3 Key Decisions For Every Moment: Create Meaning and Win in Life
“It is in your moments of decision that your destiny is shaped.” – Tony Robbins
Decisions determine what you let into your life – success or failure, courage or cowardice, fulfillment or dissatisfaction, passion or apathy, growth or stagnation.
Every decision brings either positivity or negativity in our lives. Yet many people make decisions unconsciously and invite unpleasant things like physical illness, emotional exhaustion, toxic relationships, and financial stress.
Therefore, it’s important to live consciously and make the right choices every single day. That’s how we can live with happiness and satisfaction instead of stress and frustration.
Small Decisions Matter
We create our circumstances with our decisions. Everyday decisions to exercise vs. be lethargic, to be productive vs. lazy, to express love and gratitude vs. complain and criticize – open the doorway to the big opportunities in life.
Living consciously isn’t a one-time thing. Only when you exercise every day will you be healthy. Only when you express love everyday will you have long-lasting and fulfilling relationships.
So it’s important to make the right decisions in life’s ordinary moments. Because your circumstances or life events never make you happy. It’s what you decide to do with the circumstances that makes you happy.
This is the reason many rich people are depressed and living miserable lives. They unconsciously make bad decisions which lead to negative circumstances.
Here are the three key decisions for every moment to help you win in life:
Decision 1: What am I going to focus on?
Where focus goes, energy flows.
In every moment, we can choose to focus on the present to create what we want. Or we can focus on the past or the future and remain stuck. We can focus on the beauty of our dreams and feel the joy in chasing them, or we can focus on the risk and feel paralyzed by fear. To win in life, you have to focus on the positive.
An important takeaway is to focus on what you have instead of what you don’t. Feel grateful for your family and the roof of over your head. Millions of people crave the things you take for granted.
When we focus on something, our mind makes a second key decision –
Decision 2: What does this mean?
“Things do not have meaning. We assign meaning to everything.” – Tony Robbins
The meaning is the story we tell ourselves about life events. To win in life, what matters is whether you tell yourself an empowering story or a disempowering story.
For example, if you don’t get promoted at work, is it “failure” or an “opportunity” to learn from your mistakes and grow? If you had a fight with your spouse, does it mean your relationship is “failing” or that you need to “become aware” of each others’ needs?
The meaning we assign to the event drives our emotions. A positive meaning creates positive emotions of happiness, excitement, and wonder. A negative meaning creates negative emotions of sadness, anxiety, and hopelessness.
In the face of “difficult” events like car accidents, health issues, or financial losses – it’s our responsibility to give them an empowering meaning.
Decision 3: What am I going to do?
“The actions we take are powerfully shaped by the emotional states we’re in. If we’re angry, we’re going to behave quite differently than if we’re feeling playful or outrageous.” – Tony Robbins
The kind of meaning you give to an event determines how you feel. And your emotions, your feelings, determine how you act. And your actions determine whether you’ll win in life not just on financial level but also on emotional and spiritual levels.
When we are feeling happy and excited we’ll take positive actions – work for our dreams, appreciate others, find the good in everything.
But when we feel negative – hurt, angry, sad, afraid – we react and fall into negative behavioral patterns. In a negative emotional state, people shout, curse, and sabotage themselves.
Tony Robbins advises that you become aware of your patterns when you feel frustrated, angry, lonely, or sad. The first step to change your negative pattern is to become aware of it.
Final Thoughts
Your circumstances aren’t creating your life, your decisions are. So be very careful about what thoughts, emotions, and beliefs you allow to enter your mind.
Make the right decisions – focus on the beauty of life, tell yourself an empowering story filled with positive meaning, and act out of joy and inspiration. Mastering these three decisions will give you lasting peace in life.