255 - Why You Make Bad Decisions
Ever made a decision you regretted? Did you ask yourself, “what was I thinking?” Did you vow you’d never make a decision like that again, only to break that vow soon after?
Surprisingly, there’s quite a bit of scientific research behind the decision-making process, and what causes us to make bad ones versus good ones. A few things can influence our decisions:
Hunger. The Multiamory acronym HHALTDDS (Horny, Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired, Drinking, Drugs, Sick) describes states that can all affect your decision-making. To avoid hunger influencing your decisions, try to manage your hunger by carrying snacks and staying aware of it.
Decision fatigue. The same way your muscles get tired from exercising, your brain can get fatigued from making decisions. Being mindful about how much decision-making power you have throughout the day can help mitigate this, as can choosing a smaller number of options, and then narrowing them down until you have a choice.
Hot and cold states. A hot state refers to varying degrees of emotionally charged or physically challenging situations, such as being hungry or in pain, while a cold state is a calm, rational state that is less likely to influence decisions badly. It’s hard to realistically imagine how you react to things while in a hot state, so we have a couple ways of dealing with this situation. First, you can try to avoid the hot state by actively making the decision to avoid certain hot situations. You can also plan how to navigate the hot state and work out how to overcome it so you’re prepared when and if it occurs.
For in-depth discussion about some different studies on decision-making, be sure to listen to the full episode and let us know what you think!
Transcript
This document may contain small transcription errors. If you find one please let us know at info@multiamory.com and we will fix it ASAP.
Jase: On this episode of the Multiamory podcast, we're talking about decision making in relationships and in life, specifically we're going to be discussing some of the most common reason why as human beings we make bad decisions. What I mean by bad is decisions that we ourselves wouldn't want to make at another time. We're going to explore the research about those and look at ways that we can combat these forces and make better decisions in all areas of our lives.
To start out just to bring the human element here.
Dedeker: Oh, let's get rid of the robot element and bring in the human element.
Jase: Yes, yes.
Emily: Human.
Jase: Exactly.
Dedeker: Get out. Get out of here robots, shoo.
Emily: Are we human or are we dancer?
Jase: That's a good question.
Emily: Sorry, I have to always bring that up.
Jase: Have you ever had an experience where you've made a decision that, later looking back, you're like, "Why did I make that decision? That surprised me." Or even in the moment, surprised you you made that decision. I know I've definitely experienced that.
Dedeker: Never, I've only made perfect decisions in my life.
Jase: I thought we said no robots.
Dedeker: Oh, no.
Jase: Get out of here robot.
Dedeker: You found me out.
Emily: She's a Cylon.
Jase: Exactly.
Dedeker: Okay, I'm going to shuffle out.
Emily: Obviously.
Dedeker: Hey, I'm back. I'm back, y'all. Man, that was weird. That was like an android version of me just left the room as I was coming in. Do you all have any information about that?
Jase: No, but I'm glad we identified her and kicked her out.
Dedeker: Weird.
Emily: Exactly-
Dedeker: Well, I'm going to-
Emily: - we figured that out, wow.
Dedeker: - have to investigate that.
Jase: This is a human podcast.
Dedeker: Yes, I'm very human.
Jase: Well, I mean, yes, this is an incredibly common experience and fortunately for this episode is one that's been researched quite a bit as well.
Dedeker: Yes, definitely.
Emily: Thank goodness.
Dedeker: I made so many bad decisions or, not even just bad decisions, but surprising decisions for sure, especially when it comes to dating and relationships.
Jase: Yes, yes.
Emily: Yes.
Dedeker: Yes.
Emily: Maybe those are the ones that are definitely the surprising decisions or sometimes the decisions where you look back and you're like, "Why did I allow myself to keep going through this?" Or something along those lines, yes.
Dedeker: That's a common-
Jase: Absolutely, sometimes the surprising decision is the lack of a decision almost or the lack of taking an action.
Emily: Exactly.
Jase: Just to, I guess preface this, I don't know for sure how heavy we're going to get on this episode, but I do want to give a little bit of content warning that this type of stuff is very relevant to abuse situations and some traumatic situations like that, assault, things like that. I don't know for sure how heavy we're going to go into that, but just as a little warning to our listeners that that is very much related to this topic of decision making, especially in the last half of the episode is when we might get a little more into that, so just so you have a little heads up.
Dedeker: Right. Again, this bad decision making, it can run the gamut, right? From making a poor decision to stay in a bad relationship or an abusive relationship versus something as little as just making the poor decision to snap at your partner in a particular moment, things like that.
Jase: Right. Or these could be other decisions in your life too about, "Why did I choose to buy that thing when I couldn't afford it, or why did I choose to invest in that stock when I knew it was a bad idea?" Any number of things or, "Why did I yell at my boss when I know that that's a bad idea, right?" There's lots of--"
Dedeker: "Why did I sleep with this person when I knew that they were not a good match for me?"
Jase: You're right. Yes, totally.
Dedeker: Okay, so we're going to start out by talking about three factors that influence your ability to make sound decisions, okay? We're going to kick things off just with, first one out the gate, relatively easy one, we're going to start talking about hunger.
Jase: Yes?
Dedeker: Yes. If you listen to the show, you've definitely heard us mention the acronym HALT, using HALT or HALTDDS which is the Multiamory version, so using it as an acronym, just knowing--
Emily: We just start to add a couple of more letters onto that one.
Dedeker: Yes, it's what we like to do. For knowing one of the signs that maybe you're not in a great state to be discussing something or deciding something and so you should stop. Just a quick overview of that, the full breath Multiamory version is hungry, angry, lonely, tired, drinking or sick. Was that all of them?
Jase: Well, we also had drugs as another D.
Emily: There was another one, drinking, drugs.
Jase: And horny was at the beginning.
Dedeker: Right, okay.
Emily: Yes, HHALTDDS.
Jase: HHALTDDS.
Dedeker: Again, all of those states can influence your decision making capabilities, but we're just going to talk about hunger right now. Most of us know that when you're hungry, we tend to make less responsible choices about, first of all, what you eat like when you're hunger, you're going to be more likely to go for something that's fast or something that's high calorie or something that's sugary which is purely an evolutionary thing.
Emily: Not as nutritious.
Jase: Right.
Dedeker: That decision in itself is not like, "Oh, because you have no self control and you're a bad person." It's like that's purely an evolutionary thing is you're hungry, you're going to starve, you go for the thing that's going to pack the biggest punch, essentially quickest. We know that's something that happens, but it may surprise you to learn that research shows that hunger affects our decision making in completely unrelated areas to food.
