Bad at decisions

I have been in Ghana with my family for just over a week.

Beautiful as always. But it has also been relentless.

If you know Ghana, you know what I mean. There is a warmth here that pulls you in every direction at once. Family. Friends. Business conversations that appear from nowhere. Invitations. Waakye dates. Opportunities. Obligations dressed up as opportunities. All of it arriving daily, generously, and without apology.

And underneath all of it for us, two small children who need to feel that wherever they are, home travels with them.

That became my North Star for this trip. I didn’t have to think very hard about it.

Every morning I wake up knowing what I am optimising for. Not the meetings. Not the deals that Accra always seems to have waiting. The answer to every decision this week has started from the same place.

Does this keep my family settled and stable?

If yes, we consider it. If no, we don’t. And that single question has made every other decision faster, cleaner, and much cheaper emotionally.

That is what the concept of a North Star actually does.

It does not limit your options. It prices them correctly.

And here is something most people wait too long to act on.

Your North Star does not need to be perfect to work.

It does not need to be a fully formed vision with a ten year plan attached to it. Sometimes it is as simple as deciding this is going to be a slower day. That one thought, that one axis, changes how you experience every hour that follows. It gives you something to return to when the noise arrives. Which it always does.

A rough North Star beats no North Star every single time. Because even an imperfect commitment gives you a filter. And a filter is all a decision ever really needs.

Most people navigate their careers, their businesses, and their lives without one. Not a long-term one. Not even a seasonal one.

This is not about ambition. A North Star forces you to turn many priorities into one.
And then commit to it hard enough to disappoint other things. And most people are not ready to do that.

So they move. They hustle. They respond to what arrives. And at the end of a busy year they look up and realise they have been productive in every direction except the one that actually mattered most.

It is a clarity problem.

And the cost of not solving it goes beyond time. It is the slow accumulation of decisions that compound in wrong directions.

This is what I know to be true about decision making:

No single decision determines your life. But every decision compounds. So learn to decide.

The person you are becoming is not the result of one big choice. It is the result of a thousand small ones, each shaped by what you were optimising for in that moment. If you do not know what you are optimising for, something else will decide for you. And it usually decides in favour of whatever is loudest, most urgent, or most flattering to your ego right now.

Here is the framework. Three questions that will help you find your North Star and use it to make better decisions starting this week.

What am I actually optimising for in this season?

Not forever. In this specific season of your life and work. The answer changes. Name your North Star for it. Write it down somewhere you will see it when the next opportunity arrives uninvited.

What is this decision actually costing me?

Every yes is a no to something else. Most people evaluate opportunities by what they offer. Wise people evaluate them by what they require. When something lands in your inbox or your WhatsApp or across a table from someone you respect, ask: what does saying yes to this actually cost me in time, energy, focus, or alignment? Then ask whether you can afford that cost given what you are optimising for right now. If the opportunity cost is your North Star, the answer is almost always no. No matter how good the opportunity looks.

Is this a no, or is this a not now?

This is the question most people skip. And it is the one that saves you from the guilt of saying no to good things. Not everything you decline is gone forever. Some things deserve a place in the future, not the present. Parking something, genuinely parking it with intention rather than just avoiding it, is a form of wisdom not weakness. Create a place, literally a note, a folder, a list, where good things that do not belong in this season can wait for the next one. Your future self will thank you for not abandoning them and not being distracted by them.

And then there is the last thing. The one most people find hardest.

Make the decision and release the outcome.

No decision is perfect. You will say no to things that later looked like they would have worked. You will say yes to things that cost more than you expected. That is not failure. That is the nature of deciding under uncertainty, which is the only condition any of us ever actually decide under.

What matters is not that every decision is right. What matters is that your decisions are consistent with what you are building. A series of aligned imperfect decisions will always outperform a series of perfect ones made without direction.

Compound clarity. Not perfect choices.

“Commit to the Lord whatever you do, and he will establish your plans.” Proverbs 16:3

The North Star is less about control and more about commitment. When you are clear about what you are building, decisions stop feeling like gambles. You are not choosing between good and bad. You are choosing between aligned and misaligned. Between the life you are building and the noise surrounding it.

Anyone can respond to what arrives everyday.

Very few people decide in advance what they are building and let that decision make every other one for them.

You’re not being rigid, friend. That is what clarity looks like.

And clarity is the only thing that compounds.

Sydney

P.S. Reply and tell me what your North Star is for this season. Even if it is not fully formed yet. Writing it down is the first act of committing to it. I read everything.

If someone forwarded this to you and it landed, you can get Clarity Letters directly here:

P.P.S. If you are ready to get clear on what you are building and make deliberate moves toward it, I coach a small number of people one on one. Book a conversation here.