STP 36 | Scaling Your Therapy by Limiting Your Decisions
===
James Marland: Welcome to the Scaling Therapy Practice. This is James Marland with Dr. David Hall. Hello David. Hey James. This is the show where we ask you to take small steps towards big growth. This week we're gonna be talking about decision, decision fatigue why you get it and how to some steps to overcome it.
James Marland: But first we're gonna talk about our tool tech or tip of the week. I'll go first. David. Mine's a simple, mine's a simple tool. In Google Calendar, you can create tasks for yourself like a checklist. I don't, did you know that already? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. But I, it's
David Hall: still a good
James Marland: tip. I just discovered it and instead of, instead of like assigning things on my calendar, I can assign tasks to myself.
James Marland: It reminds me it's all in one program. I mean, I love click up and Trello and other things that remind me things. But I, I look at my calendar so, so much. Mm. And so putting those reminders right in the calendar, that's free and it's there and it's integrated. And it also pops up on my email too, my Google, my Gmail.
James Marland: It's, it's it's keeping me more on track with some of those little tasks. Like, like, oh, I gotta do this. Oh, I gotta do this. It's not on, it's not on notepads, you know, sticky notes. It's in a place that's gonna remind me, and I'm, I'm really enjoying using the Google tasks bar. Yeah. So that's my
David Hall: tip.
David Hall: It's a good tip. Mine's kind of related to our topic. I like eggs. It's, it's, I mean, it's, it's a, it's, I enjoy it. It's a good protein source. I find I'll add. Hard boiled egg to a lot of things. And I buy generally pre hardboiled eggs. It's something I discovered a few years ago. It may have existed for a while, but I don't know, I only discovered it a few years ago.
David Hall: But Eggland's Best is the brand I use. They're a few different brands, but I get into the bag of six eggs, but they're pre hardboiled and peeled. 'cause that's my thing. I like hard boiled egg, but, Who has time to make a hard-boiled egg. And that feels ridiculous on some level because of course I have time to make a hard-boiled egg.
David Hall: Most of us do. But by having pre boiled, pre peeled, hard-boiled eggs in my refrigerator at all times that I add, I add them to salads, I add them to to, you know, I guess salad's the thing I have the most too. Or I'll just eat them kind of on their own. And yeah it's a good protein source. It's good, but like, One less thing I have to do an important, one less thing I have to think about because as it relates to what we're talking about today, is decision fatigue.
James Marland: Is this a good time to start talking about decision fatigue?
David Hall: We make the amount of for, for those. If you're listening to a podcast, this, this will, you'll qualify for this. If you're listening to a podcast, watching YouTube videos, this would qualify because. We, because of our lives, because of technology, because of a lot of complexities in our lives, the amount of things we decide in a given day is astronomically greater than in generations past.
David Hall: Even for a lot of us. You know, for those of us in our, you know, forties, fifties, even compared to what it was in our childhood you think about, here's a kind of a simple example. I talk about food. What most of our ancestors ate on a daily basis was pretty routine. Mm-hmm. Most people didn't have that much variety in the things they ate.
David Hall: Unless you were exceptionally wealthy or you would eat things, maybe the variety would be seasonal, like what fruits and vegetables were in season. But you know, James, you've talked in past episodes eating a lot of goulash when you were a kid. Oh yeah. Yeah. And even, even for me, like this idea of, you know, I ate a lot of SpaghettiOs for lunch when I was a kid and, and you know, I, I had some choices, but they're just, this, what you eat, you know, you, this is, and in some ways we look at that.
David Hall: We, from our vantage point of our time and age, we think of that's boring. And we think real lives are so much better because we have so many more choices. But that's super qualified because we're a lot more tired. Mm-hmm. We're tired, mentally. We're tired and our ability to function. James and I were talking about before recording the pressures on solopreneurs in the mental health space, and I think one of the biggest pressures is when you're on your own, there's so many more decisions you have to make.
David Hall: I have a business partner, it's, it's my wife, and, but we have a divided category of tasks and part of that is, is that if my brain's a hard drive, I don't have to keep certain things on the hard drive. There's certain things I don't think about relating the running of our practice. 'cause it's what she does.
David Hall: She does payroll. I don't do payroll, so I don't think very much about payroll. I think about it in as much as it touches on things of my responsibility.
