect they deseve. Stop using avoidance tactics and excuses as a means to keep people around wondering.
Anne Bishop once said, “Everything has a price.” And while there are good reasons to take your time with some decisions in life, for the most part your answer often comes in the silence of doing nothing.
And many times doing nothing comes with a heavy price.
