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The Crippling Cost of Decision Making Fatigue - And How To Beat It by Jude Kempton

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You feel overloaded, responsible for everything. Every decision you have to make starts to take a lot of energy - even simple decisions like what to wear, what to eat or what to listen to on your commute may feel exhausting and like they are too much to bear. If this sounds familiar, it's likely you’re suffering from decision making fatigue - a crippling side effect of stress. Decision making fatigue is based on the idea that we have finite capacity to make decisions. Once we have reached capacity, our ability to make further decisions becomes worse and stress increases. As stress levels rise, we struggle to trust others: the quality of our decisions declines, yet we take on more responsibility and stress and fatigue begins to mount. We can become locked in a vicious cycle of overwhelm and exhaustion. Yet the consequences can be far reaching: as we become more fatigued, our decision making becomes worse. We may start deciding things impulsively, or avoid making decisions altogether. Loss of trust in other people means we are less likely to reach out for support, we become increasingly overloaded, and start heading towards burnout. As an accredited Female Leadership Coach, Jude Kempton often works with women who are exhausted from constantly juggling demanding work and home lives. “Many women are simply drained from the ongoing decisions that need to be made throughout every day” says Kempton. “From seemingly simple but necessary decisions like what to wear, have they got enough food in the fridge, through to more complex decisions like approving large budgets, team structures or strategic action. They are simply overloaded - and this can be exacerbated for women with small children where they are often the default decision maker.” Could you be suffering from decision making fatigue? Here, Jude explains the symptoms: Feeling irritable or exhausted. You might have a feeling of being overstretched all the time, and even the smallest requests from other people trigger a feeling of overwhelm. Decision making paralysis, or making impulsive decisions. It feels impossible to make decisions, it takes you a long time to decide about anything and everything. You avoid making decisions, or you act impulsively because you can’t decide. Struggling to trust others. You feel like you are the only one who can do it, or the only one who cares, so you don’t delegate tasks or ask anyone else for help. You may feel ‘like you have to do everything’ because, in your eyes, no one else is capable. How to relieve decision making fatigue The good news is that it is possible to get relief from decision making fatigue. Kempton recommends trying four simple steps to pause, recover and reset: Time pressure can make decisions more stressful and add to the fatigue. Take the pressure off by planning the smaller decisions, like what you are going to wear, ahead of time. This way you aren’t doing it at times when the pressure is on. Automate decisions where you can, for example by using meal planners or meal delivery kits to “batch” decision making. Reducing the number of decisions you are making each day will free up your decision making capacity for more important things when it counts. Review the decisions that you are making, looking at where you can start to extend trust and ask other people to take on tasks. Start small if you need to: it may help to think about the level of risk involved. If the consequence of something going wrong is low, delegate it to someone else and don’t look back. Prioritise decisions that will benefit your wellbeing. Exhaustion is at the heart of decision making fatigue: prioritising rest and wellbeing will allow you to recharge and reclaim the cognitive energy you need to start making decisions again.   If you’re noticing the signs of decision making fatigue, this is your brain and body telling you it’s time to stop. Taking a few moments out of your busy day to find small steps to recovery could help you to avoid burnout.

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