Emily: Yes, so we love studies and science here on the Multiamory podcast, so we're going to throw one at you right away. There was this study by Benjamin T Vincent and Jordan Skrynka. How do you say that?
Jase: Skyrim.
Dedeker: Jordan Skyrim.
Emily: It looks like Skyrim with a K in it and an A, but here we are.
Jase: I assumed it was Skrynka, but who knows?
Emily: Skrynka, yes, I like that. The University of Dundee, Scotland which Dundee makes it sound like it should be in Australia to be from Scotland.
Jase: Crocodile Dundee, yes.
Emily: Exactly, yes. Okay, they asked variations on these questions to participants at different times, both when they were hungry, hadn't eaten in 10 hours and when they had just eaten recently. The questions, these variants were choosing between two options, one amount of something now or double that amount later. For example, 10 chocolate bars now or 20 chocolate bars in 35 days or £10 now or £20 in three months. They also did the same thing with song downloads.
Jase: You mean like currency pounds, right?
Emily: Yes, exactly. Pounds. Yes, yes. Pounds meaning or euros I guess is what it would be now because-- No, wait. Scotland is still--
Jase: Scotland is still on the pound, yes.
Dedeker: Scotland is still on the pound.
Emily: Lies, okay. Yes, so still pounds. They did the same thing with song downloads which is very silly to me, but whatever. Yes, maybe people love songs and downloading them in Scotland, I don't know, that's funny.
Jase: Yes. No, that one was so bonkers to me when I was reading about this study because all of them were 10 of the thing now or 20 of the thing at some later time and the amount later that it was would vary and, based on how people answered, is how they found what's the threshold for how long people are willing to wait. With the song downloads thing, I was like, "When was this study made, like 2005 or something?" I looked it up and it was 2017.
Emily: Yes, it's like, is this Napster? Really?
Jase: This was in 2017, so I'm like, "Okay, I guess maybe song downloads are still a thing in Scotland. I don't know."
Emily: Do people download songs? I guess, yes, maybe it feels like a Napster thing to me, but I guess it's not.
Jase: Right, so in the study basically, the thing that was consistent was always that it's 10 of something now or 20 of something later and it was always either chocolate bars, pounds, German-- German?
Dedeker: German?
Jase: Great British pounds.
Emily: German pounds.
Jase: The Great British Bake Off. Pounds or song downloads. Their reasoning being that all of these things were roughly equally valuable in terms of a chocolate bar is about a pound, a pound is a pound and a song download is a pound, so they're trying to look at things that are roughly equivalent even though they're in different areas. Anyway, what they would do is they would change. They would ask you a bunch of questions and the amount of time that they would ask you to wait would be different.
For example, it's like, "Do you want 10 chocolate bars now or 20 chocolate bars tomorrow?" It's only a one day wait and people would, in that case, tend to pick, they're like, "Yes, I'll take 20 chocolate bars tomorrow." If it were like, "You can get 10 chocolate bars now or 20 chocolate bars in a year." Almost no one picked the year because they're like, "I don't care in a year from now. I'll take the 10 chocolate bars now."
Basically, by asking lots of questions like that of different amounts of time, what they found was that for the chocolate bars, when people were not hungry, 35 days was the average amount of time people were more likely to say, "Yes, I'll wait. I'll wait the 35 days. Once you got longer than that, people started to go, "No, I'd rather take the 10 now." Then with money, it was three months. Basically, three months is how long I'm willing to wait to get twice as much money as I could get right now.
Dedeker: With song downloads, was it, "I'll just wait till Spotify's available in my country,"?
Dedeker: Right?
Emily: Exactly.
Jase: I didn't write down the amount of time that it was for song downloads, but it was similar to the money I think where it's like--
Dedeker: It's about three months or something?
Jase: Three months or something to download.
Emily: That's a long time though, even three months to me feels really long.
Jase: It is interesting. I do think the study's interesting because the dollar amounts are relatively low and I'd be curious how different this would be if they were higher. The point of this isn't to determine how long people were willing to wait, but to compare it to how long people are willing to wait when they're hungry.
Dedeker: Yes, when they were hungry and they were asked the same questions, basically, the amount of time that people were willing to wait for something like double chocolate bars, it dropped from 35 days to just three days.
Jase: If you're going to make me wait longer than three days, I won't do it.
Dedeker: I won't do it, yes.
Jase: Compared to 35.
Dedeker: Which makes sense when you're hungry. However, with the money, also it dropped. Initially when people weren't hungry and they're asked, "Do want £10 now or £20 in three months?" They're like, "Yes, sure." When they're hungry, then the amount of time that they're willing to wait drops from three months or 90 days to just 40 days.
Emily: That's amazing.
Dedeker: It's not really relevant-
Jase: To being hungry.
Dedeker: -to being hungry. Maybe you can buy more food with more money, but still.
Jase: I could use that $10 and go to McDonald's after this study.
Dedeker: Exactly. That is interesting. Now, going for a more immediate reward, it's not always a bad decision by default.
Jase: Like you were saying, if you were out in the wild and you're starving, you should eat right now and not wait.
Dedeker: You should eat the 10 chocolate bars right now. You should download all those songs right now. Who knows when you're going to be able to listen to them again?
Emily: It's so ridiculous.
Dedeker: It's not necessarily a bad decision, but in many cases, it can be maybe the less good decision or maybe not quite the better decision. When we expand this phenomenon to something like investing, let's say, or decisions about your relationship or who you're going to date or who you're going to sleep with, there can definitely be some negative consequences there. Same thing with our small decisions about whether or not to get into a fight about something right now with your partner or to say that little snappy insult or not.
Jase: Yes, like with the example of yelling at your boss or at your partner or something like that, if you're looking at it this way from this immediate gratification, it's like, yes, when you're angry, yelling at someone does feel good. It might not feel good very shortly after that, but right at that moment, that's why we do it because it's a release of that tension that we're feeling.
When you're hungry, we've all heard the term 'hangry' before, this is the studying showing exactly that same phenomenon of like, "I'm going to more likely to react to get the quick rewards of just being angry now even though I'm going to suffer consequences for it later most likely."
Emily: A solution to this is fairly self-explanatory, but it's to try to manage your hunger levels and stay aware of it. People like me, I know this is tough for me sometimes because I'm not always great at managing my hunger level and staying aware of it. I am pretty hypoglycemic and so, I do tend to have snacks with me, a GoMacro bar - I love their stuff - something to maintain your sugar level and not have it spiked too rapidly or go down too low. Just having emergency snacks with you if you want. Then definitely, if you have a big important decision coming up, then do grab a snack before you have to make that decision just because you never know if you're going to accidentally make a shittier decision just because you're fricking hungry.