James Marland: So, the having to make all the decisions gets people like, What are some of the signs, I guess, of decision fatigue? For me, I, I think I get frustrated.
James Marland: Like, I know, yeah. Oh, I get interrupted in something. I am asked to make a decision, and I'm just like, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Is that a
David Hall: sign of decision fatigue? I, I would say, so. I say frustration. I think a practical sign is we often make poorer decisions. Mm-hmm. We, because we don't have the capacity to really kind of weigh things out, so oftentimes we'll make just quick decisions.
David Hall: Or we'll put off making decisions. Yes, procrastination is probably, procrastination becomes a way that we handle fatigue, but basically none of it is very productive. None of it is very so I have three things I wanna talk about in this as we're planning a shorter episode today. Just this is, want this to be a quick little bite, one less thing of a decision to make of how long you want you to listen to this episode, because we're gonna keep it short.
David Hall: Here's one of the first things. To do is as much as like, so there, there's an automating of processes. There are lots of things that we can automate that's good to automate. There's an example of the egg process. I, because I've made access to eggs easier, it's easier for me to eat eggs. Also, I don't think, I don't keep a lot of different types of food in my house generally for one as I.
David Hall: I'm in a season of life where I'm trying to eat better and that decision fatigue actually comes into it. Like, and if I, if I simplify eating things that are easier, that one, I'm more likely to do it. 'cause it's simple. But it's one less decision to make. I have a basic Varieties of clothes that I wear that don't vary a lot.
David Hall: I'm, I, I stay as close to like a uniform as possible, and, and I, I think a lot of men particularly have this, but mine's pretty basic. I have my, my, i, I wear, you know, jeans or type of pants on, or if it's a day off in nice weather, I have shorts and I have cargo short. I'm very specific, the sorts of shorts I wear.
David Hall: I wear Oxford shirts if it's, if I'm trying to be a little dressier. I used to wear, I don't wear polos anymore. It just, like, I don't, didn't, 'cause I, I found that I just like the simplicity of, you know, Oxford's, I could have long sleeves or roll up for short sleeves and you know, I, I like the simplicity of that.
David Hall: Oh, remove, wear, remove. It removes the decision. It removes the decision. I also wear, like, like I they're these like outdoor. Thin fabric, hoodie things. Mm-hmm. I'm wearing one right now, which is like, I, I have a few of these things. I really like them. They're really comfortable. I, I, I really try to simplify as many decisions I can make.
David Hall: So as, as much as you can kind of automate the process of, you know, thinking about how much, how many choices am I giving myself? Affects that. I'm
James Marland: pretty sure I read in the, the book on Steve Jobs, like he was, he had the, the black turtleneck. Turtleneck and his jeans. And that's, that's wore all you saw the later, I mean, I can't remember, except for some of the early videos.
James Marland: That's all he wore.
David Hall: And, and that's all he wore. And he talked about it in the context of decision fatigue of that. You, I make all these decisions every day. I want one less thing. Yeah. So. The, the automation as part of it, how to make it as automatic, but another bit of it is related as you do have decisions to make pre-plan.
David Hall: That's tip number two in this, okay,
James Marland: automation. Then pre-plan.
David Hall: Well pre-plan. So try to make as many decisions as you can earlier in the day. You have more energy making decisions has caloric cost. It takes mental energy and your brain is burning calories and. It is, you have more capacity at the beginning of the day.
David Hall: So this is an example for in a health management app I use, when they talk about meal planning, they encourage you to plan your meals early in the day. And the reason is, is because you have, they, they use the principle, which is a cognitive therapy principle developed by Jonathan Het of the elephant and the rider, which is.
David Hall: You know, the, the rational part of your brain is like somebody riding on top of an elephant. The elephant is much stronger, the elephant's, your impulses, your drives and things like that. But if your elephant is, is well-managed, well taken care of, well-rested the rider can steer the elephant in a lot of different places.
David Hall: But if the, if the elephant's fatigued, do the elephant's ornery, as we say in the south, if it's, you know, if it's, if it's hangry. It's not gonna be as responsive to the rider. And so it's one of the things that's helped me like in eating better is planning earlier in the day, what am I going to eat today?
David Hall: Like planning, like I'm gonna have this for not just what am I eating for breakfast, but I'm gonna have for lunch and what am I gonna have for dinner? Yeah, that
James Marland: makes a lot of sense. They say with like, school children, why, why are school children so well behaved? Or why can they behave during the day and then they come home and like lose it?
