I Used a Decision Journal for 30 Days

Our brains are terrible narrators. In fact, they lie to us… quite often. Either by amplifying our negatives through a “sky is falling” effect where we perceive things as much worse. Or through self preservation, where our inner narrator attempts to make things seem in our favor by omitting certain details and by bending the truth.

This is a big problem. Not because it affects our short term decision making skills. But because it creates a disconnect in why we made a decision, and the result of that decision. If we can’t accurately remember why we decided something, then we can’t learn the right lessons from how it turned out. Effectively corrupting our own feedback loop.

This is why a month ago I started using a decision journal. It sounds weird right? Like actually writing down what you are about to do and the why behind it. But it has proven extremely useful in my life.

Another way to think about it is that each time you write down a decision, you effectively create a hypothesis for what will happen, and each time you see the result of that decision you are either validating it or going back and learning from it, which then improves your future decisions.

When I first thought about doing this I thought it would be extraordinarily tedious. In fact I let it sit as a random note on my phone for THREE entire months. But it’s not like you are writing down every single decision, just the ones that matter most to your life. And it takes maybe 2 minutes per session.

How to Actually Do This

First thing is get a REAL, physical notebook. Writing stuff with a pen not only increases your retention of the content you write but also your understanding of it.

Second thing is set the date, and choose a topic you will start journaling decisions for. It could be investing, relationships, which class to take, which opportunity to pursue, literally anything.

Then once you have the date + decision, start journaling your thought process. Why you feel the way you do about it, and also mention external factors affecting your choice. I typically do bullet points for brief, analytical decisions, and paragraphs for more emotional/bigger decisions.

The most important part is that you need to write it in a way that you are actually willing to read it later. So this means not taking pages upon pages to analyze the decision (unless it’s a super big one). I try to stick to <2 pages for most decisions.

Another important thing to keep in mind is the amount of pages left in your notebook after this decision. Since such a major part of this process is actually looking back and reflecting, or updating the status of the decision if it’s more long term, you need to actually have space to write about the next part without getting lost in your journal. So for brief decisions that you are only going to update once more, just save 2 pages after your decision. If it’s a bigger decision then save as many pages as you think is necessary for the timeline.

If you really get into this then you might adopt separate journals for different decision categories, but I don’t really think that’s necessary until after a year of usage at my current rate at least.

Long Term Usage

Whenever you have bigger / more long term decisions always save more pages and try to do somewhat consistent status updates. As the decision evolves you can add little statuses next to the dates. For example for investing you could add the current value of said investment, and reflect on why it has changed or not changed since the initial decision.

If you do regular journaling it’s also really nice to look at regular journal entries side by side with the decision making entry, as sometimes these regular entries can give you more context/insight into how you were feeling when that entry happened.

It’s also okay to not make a definitive decision after your first entry. Sometimes multiple entries or thoughts throughout the day can help contribute to a better informed decision compared to just trying to do it in one session.

Prompting

Always be curious about your thoughts. When using the journal try to find the core thing driving the decision and challenge its accuracy outside of your emotions. That’s not to say you should ignore the way you feel about a decision, but the whole point of this journal is to try and better understand why you’re making a decision, so that future ones can be better informed.

Adding in little notes about external factors that changed your mind or almost did can also be extremely useful later on. For example a tiny note about an article, or something your mom said, can all give you more information for your future decisions.

A month in, the biggest change isn’t that I make better decisions. It’s that I actually know why I made them. And when something doesn’t work out, I can go back and see exactly where my thinking went wrong, not the story I tried to convince myself later. Which in itself is valuable, and better decisions will only follow once I better understand these thought patterns.