Jase: I like the idea of, okay, we've got an appointment to talk to our financial planner or to choose an insurance plan at work or something, it's like, "Go have some food first and then go do that."
Emily: Yes, for sure.
Jase: Yes. Yes, definitely. Then also on the other side is just avoid those situations if you can, if you know that you're hungry right now. It's like, "Yes, I know this decision feels pressing, but actually I'm going to wait till after I've had some food."
Emily: Yes, I think you're good about that, Jase. You're like, "You know what? I've got to eat something," I feel like you're pretty good about that.
Dedeker: Jase, every two hours, you're like, "I need to eat something."
Jase: That's not as true actually. I find that to be less true now than it used to be since I started doing more of an intermittent fasting kind of thing in the mornings that I found that-
Emily: That's good.
Jase: - it's also made me feel less desperate when I am hungry. Usually.
Dedeker: He says as he looks at me.
Jase: Sometimes though it is just that--
Dedeker: Jase goes back and forth because sometimes he's also started doing this thing especially since we all went on that Buddhist retreat together where now I'll be super hungry and I'll know that Jase should be hungry because we're on the same eating schedule--
Emily: And then you're pissed that he isn't.
Dedeker: No, because then he--
Jase: Yes, she is pissed that I'm not.
Dedeker: It's because I'm like, "Okay, we need to get food. We really need to figure out something for food. What are we going to do for lunch?" Or whatever. Jase just turns to me with this most beatific expression and he's just like, "I don't have sense desires." "I got rid of them, I'm fine." It really is kind of a 50-50 with Jase though, whether I get you hangry or I get you ‘enlightened Buddhist don't have any sense desires, don't need to eat, I'll just air, thank you very much.’"
Jase: Oh boy, I'm filled by my enlightenment.
Dedeker: Here's the question though, here's the study though is when you're in your whole very zen, have-no-more-sense-desires-but-still-hungry state, would you still make the same poor decisions?
Emily: Good question.
Jase: That is an interesting question.
Dedeker: Is your hunger still going to trump whatever your brain says?
Jase: It is an interesting question and it's something that we're probably going to talk about later, but I could talk about it now too is when it comes to learning about how to make better decisions in adverse circumstances, one group that specializes in this is the military. Because we want people to be in very stressful situations and make the best decisions that they can or at least do the decisions we tell them to do.
In that case, specifically with special forces types, like Army Rangers or Navy Seals, like those, part of that training is being hungry specifically. It's not getting fed enough and not getting enough sleep while still having to execute drills and make decisions and things, specifically to learn how to be better at those while in those circumstances. I do wonder, if you were to do the same study with Buddhist monks or something who don't eat after noon, right, were you to--
Dedeker: We're also not getting a ton of food or a ton or sleep necessarily.
Jase: Right, it's be interesting to do a study-
Dedeker: Maybe slightly different stressful situations.
Jase: Yes, but I wonder if it would be a similar thing though of like you can train yourself to become better at that.
Dedeker: Build that muscle?
Jase: I don't know.
Emily: Maybe. Probably.
Jase: All of our researchers out there listening to the podcast, that's a cool study, you should do it or if it's already been done, let us know.
Dedeker: Next time you tell me you have no sense desires, I'm going to throw all the decisions at you.
Jase: No ask me, "Do you want this now?" Or, "Twice this in a certain amount of time?" and see--
Dedeker: I'll ask you about your song downloads.
Emily: Yes, see what happens and report back.
Jase: Okay, all right. Let's move on to the next major category of decision difficulty. This one is decision fatigue. This is something that we have mentioned to this before on the show, but we're going to dive a little bit deeper into it now. Decision fatigue has been studied a bunch. There's a ton of research on this. It essentially comes down to this. In the same way that our muscles get tired after exercising and eventually they can barely function, if you've ever gone on a really long hike and your legs just feel like jelly, you're just like, "I can't even take another step."
Emily: You're shaking afterwards.
Jase: Exactly. Exactly. Essentially, our decision-making part of our brain does the same thing. If we're hiking the hike of making a ton of decisions, it's just going to turn to jelly in the same way. We're going to lose our ability to make good decisions.
I find this interesting because it frustrates people. When you tell them this, I find that there's certain psychological phenomena that really piss people off to hear about because-- I don't know, I think it's somehow a threat to the idea that their mind is this perfect, impenetrable, unaffected by the world thing that I think people tend to have this illusion about the way their mind works that is not affected by their body chemicals or by many other things.
The good news to accepting this and understanding it is it means that you can take steps to prevent it or work around it or work with it. If I'm really pissed off that I can't fly and I just choose to deny the gravity exists, that's not going to be very helpful.
Emily: That would be very odd.
Jase: Versus understanding gravity and then being able to develop technologies to be able to fly. It's just accepting that this is a reality, doesn't mean you can't overcome it. Anyway, there's my little philosophical rant about that. This happens both on a large scale where we're worse at making decisions in the evening. As we've been tired through the day, hungry is also part of this, but just making decisions through the day, we're going to be less good at making decisions later.
This also translates to willpower. Essentially, willpower boils down to decision-making. Do you have the willpower to not have that drink or that cigarette? That's a decision you're making or do you have the willpower to keep going in this workout when you're really tired. That's a decision that you're making. Willpower and decision making effectively are the same thing.
Not only that, over the course of the day, it's going to be harder to make good decisions, but also just on the small scale. If you're making a bunch of decisions all in a row, that you're going to be less able to make decisions right after that. Just like with working out, you hike up that mountain and you feel like your legs can barely move, maybe an hour later, you're like, "I actually feel okay," maybe you couldn't do the same amount of hike again, but you can still go away as now and be pretty good. It's the same thing with your mind, it can do some short term recovery, but then also it needs that longer term recovery of sleeping. Not getting enough sleep also can cause a problem with that.
Emily: I am dealing with this right now because I'm severely jet-lagged so making any decision-- This whole thing can definitely apply to relationships. I know for myself, I just got home to a bunch of sag screeners, which is super fun and awesome, but because of that, I have them all in front of me and I say to my partner, "What do you want to watch?" He's like, "You pick," and I say, "I can't do this right now. I can't pick. I need someone else to make these decisions for me because honestly, I have no brain power or anything because I'm so sleep deprived and I'm taking money to the bank and trying to figure out finances and stuff right when I'm getting home.