James Marland: 'cause they've had to. It in. Yeah. They've had to rein it in and have controlled decisions and, and, and it's the, there's a cost, as you said, there's a cost mm-hmm. To it with willpower and with like brain power and it's, it's the, just thinking about like your, your eating habits. Mm-hmm. When are you gonna make your worst eating habit decision?
David Hall: I make mine at night. It's the end, end of the day. I, I'm the worst night snacker.
James Marland: I've been so good all day. I deserve this,
David Hall: this chocolate cake. Oh, sure. And, and the, the, the cognitive capacity to resist or do something different is really limited. It's depleted. Yeah. It's
James Marland: down, down, down.
David Hall: So it's, it makes a lot of sense.
David Hall: Automate number one, two, make decisions early, even like, you know, I think about other positive ones. For me, exercising is, Anchored done a lot better when I'm doing it with somebody. Hmm. And I make an appointment of like, Hey, we're meeting at the gym at this time. I'm, I'm more likely to, to follow through because of the social pressure, but it's setting myself up in ways to make the decisions I want easier in the future.
David Hall: But part of that is preloading makes, and so when you have That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. When you have the moments. So automate preload, you know, make decisions early. Here's my last tip. In it is, simplification is not a moment as an ongoing process. Mm-hmm. Simplification is hard and is, and I, the bigger thing in it is simplification is not natural.
David Hall: We have, as humans, we have this natural tendency to believe that complexity requires effort and simplicity is the resting point of things. That is not true. We naturally build and add and add more to and add more to. It's why spring cleaning or clean out your closet is a thing. My, my closet doesn't naturally get fewer things.
David Hall: It collects more things. And my desk, I clean my desk off. Not as frequently as people would like me to, but I do it and it's clean, it's, there's absence of papers and then it builds things up over
James Marland: time. I'm not sure this is where you were going with it, but they say like, if you have a lot of stuff around you, it's, it's distracting and harder to make some decisions.
David Hall: Sure. Or the sorts of things you have around you. But this idea that if you want to, it's, it's not a one-time process. You constantly have to revisit it to kind of clean. Mm-hmm. It's like cleaning that you, the, the atrophy of clutter. Is the natural thing in life and particularly materially and other we live in, in a world that has a lot of stuff.
David Hall: It has a lot of tangible stuff. Mm-hmm. Has a lot of intangible stuff. James, confession time for a second. Are there any subscriptions that you pay for of softwares or services that you aren't actively using?
James Marland: I mean, when you said subscription, I immediately go to like TV type stuff. Yeah. And I have like three, and I only use, we use Netflix the most.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. And then maybe Disney plus, but then we also have Amazon, and then we have the cable one. Mm-hmm. And like, I could probably get away with one of them. Like for as much TV as I watch, I could probably just use one. What about software? I, I have some web pages that I have that I pay for that I don't use.
James Marland: I'm not sure.
David Hall: Is that an active decision though, or is that, like, is that from neglect or from purpose?
James Marland: It's per on purpose. I, I've let some lapse, like some webpage what are those called? Domain names. I've let, I, I bought some and then never used them and then let 'em lapse.
David Hall: But those are good examples I think of just word clutter and like, I, I want, I asked the clarifying question because I do think it's important to distinguish between those things we're not using, but we're making the decision to keep.
David Hall: Mm-hmm. Like I still have a v h s tape tape of my wedding. Me too. Yeah. I, I've not watched it in a number of years. But I don't plan on, that's, that's not from neglect. That's a deliberate decision to, to maintain that.
James Marland: Well, I don't have a v h s
David Hall: player anymore. I just, my parents just clean out a house and I picked up one from their house because I didn't have one anymore.
David Hall: And I, and because I realized like, oh, I have I have a few things on v H s that I still wanna be able to access and good to grab a, a player while I can still grab them. But as, as related to this of I have to clean out, like it's this, we, we have to do it because yeah, when we have this weight of things, every once in a while we find ourselves with energy to do something about it, and it's taking advantage and realizing that we've gotta take, we constantly have to be removing otherwise we carry around it.
David Hall: It, it's like anyone who's gone backpacking. For extended amount of time realizes that when they start, they overpack and then you realize like, what do I really need? And then it gets, it gets much simpler. It's the thing for the, I'm, I live pretty close to a, a section of the Appalachian Trail, the at, and, you know, it, it begins and ends depending on where you start.
