Hindsight may be a little less forgiving than we think it is.

I don't know if I have told you this yet but my absolute favorite time of the day is early mornings and during the work week, I actually look forward to my morning commute. Before you think I am crazy, let me tell you why. Over the last few months, I have gotten into the habit of listening to podcasts each morning while enjoying my pumpkin flavor coffee (even though pumpkin season is officially over). Aside from the work week, mornings have always been my favorite because the day is still so young and fresh which is the perfect time for self-reflection. I do best in the morning. The world is quiet and there is so much opportunity ahead. By the afternoon, I'm a fried zombie who wants to generally curl into a hole and workout any frustrations I have caused myself throughout the day or annoyances I have encountered. But, that's besides the point. The point is, in order to try to have a successful and optimistic day, I have created a morning routine during the work week that sets me up with a clear and reflective mind which brings me to today's post.

I recently stumbled upon the podcast "The Good Life Project" by Jonathan Fields (definitely check it out!). This morning he was discussing hindsight and "Outcome Bias" which is a part of the theory of Cognitive Biases. Cognitive Biases are systematic errors and factors that impact our decision making abilities, memory, and reasoning. Outcome Bias specifically focuses on our reflection of a decision we made in the past and judge it based on the outcome we have in the present moment and evaluate that decision as "bad" or "good" rather than reflecting on the resources and factors we had at that time that led us to that decision. This often happens with jobs, relationships, education, etc. We say to ourselves often "If I knew then what I know now, I would've done A, B, C differently". This belief system often causes frustration within ourselves and resentment to a degree. The reality of the situation though is that as human beings, when we are in the position to make an important decision, we can only use the information we have at hand, our deductive reasoning abilities, and faith. Simultaneously though, there are circumstances that include warning signs telling us to steer away from a decision but we ignore them and make the less favorable move. In those moments, yea, we may have been able to done a better job but as a result, we know better for next time and learn and grow.

This podcast really resonated with me for more reasons than I can express. There have been more times than I can count that I have looked back on choices I have made and paths I had gone down and really regretted my decisions to the point that I became shameful and resentful towards myself. In these moments, I feel angry looking back because I believe I should have known better based on a variety of things I thought I should have known or listened to. Often, when we look back on things, it is with new knowledge, experience, and perspective. In the moments when we are smack dab in the middle of needing to make a decision or choice, we can only work with what we have and in some cases, feedback from others. For me, not feeling anger and resentment towards myself for past choices I am not proud of or ways I feel like I should have known better or done better is something that has taken years for me to work through. In hearing further exploration of the concept of "outcome bias", I was able to to understand a more realistic and forgiving perspective on how as human beings, we do the best we can with what we have. We often make decisions from a hopeful standpoint and try to avoid thinking of what can go wrong. We take many situations and people at face value because, well, that really is a majority of what we have to work with and then, we learn as we go.

Considering how unique we are as people from our genetics to our upbringings, values, experiences, personality traits, cultures, etc., it is impossible to be able to evaluate or pass judgement on why others make the decisions they do and the factors that impact those decisions. For ourselves, we need to have the same level of understanding. Who I was 15 years ago, the factors impacting my life at that time, my level of brain development, personal exploration, coping techniques, my support system, etc. all play into my ability to have made the best decision I could at that time. Even now, a decision I make today could be looked at more critically 5 years from now based on the knowledge I will have at that time and the knowledge I have in this moment that is equipping me to make the decision I may.

We tend to hope that the decisions we make are going to be the best ones but in all fairness, life isn't that "clean cut". Its just unrealistic to think we have all the answers in order to make the "right decision" and avoid what we believe to be the "wrong decision". We make the best decision we can. Even with being hopeful, using deductive reasoning and receiving feedback from others, we can potentially go against the decision that is in our best interest in order to hold on to some ideal surrounding the circumstance. For example, warning signs about a job or relationship. We see them, acknowledge them, but choose to ignore them in hope that something will change or a presenting issue may be inaccurate. In those moments, we gain the biggest learning experience because even in that decision, we knew there was a better option but we needed to make the choice we did in order to truly and effectively gain the knowledge we needed to from that situation. Just like when some situations keep happening in our life over and over, it may just mean there is a lesson you need to learn or grow from but you haven't been able to acknowledge it or you're not ready to truly gain the benefit of what that lesson has to teach.

So, all in all, today's podcast taught me how to forgive myself a little bit more and not be so hard on myself. It taught me to let go of the shame I have from the past and how unrealistic the standards may be that I have held myself to. It showed me that although I am in a position now that has more clarity based on what I had learned experiencing what I did and going down a specific path, I did the best I could with what I had. Knowing that gives me some additional tools and knowledge to make better decisions in the future and approach every day as a new opportunity to do so. We do not have all the answers and in life we may be a little bit behind when it comes to being about to make the best predictions for our lives but its taking those experiences and allowing it to help us grow that contributes to our ability to keep heading down the path we want for ourselves.