All of those things, I have other things that I need to spend my little bit of ability to make decisions on. If you're in a moment, also, you may snap at your partner at the end of the day after you've been making a bunch of decisions throughout the day about where you want to go to eat, for example, or what kind of food you want from takeout or something along those lines, and it may cause you to pick the lowest common denominator of something unhealthy, perhaps or the same thing that you've had all the time, just simply because you're out of steam, out of the ability to make a good rational decision in that moment.
Dedeker: Yes, I've definitely run into this with, for instance, things like planning anything with a partner, honestly, whether it's planning a trip or planning a, "Hey, when are we going to go to the bank together to deal with this thing?" Or, "Hey, let's figure out when we're going to go to our kids schools to deal with this thing or that?"
Often, if you're both out of the house during the day working, making a bunch of decisions at your work and then you come home and then suddenly it has to be, "Okay, well, now we got to figure out all these logistics," that can be a time that's just rife and just ripe for it devolving into not good communication or picking on each other or snapping at each other, things like that, I think in part due to the whole decision fatigue thing.
I think this is also part of why the Gottman Institute, they really, really stress. When you and your partner reunite after work, or at the end of the day, that your first conversation together is a stress reducing conversation, rather than a stress producing conversation. Again, it's the kind of thing where it may not be intentional, but it's stress producing.
Maybe it's like, "Yes, we can plan a fun vacation, let's sit down and talk about it," but again, when you're in this decision fatigued state, it's going to be more likely to be stress producing, even if it's something as simple as let's pick out which movie to watch rather than stress reducing.
Emily: It's very stressful. No, I'm kidding, but yes.
Jase: Yes, absolutely. No, I heard a story that I think a lot of people can relate to in some extent of that thing of coming home after work and your partner being like, "Hey, what do you want to have for dinner?" "I don't know, what do you want to have?" "I don't know. What do you want to have?" Then just getting pissed off and angry and be like, "I don't fucking know, just pick something."
Dedeker: My eyes and my eyeballs are twitching a little bit right now.
Jase: This happens, this is real, yes.
Emily: Yes, I know, I was like, "Uh-oh."
Dedeker: Jase has never said that to me in that way, never that aggressively. I don't want people to worry.
Jase: Well, in this story that I heard it's that that goes on and she ends up snapping at her husband and it's like, "Just do something." He's like, "Okay, I'll cook us chicken or whatever it is." Then he makes it and then asks her a question before they're about to eat about like, "Oh, do you want a breast or a thigh or something?" And she just starts crying because even that little of a decision was just too much for her at that point of just being so tasked in decision making.
I have found that this one though, I've noticed this because Dedeker gets very frustrated when she's decision fatigued, in that example of wanting to pick where to eat. Then both of us are like, "Can you please make a decision?" "No, can you please make a decision?" I have noticed that when I have enough of the resources, that if I'm able to notice that, I say, "Hey, what do you want to eat?" The question I get back or the answer I get back is, "What do you think?" With no input at all, it's like, "Oh, I don't know."
Emily: Then you're like, "It's going to be me who's going to then make these decisions."
Jase: Exactly. It's this cue of, "Okay, I just need to toss out some decisions now." You two did this to me the other day when we were going to record.
Dedeker: Did we?
Jase: We had two episodes prepared last week and we're like, "Which of these are we going to record?"
Emily: Oh, yes.
Dedeker: Right when none of the three of us could make a decision, God.
Jase: Right. It's like, "Okay, which one--?"
Emily: Dedeker did it though.
Jase: No, actually, I did.
Dedeker: No, Jase did it.
Emily: Oh, I forgot, I forgot, that was you. Good job.
Jase: Dedeker just reported it to you, but both of you guys were like, "I don't know, either ones fine with me," or "What do you think?" I was just like, "Okay, someone has to pick this." It's like, "Okay, we're doing Dedeker's episode, we'll do mine this week." Definitely as I had just prepared this episode was like, "Oh yes, here's the situation where I realized--"
Emily: Well, then you should have had good answers for us already. You should have already known that this was a possibility, but I'm glad that you made the decision.
Jase: I did make the decision for you.
Emily: Well done, well done.
Dedeker: I think this is something that also comes up with swiping and using dating apps, the decision fatigue because you can start out at the top of the pile and be like, "This person is-- Oh, yes. Maybe I'll check out their-- I don't know about their Instagram, yada yada," decision, decision, decision. If anyone else is like me, I noticed that after I've swiped 20 people, that suddenly I become a lot more sloppy and you're just, "Yes, I know," a lot more snap judgments about people which is maybe not necessarily the most mindful way to be doing it.
Jase: The first few you'll read the little profile message, and you'll think about it and then after that, it's just whatever, swipe, swipe, swipe.
Dedeker: Also something even if you choose to be swiping in bed at the end of the day, when you're the most tired, you're maybe not going to make the best decisions.
Jase: Swiping at a bar after drinking is also a move that is very common.
Emily: Is it?
Jase: Yes, you're out with your friends and then it's just goes low in the conversation, you pull out your phone, you do a little swipe, swipe, swipe. This is a very common thing.
Emily: I have not been on a swiping dating app in, gosh, almost two years. It's been a long time, but I do remember that sometimes if you're in a bad mood or a sad mood, or you've been drinking or you're tired or whatever, that it's not the best time.
Jase: Well, not only that, but if you're killing time by swiping, that you're using up decision power that then if you have to make a decision after that that's a real decision, you've used up some of that.
Emily: Don't do it.
Jase: I think it's also worth being mindful. It's I know I'm going to go on this big hike. I got some free time, I'm going to go for a jog. Yes, that's going to make that hike harder because I'm going to be more tired.
Dedeker: Interesting. When it comes to combating decision fatigue, there's a few recurring themes that come up in all the advice out there. A lot of people mention, maybe it's better to make important decisions in the morning when your decision energy is the highest related to willpower, the thing that you usually put off first, whether it's exercising or meditating, or maybe a particular task that you keep putting off that it's better to do that earlier in the day when you have the most willpower and most decision energy essentially.
They're going to be things like planning decisions in advance, creating a routine for yourself, especially in the morning, things like planning meals ahead of time. I know that the times that I have actually done that it really does help, picking out your clothes beforehand. Now this one I was resistant to. My sister is super type A and for years she's always been the like, sets out her clothes the night before.
Emily: You are super type A, Dedeker.
Dedeker: No, my sister is even more type A. I know I'm type A, my sister's even more so.
Emily: Really?
Dedeker: Anyway, she did that for many years and I was really resistant to it. I was like, "Whatever I just get up and pick out the clothes I want to wear. I'm not going to take the time, I'm not going to sacrifice my precious evening, five minutes to setting up my clothes."