David Hall: One ends in New Hampshire, I guess. Maine, I can't remember. It's, it's one end. Then Georgia's the other side. But there are different trail stops on both ends and you find that there's just a lot of, of these trail stops, a lot of stuff that's been abandoned because people mm-hmm have packed up these over hefty and they realize that I've gotta carry that.
David Hall: Anything's going with me. I gotta carry. And I don't, I don't camp a lot, but I've realized when I do that, like I don't need nearly as many changes of clothes as I think I'm gonna,
James Marland: I know, I, I know I, I bring three pair of shoes and just wear the sandals the whole time or something.
David Hall: Yeah. I, I've had that what I, what I, but then you, there are other things you realize.
David Hall: I really wish I had more, like I've had it for sunscreen or I've gone through a lot of sunscreen and but so
James Marland: I wanna, I wanna I wanna say the, what you were talking about reminds me of the book Getting Things Done. Mm-hmm. I forget the name of the author, but getting things done, he says, your brain remembers things about all the things that you're carrying with you, and it can't determine whether it's important or not.
James Marland: And so you, you're not like getting rid of things or. Putting things on the list to do or saying, I'm not going, you know, deciding this isn't something I'm going to do. Your brain will keep spending energy trying to work through those problems, whether you're thinking about it or not. And it doesn't decide it, it doesn't decide what's time conscious or what's important it.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. It just says this is, this is you know, he has 15 things on the list. I'm gonna like think through them at random times. His, his big thing was trying to do I think it, I think it was getting getting them off your mind and onto the list. Like you were talking about decluttering, like getting 'em
David Hall: off the thing.
David Hall: Yeah. And sometimes decluttering isn't like a complete removal of this thing from your life. Yeah. But is like, one of the things that helps me is I carry a lot in my head. And the discipline of using Trello, which is organizational tool. And I, I go in waves of how disciplined I am. But one of the things that helps me right now, and I'm, I'm in the beginning of a, a very intense creative process and I just have to write things down.
David Hall: Yeah. Because the freedom I get from writing things down is I don't have to remember it. 'cause one of the most frustrating things that happens to me is I'll realize I forgot something, but I dunno what I forgot. And I will grind my gears, trying to recall it, and sometimes I can get it where it happens to be the most is my wife and I will be watching TV and I'll think of something.
David Hall: And what I have to do is I'll, I'll go back to like, I'll, if it's, I'll rewind. 'cause my hope is, is that something in, in the, you know, previous minute or two of the show will trigger the thought again. 'cause the thought I had before went simultaneously with some action that was going on or some statement.
David Hall: It often works, but it wastes so much time and me just having the discipline to say like, no, I'm gonna write this down. I'm gonna take this out of my head, put it somewhere else, and that's gonna be it, and that's gonna be okay. So those are my three things.
James Marland: All right. So to review it's automation or automating the second one was, what was the second one?
David Hall: Ear, ear, early decisions,
James Marland: make the decision, early decision. And then the third is like, simplify and
David Hall: declutter, put in the work to
James Marland: simplify, put in the work to simplify and declutter. Great. Yeah. All right. Well, David, if there's one thing you wanted people to remember from this episode, what would that be?
David Hall: Simplicity is not the natural state.
David Hall: Hmm. It is clutter and complexity is the natural state. We move towards that. Simplification requires input and effort to move towards.
James Marland: And I think my one thing I really liked, and it because it's so true, is like, make your decisions early. 'cause like the later in the day, the less, the less. Mm-hmm. There's more fatigue and you're gonna make worse decisions.
James Marland: Absolutely. So I really liked like that tip that was very applicable. A hundred percent. Yeah. All right. Well thanks, thanks again for talking little bit talking with me, David, as always, James.
David Hall: Enjoy it.
James Marland: All right, so this is James Marland with Dr. David Hall for the scaling therapy practice. This is where we encourage you to take small steps towards big growth.
James Marland: We'll see you next time. Bye James.
James Marland: Thank you for listening to the scaling therapy practice I hope you enjoyed the show I want to remind you that the content shared today is for general information and entertainment purposes only It shouldn't be considered as legal or tax advice If you need a professional advice in those areas please consult with a licensed attorney or accountant but thank you so much for listening The scaling therapy practice is part of the psych craft network
