The glorified myth of the right decision

In life, we are very often obsessed with taking the "right decision". Be it something as mundane as buying a car or a house, or something more important like a career move, the myth of the right decision consumes our collective psyche.

Imagine a journey. You are at a fork in the road. Even if the roads are well laid out before you, and you know how each road is spread out, and assuming you know exactly where you want to go, it may not possible to say for sure whether going left is better than going right.

In life, it is a lot different. Most of the times, we do not know where we want to go. Even if we do, its definitely not enough to know how the roads are laid out in front of us. Knowing each path does not mean we can foresee the journey on the path. And that's where the right decision becomes a myth. There is no way you can tell before hand that one decision is right and the others are wrong. You just make a choice at each point of time, and in the end the choices that you have made are all you have. You cannot undo these choices or their consequences. You can retrace your path, traverse along the opposite direction, but time waits for no man.If you make a different choice the second time around, and you like the journey better, it no way makes the first decision wrong.

The myth of the right decision is a representation of the fixation of the human mind with assuming arrogant ownership of these choices, and assuming a certainty in the way things will pan out in the future. Its in our nature to be proud of the choices we make; to take credit for the consequences of these choices. It is our ignorance that makes us feel we have all the information, perspective and the intelligence to be able to take the correct decision, where no such thing is possible.

Take this experiment. A and B are at a cross-roads in their lives. A goes along path 1 and B goes along path 2. Firstly, A enjoying path 1 and B enjoying path 2 are not mutually exclusive. Lets say that is what happens. Now, typically, A will feel his decision of going along path 1 as opposed to path 2 was a master-stroke. He will talk to B on the phone and express his immense satisfaction on having taken the right decision. B will no doubt say something similar. The concept of the right decision assumes that A knows exactly what it is like to traverse path 2 and path 3 and path 4, if he is to say that path 1 was the right decision. If A wishes to conclusively prove that his decision was the correct one, he cannot because the overall system (for want of a better word) has changed since the time he made the choice to go along path 1. The decision of going along path 1 at t1 cannot be compared to the decision of going along path 2 at time t2. Furthermore, the experience of going along a path depends on many more factors than one can simulate in this experiment. The overall experience along any of life's paths depends on the experiences we have with others whose paths we cross, when we cross them among several other things. To say that we know for certain that we will have come across a multitude of random experiences along a path we know little about, whose overall effect on us would be better than another path is at best speculation, but to be honest, arrogant foolishness.

In essence, it is good and reassuring if the choices we made in our lives have held us in good stead. On the other hand, if the choices turned out to be not so good, there is no assurance that another choice would have turned out to be better. There is just a lot more happening beyond our control than the choices we make. In the long run, everyone ends up where they ought to be, our choices and right decisions notwithstanding.