Then the times that I do do it, it makes such a huge difference. There's something tangible that I feel of where that decision's already made and it's that little bit of extra energy is there, or things setting your priorities for the next morning the night before.
Jase: I think these ones are interesting because they come up a lot in advice about this even though we just said your decision making power is going to be less in the evening.
Emily: Interesting, good point.
Jase: The idea here more has to do with while you're at work--
Emily: Giving yourself a leg up.
Jase: Well, it's like while you're at work and right after work, when you're particularly tired, it's like by the evening maybe hopefully, you've relaxed a little bit and recovered a little bit from those decisions, so that then you can make things like, "What am I going to wear tomorrow?" Also, when you're not in a time crunch to do that.
Dedeker: Right, that's the thing. It's also like making a decision about, "What am I going to wear tomorrow?" When you're not in the situation where the stake's the highest, where it's like, "If I don't decide what I'm going to wear, then I'm going to be 10 minutes late," or whatever.
Jase: I find the time I pick up my clothes beforehand is any time I'm getting up extra early or if I'm traveling, something where I know it's going to be a little bit more stressful of a morning, that's when I'll pick up clothes beforehand.
Emily: I do it sometimes before big days. When I was in Shanghai, for the first day we had to wear the Disney look. The day before we started everything, in my head as I was going to sleep, I was like, "Okay. I'm going to wear this dress, these shoes, this hat.
Dedeker: Hang on. What is the Disney look?
Emily: The Disney look? It's classic and timeless. That's basically no open-toed shoes, no really short skirts or really cleavage-- Whatever. Really cleavage, yes.
No, I don't know. Stuff like that. They just basically emphasize timelessness.
Dedeker: Just like professional, classic and cute?
Emily: Yes, exactly. I wore my Star Wars dress because--
Jase: Perfect. Disney owns ‘em, so you can wear ‘em.
Emily: Yes. There you go, exactly. Another way to combat indecisiveness and this decision fatigue is to not agonize over unimportant decisions like what brand of floss to buy. I buy floss all the time, which I need to be better about this year. That's a new year's resolution.
Dedeker: This is something that Jase I know struggles with on menus.
Jase: Right, at restaurants. It's just like, what to pick?
Emily: What's to eat.
Jase: Yes.
Emily: In this way, just kind of say, "Fuck it," and choose one, grab one, whatever. It doesn't really matter Colgate over Crest. No, it really doesn't. Also, try a system for making decisions to simplify them, like pick five, pick two, pick one method for deciding with a partner, for instance, what is this exactly. You pick five items and then the partner picks three, and then you decide on one.
Jase: They pick two and then you decide on one.
Dedeker: This is great if people are having a hard time making a decision about where to go to eat or what to eat.
Jase: Or what to do tonight.
Dedeker: Or what to do, yes. One of you comes up with five options. The other person picks two of those options and then the original person picks one from those two.
Emily: Cool. Yes, exactly.
Dedeker: It just helps to make it a collaborative process and also simplify the decision-making.
Emily: Totally.
Jase: Yes. We actually just did this one last night when we were trying to decide where to eat. When it was getting late and we were hungry, we were just like, "There's too many options." It's like, "Okay." Dedeker picked five and I picked two and then she picked one, and it helps. Or if you're by yourself, you can pick three and then choose one from those.
With the restaurant menu one, I just learned about this when researching this episode. I haven't gotten a chance to try it out yet, but it's like you go in, you see the menu. If it's overwhelming, you can just arbitrarily go, "Okay. These three sound pretty good." Then, "Okay, between these three, which one do I want?" It's not having to pick between a hundred things. It's just having to pick between three makes it just a little more manageable.
Dedeker: Remember that next time you go to the Cheesecake Factory and they drop that Bible-sized book in front of you.
Jase: Right.
Emily: Oh, Gosh. This Disney thing was just insane, so no way.
Jase: All right. We're going go on now to talking about hot states versus cold states, which is actually what inspired me to start putting this episode together in the first place. Before we get to that, we want to take a moment to talk about some ways that you can support this show to keep it going and get this information out there for free to as many people as possible. All right, are we ready to move on to hot and cold states?
Emily: Heck yes.
Jase: This one is a bit bigger and, honestly, a little harder to wrap your head around, in my opinion. Let's just start out by a real basic definition here, hot states versus cold states. Essentially, this terminology of cold state refers to when you're being rational, you're calm, you're not emotional, you're not hungry, you're not tired, you're in a good decision-making state. For example, it's while you're making new year's resolutions while sitting on your couch or while you're sitting here listening to this podcast. You're probably in more of a cold state.
A hot state refers to varying degrees of emotionally charged or physically challenging situations. This is like being hungry, being in pain, being angry, even being surprised or feeling ashamed or tired, or being excited or turned on. Any number of things. Basically, any time that we're not feeling rational when we're a little more emotionally charged is referred to as hot.
With the example of the new year's resolutions, you're in a cold state when you say, "Yes, I'm going to do this." Then, you're in a hot state when it's late at night, you're out with your friends and you decide to have a cigarette. That's the difference between the cold state and the hot state.
Dedeker: The thing is that we're extremely bad at predicting how we are going to act in a hot state.
Emily: This is very unfortunate.
Dedeker: Yes. We're also really bad at predicting how other people are going to act when they're in a hot state as well. This is sometimes also called the empathy gap. We covered that a little bit more in our episode 160, where we talked about cognitive biases in relationships.
Emily: So long ago.
Dedeker: I know.
Emily: Almost 100 episodes ago?
Jase: Yes.
Dedeker: Yes. Anyway, go and check that out. Here is an example of this. In The Journal of Social Issues, there was a study entitled Real Versus Imagined Gender Harassment. The researchers asked women to just imagine a situation where they're at a job interview, and that a middle-aged male interviewer asks the following questions. Do you have a boyfriend? Do people find you desirable? Do you think it's important for women to wear bras to work?
When the participants imagined the situation, many women said that they would speak up, they would walk out, they would get angry, they would report the interviewer, things like that. A whole 68% said that they would not answer at least one of those three questions, that they would just refuse to answer.
Emily: Yes. Then, they recreated the situation in real life for a study by posting a job interview or just posting a job out there and including those questions in the interview. This control group also had equally unrelated but non-sexist questions. There was one group with sexist questions and one with non-sexist questions.
Jase: Still equally, weirdly non sequitur.
Emily: Unrelated. Yes, it's like, "What?"
Jase: Instead of, "Do you have a boyfriend?" Would be like, "Do you have a close friend?"
Emily: Do you have a dog?
Jase: "Do you have a dog?" Yes, exactly. It's like, "Do you have a favorite movie?"
Emily: Do you have a pet? Exactly.
Jase: Right.
Emily: We just want to do a quick side note on ethics. The study was closely monitored. There was no physical contact besides an initial handshake. The interviews were videotaped. The women were debriefed afterwards and they were given the option to have the results and video destroyed. This was an ethical study, which is great because I definitely would feel very awkward if someone asked me if I was desirable in an interview. That's pretty intense.
Just to make sure that I'm correct here, Jase, these interviews were done as though these women went to an interview and it was just a study, but they didn't necessarily know that it was a study?
Jase: Right. They thought that it was real job interview.
Emily: They thought that they were actually interviewing something.
Jase: Yes.
Emily: I see, but then they were told afterwards.
Jase: Right. That's why it was a tricky ethical thing because in order to get a study of this, they had to make it so that the women actually believed it was a real job interview, because if you go in knowing it's a study, that totally changes the stakes.
Emily: Of course.
Jase: It's not a job, it's not a stake, now it's like, "I'm in a study. Of course I'm going to say something."
Emily: Yes, of course I'm going to say like, "This is fucked-up." They found that none of the women actually did what the other women had predicted, which I think makes perfect sense. I don't even know if it was a really high-stakes job interview. Even if somebody asked me if I was desirable--
Jase: It was for an assistant position.
Dedeker: But it stakes, though.
Jase: But you need a job.
Emily: Interviews are intense.
Jase: Yes.
Emily: Absolutely, yes. You want to put your best foot forward at an interview, so it completely makes sense. Very few people brought it up at all and they did it in a really polite way. They might bring up in a very polite way, like, "I don't know if I want to answer that question."
Jase: No, they didn't even say that.
Emily: They didn't even say that?
Jase: No.
Emily: They were just like--
Jase: Most of them it was like, "Oh, why is that relevant to the job?" Or something like that, not even that direct. Or most would wait until after the interview was over and then when they had the chance to ask questions, "Earlier, you asked this question about me having a boyfriend. Why did you ask that? That didn't seem relevant to the job interview." Maybe they would ask at the end.
Emily: Interesting. Essentially, they found that 100% of the women answered all three questions, all three of the non-relevant potentially sexist questions. Then in the testing afterwards, the prevailing emotion that this woman had was fear and not anger, which again, makes perfect sense to me because I tend to get fearful over something rather than angry in a lot of instances like this, like maybe in interview typesetting for sure.
Dedeker: I think honestly a lot of people listening to this and especially a lot of people who maybe have this experience, it makes 100% sense. I think this is why the Me Too Movement was so revolutionary, is because it was like, “Yes, we can all relate to this sense of these shitty things happen that are maybe ‘small’, but you just deal with it because it's more important to just be able to deal with it and move on with the rest of your day, or get the job, or have a smooth working environment rather than create a dust-up over something like that."
I've been in this situation before especially on jobs, especially in the entertainment industry. Someone in a position of power does something inappropriate or asked an inappropriate question and you can't refuse or I can't refuse to answer the question or-
Jase: Or it doesn't feel like you can.
Dedeker: -it doesn't feel like you can.
Emily: Yes, it doesn't feel like you can.
Jase: I actually had an audition for a film where they asked me about my religion. In my head, I'm like, "You are very much not allowed to ask me that." This was a union gig too. It's like, "This is actually against a lot of rules. You cannot ask me this." I didn't end up saying that. I answered them, anyway, but internally, my mind was screaming at me like, "No, call them out on this," and then it didn't and it is that weird. Even in something like that that’s very low stakes. This wasn't a huge Steven Spielberg film or anything, it’s some independent film, but still, my mind was like, "No, you're going to do that."
Dedeker: This becomes a real problem when we start to blame victims of harassment or abuse for their inaction or for not speaking up or things like that because we incorrectly assess what we would have done in that situation because we're so bad at being able to guess what we would do in a hot state. When you're not in the state of feeling fearful or feeling like a potential job is on the line, it's easy for you to say, "Well, fuck that. I would have said something or I would have thrown my resume in his face and walked out."
It's very easy for you to say that versus when you're in the actual state. This happens all the time. It's 100% the empathy gap. Here's the even more interesting part is that even after you personally have an experience in a hot state, once you're cool again, you still can't predict how you're going to act in a hot state. In fact, according to research, we become even worse at it.
Jase: This one is nuts and is hard to wrap your head around. This one I have to read over multiple times. There’ve been a number of studies, but I'm going to try to give one example here. This is in a study called enduring pain for money right down on the scene.
Dedeker: Great, it’s capitalism.
Emily: That's interesting.
Jase: In this study, they did a study that involved holding your hand in a bucket of ice water for a period of time either while trying to destruct yourself from the pain by thinking about something else or while focusing on it and really being attentive to the pain. Then they asked them afterward, they got a sense of how does this feel. Then afterward, after they’d had a second to, I was going to say cool down, but I guess warm back up, then they would ask them, "How long would you be willing to hold your hand in that water in exchange for X amount of money?" Basically, the longer you hold your hand in this water, the more money you'll get from this study.
What they found was that people surprisingly would overestimate how long they could keep their hand in that water even though they had just done it. That it’s like once you've gotten over that, once you're not in that pain, it's like, "Yes. I think I could go twice as long as I did just then. That’d probably be fine.” That it’s like almost immediately we forget. It's like that thing of doing a really painful intense workout and just being like, "I'm never going to be able to do this again. This is awful. I hate this. I'm never going to do it." Then 10 minutes after you're done, you're like, "That's okay. Yes, I could do that again." It’s that kind of thing.
Then they came back three weeks later and they asked them again, "How long would you be willing to hold your hand in this water for more money?" What they found here was that the group who tried to destruct themselves from the pain, at that time, reported the ice water as being more painful and right afterward, were like, "No, I don't think I could it for a very long." But three weeks later, they were the most confident at saying, "Yes, sure. That shouldn't be so bad. I'll put my hand in the water for that money." Whereas the group who focused on it, actually, at that time reported it as being less painful, but then three weeks later, were less willing to hold their hand in the water for money.
Emily: That's fascinating.
Jase: It's super fascinating. It's just mind boggling to think about.
Emily: Yes. You have to ask what gives here because this is very strange, but this and many other studies show us that human beings are really incapable of remembering pain. Instead, we remember things like the event that caused the pain, maybe the beginning, or the peak, or the end of the pain, maybe just the fact that it happened but not really what the pain felt like and the intense emotion behind it. In this case, the group that destructed themselves was only experiencing the emotional part since they weren't focusing on that pain itself. Therefore, they were less likely to remember how painful it was.
They were given a thing to focus on, being the emotion or the destruction, which meant that the pain itself was more difficult for them to remember. This also happens with other emotional experiences like the empathy gap that we mentioned earlier.
Dedeker: An example of this, maybe something like in the heat of the moment when you're physically aroused and maybe you're about to have sex with somebody, maybe you make the decision not to use a condom when maybe you otherwise would have. Then afterwards, then you think like, "Gosh. Okay, that was a mistake. I can't do that again. Next time, I'm going to wear a condom." Then you make the same mistake again because then you're in this hot state of being aroused and you end up making this poor decision again or the decision you didn't want to make essentially because of being in that hot state. So again--
Jase: That you’re actually more likely to think you'll make a better decision next time because you're like, "I've experienced it once. I'll definitely make a better decision this time," and then you don't. We actually become even worse.
Emily: You've experienced and you've made a bad decision once, so you'll probably do it again less likely.
Dedeker: Or a situation like someone makes a sexist comment or a racist comment at work and you don't say anything maybe because in that moment you're afraid or a little intimated or a little nervous to speak up about it. Then later on, you think, "Well, next time I can speak up for sure. If that happens again, I'll be able to speak up." But then it happens again, you're in that hot state again, you're fearful again and then you still don't speak up again. That's how we can end up in these loops of either behavior not changing or making not the best decision for a particular moment because we're so bad at predicting how it's actually going to feel to make that decision when we're in the hot state.
Jase: It’s the counterintuitive thing. It's like having experienced it and seeing what we did, doesn't now make us immune to that effect that then, “Next time I'll make a logical decision." That rather instead, it's like, if you were in that situation and made one decision, the next time unless you take steps to make sure something different is going to happen, you'll probably do the same thing again. That's counterintuitive, but can actually be really helpful if you know that that's going to happen and then can take steps.
Dedeker: Once you can recognize it, but if you can't, then it's just most likely going to keep happening. I see this all the time with clients. I blame it on clients, but let's be honest, we've all been there and I've been here too, which is constantly coming back to the same bad relationship or getting back together with the same ex that's really not a good match for you. Things like, "Well, we're just going to meet up and talk,” or, “We’re going to meet up and get a drink,” and that's going to be it. Then they get back together and it's great for a couple of weeks, and then it's terrible again and then it's like, "No, I can't be with this person anymore. It's got to end. It's got to end."
Then like, "Well, we're going to meet up again just to get drinks, just to talk over things.” I think it's that same thing of you get around with this person and then the feelings come up. Maybe it's the arousal because you're still attracted to each other or maybe it's the anger or sadness or all the emotions, all the baggage, and stuff from the relationship comes up and you're just not good at predicting how your decision-making is going to be when you're in that state.
You could say ahead of time, "No, there's no way I'm going to sleep with that person again. There's no way." Then you get into that state and then it's like, "Well, here we are, tumbling into bed again. That's right, whoops.”
Jase: Whoops.
Dedeker: Did a guest say this? I feel a guest said this to us once. Maybe it was Kathy Labriola. I forget, but just the decision to stay friends after the end of the relationship often doesn't do much except to make the sex hotter.
Jase: You right. Someone did say that.
Dedeker: Yes, someone told us that. That's a blank statement. Of course, people become friends with their exes definitely, but when you're still in that vulnerable fragile state when the relationship is ending and there's a lot of feels, that's probably the time where, again, actually becoming friends, has that effect that it just makes the sex hotter for a little while.
Jase: We understand now, hopefully, about-
-hot and cold states, and what can we do about it. We've got a couple of techniques that you can try. The first one is to find ways to avoid the hot state. A simple example would be in Alcoholics Anonymous. As part of that process, they don't encourage you to go to bars and smell the alcohol. The idea is stay out of that hot situation so that you can remain in more of a cold state and make better decisions as much as possible. Don't make things harder for yourself. Or in the example--
Emily: This is the opposite of--
Jase: Yes.
Emily: Sorry. This is the opposite of last week when they were talking about exposure therapy and in this instance it’s-
Dedeker: Well that was for dealing with your fears.
Emily: -getting away from it.
Dedeker: Yes, that’s for dealing with your fears and building resiliency.
Emily: Yes, that's true.
Jase: Another example of this would be if you're trying to not eat sweets, don't have them in your house or don't have them at your desk at work or whatever because every time you see them, you're having to make a decision or you're maybe you're hungry and you're just like, "Okay, fuck it, I'll do it." Same like, once you've paid off your credit cards and you don't want to get back into credit card debt, cut them up. You can always still get one again if you had to for some reason, but-
Emily: But don’t.
Jase: -cut it up. Delete it off saved credit cards on your computer so it’s not so easy. Remove some of the ease of making the bad decisions or like in the example Dedeker gave of, you’re all aroused and in this hot situation and so you don't use protection. Maybe it's because you didn't have any with you, and then next time you go back, you still don't have any with you.
Dedeker: It's even harder to pull yourself away from that aroused state to go down to the gas station to buy condoms or whatever.
Jase: Instead, take steps in advance, have them with you or take steps in advance to just not be alone with that person if you know that they're not going to be willing to use protection with you because you know that your resolve is going to be weaker around them if that's the decision that's important to you. Take proactive steps to avoid the difficulty in making that decision in a hot state or the hot state at all.
Emily: Another way is to plan how you'll overcome the hot state. Rehearse it, be like you're in a play or something. Yes. Okay, there's a book out there called Nerve by Taylor Clark and he discusses two groups of people who are routinely required to make smart decisions. We talked about this a little beforehand about firefighters and Navy SEALs. The way that they overcome stressful circumstances is through experience and rehearsal.
Here's a quote from this book. “When a fire commander sees a building with a billboard affixed," affixed, not as fixed, that's that word. “Affixed to the side go up in flames.” So, “When they see a building with a billboard affixed to the side go up in flames for example, experience immediately reminds him of the times he's seen billboards suddenly plummet to the ground below and he gives orders to clear out the area without having to think."
Interesting. It's like, one thing happens and then immediately he just knows what to do in that moment. Like a Navy SEAL or a Firefighter, if this were to happen, then yes, they already have the experience and the rehearsal in their mind, just to make a split second decision. Yes, again, in these moments, you can potentially rehearse for something even like what Dedeker said, just put a condom in your wallet or something or have it on hand. Because if you do happen to be in a circumstance where you're going to potentially be getting frisky with someone, then just have the protection, have it.
Jase: Unfortunately, I think some of this rehearsal thing is a little difficult if you haven't--
Emily: Yes, in certain moments. You're not going to be able to rehearse for a car crash, which God forbid.
Jase: Even the example of being sexually aroused or something, like with this firefighter one, it's because these firefighters have been there and actually seen it. They've been in that stressful situation and over time have learned to make better decisions in that stressful situation. Same thing I was talking about before with the Navy SEALs, or with the Army Rangers, or things like that.
That in addition to doing a lot of training in states of being hungry or being sleep deprived, they would also before missions will do the mission over and over again for weeks in full scale replicas with people playing the other parts against them, playing out all the different ways it could go wrong, so that in the moment when those things happen, there's more of a chance that their mind’s going to go, "Oh, yes. I've been here, I know what to do."
I think that this is where-- To take it back to relationships, and sex, and things like that, it’s where things like having your elevator pitch version of your STI status comes from. Or your coming up with very concise and firm policies for yourself about your sexual health for example, so that in that state where you're not as good at making decisions, there's a little more hope that you'll come back to, "Oh, yes, okay, I've practiced going through this speech. I'll just jump into it and do it." Or, “This falls either within or without these rules that I've made for myself,” so hopefully that can help you a little bit. It's doing to prepare for making those decisions easier when you're in the moments so you're not having to do as much decision making.
Emily: Even things like an elevator pitch for your relationship structure. Because I've-
Jase: That’s a good one.
Emily: -definitely been in situations, yes, where somebody-- or even about the podcast because sometimes-
-talking about our various podcasts, if I were to say it in a certain way, they might be like, "Okay, that's weird,” or something. But if you come up with a scenario or a thing to say already then it can be much easier in those moments. Especially when you're perhaps caught off guard with somebody asking you a question like, "What kind of relationship structure are you in?" or, “Wait, what about polyamory?" or something along those lines, then you already have a predetermined thing to speak about.
Jase: Another example of this comes from a 1994 study so a little bit older, by Ron. S. Gold, who did a study about teaching gay men about the importance of condom use. In one group, basically all of the men in the study had had unprotected anal sex at some point in the past. In one group, they were educated about condom use by looking at educational posters in a basically a cold state type of teaching. Treated very logically, and it's like, "Yes, you should do this."
Then in the other group, they had them vividly recall, as vividly as possible, recall a sexual encounter where they didn't use a condom, and then try to evaluate as they're remembering this encounter, evaluate their motivation for doing that. Then to question whether that was good reasoning or not, whether that motivation was justified.
What they found is that the men who vividly imagined that situation tried to recreate more of that hot state, while thinking through their decision, were significantly by a very large margin, much less likely to have unprotected anal sex again in the future. That's an example of preparing yourself in that hot state, rather than just thinking like, "Oh, now that I'm all cool and logical, yes, I'll be fine next time."
Dedeker: Once they could recreate putting themselves almost in that hot state or remembering that hot state and then from that point of view, evaluating, “Why did I make that decision?” or, “What were my reasons for that decision?” and then--
Jase: And, “Why are those maybe not good reasons?”
Dedeker: Right, so almost like inviting the logical brain into the scene as you're re-experiencing what happened?
Jase: It's like priming the counterargument because then when your hot brain is making the argument of, "But it's fine because it's hot or whatever," that that other part of your brain has rehearsed like, "Oh, yes, yes, but I've heard this one before and the answer was no," or whatever it is.
Dedeker: Again, it's going to depend on the scenario but there's a number of different strategies for being able to do this for yourself. Something like that, actively imagining different scenarios, maybe scenarios that you have been in. It could be something very similar to this actually of a time that you regretted not using a condom when you should have, calling to mind vividly that experience and evaluating what you would actually want to do next time. Mentally rehearsing what you'd want to do or what you'd want to say.
Things like pre-planning some standard responses to a sexist comment or a racist comment, an ableist comment that comes your way or that you overhear at work or something like that. Something that you'll feel safe saying or using even if it's just something as simple as, "Wow, I don't think that's really appropriate." Because I think people feel big pressure to like have a super snappy comeback to somebody, depending on what they say and that doesn't necessarily have to be the case.
It can help to pre-plan, just the standard response that you know you have under your belt, and that you have ready, and that you'll feel safe using.
Jase: It's like often at work. You might think, "Oh, I got this great snappy comeback," but you're at work or you're in a public place and at the moment, it's like, "Ooh, that might be risky to say. This person might yell at me, they might cause trouble for me." It's coming up with a response you actually do feel like you'd feel comfortable using, is part of the challenge.
Dedeker: Again, things like that, having condoms with you before going into a potential sexual situation or just having something with you to help preclude you from making poor decisions in that hot state. Something like practicing your elevator pitch about sexual health, or like Emily was saying about your relationship structure. Or even something like you can recall in detail a recent fight that you had with a partner and recall it vividly in detail.
Think about-
-the moments that cued you in to like, "Oh, this is when I really got angry, when I saw my partner roll their eyes, and then that's when I snapped back with such and such comment, and then that's when they slammed the door." Then from that state of recalling that hot state, recalling how you might want to have behaved differently, how you could have stopped it from escalating, things like that.
Jase: Okay, so let's review, shall we?
Emily: Please.
Jase: The first decision-making challenge that we talked about is hunger. That one, luckily, quite simple and the solution is either don't make decisions when you are hungry or try to manage your hunger levels.
Emily: Stop being hungry.
Jase: Yes, stop being as hungry.
Dedeker: Yes.
Jase: Next one is decision fatigue. Put your big decisions earlier in the day. Don't waste a lot of energy on unimportant decisions when you can. Then also be mindful of making a lot of decisions in a row is challenging. If you can space them out, that can also help. Then lastly, is hot versus cold states, which we just talked about a bunch but basically is just be understanding and sympathetic to the you that's in hot states as well as the other people that's in a hot state. That even something like surprise is a hot state.
That's something that-- When you think about at work, like someone's sexist comment or something, it's like you might actually kind of be surprised like, "Jeez, I'm shocked someone even said something like that.” That even that emotion of surprise is enough to throw you into that hot state where you're not going to make the decision that you might think you would make in a cool and logical state. Just be really sympathetic to that both in yourself and other people. Then do what you can to either avoid those or to plan ahead and really get yourself in a place where it's easier to make better decisions even when you are in that hot state.
Emily: Our bonus episode is going to be even more tools on effective decision-making. If you couldn't get enough from this episode, then check out our bonus episode only for patrons.