The decision making process

The decision making process is a very challenging process for some people. This text proposes to explore this theme with reflections based on Steven Hayes Steven, Kirk Strosahl and Kelly G. Wilson's acceptance and commitment therapy.

This therapy discusses 6 (in) processes and psychological flexibility to address how people relate to their experiences and how they behave toward a significant life or not. For people who are more psychologically flexible, the process of making decisions can be less challenging. Let's look at a process by process to make this clearer:

1. Present moment - Being more flexible concerns being aware of the present moment, experiencing what the 5 senses offer us in here and now. The constant exercise of noticing what is happening in my body and around me, moment at moment, enables a greater connection with what each experience causes in me. With this clarity, it is easier to choose what sensations I want to approach, as well as knowing what are those sensations I would choose to keep away if they were not inherent parts of a significant path.
2. I as a context - our awareness that we are not defined by a choice, nor for a thought or feeling, but that we are containers of all the experiences we live is a way of discussing me as context. If I am adamant in this process, taking an aspect of me such as a decision, I can get stuck and have difficulty making decisions.
3. Values - A clarity of things that really matter, meaning that makes life really significant makes the decision -making process lighter, because this scale is clear. Recognizing what is more true for me can make the decision process simpler, as priorities are more evident.
4. Actions with commitment - are those behaviors that lead us towards what really matters to us. It is what we do to approach our reinforcers. When we experience the processes more flexibly the decision -making process can be shorter.
5. Acceptance - An opening to experience whatever we are feeling when thinking about the decision, living the decision. Allow us to feel independent of being pleasant or unpleasant free us.
6. Defusion - Look at our experiences as experiences. Do not judge our thoughts, look openly to the "items" of our scale. Having openness to notice our thoughts about the ways we are thinking of taking, and looking at a perspective on our ideas about people's ideas about our ideas.

Knowing these 6 processes from the most flexible point of view can help us look at the decision -making process and understand why it can be so difficult in the experience of those who are most inflexible psychologically. Returning to the processes,

1 - How will I know what I want to live in the future or the past and am I far away from mine here and now?

2- I judge myself for my thoughts, the things I feel, how am I going to look with openness and without judgment for the possible ways?

3- If I am not clear what is really valuable and significant to me, how to make decisions? What will be my compass?

4 - How will I have decisions committed to my values if I am lost from them?

5 - If I dodge unpleasant things, how will I allow myself to feel everything that the possible ways can evoke on me?

6- If I get “stuck” in thoughts and judgments, how to make conscious choices?

This text set out to think about decision making from Act's 6 processes, starting with a look at psychological flexibility and ending with psychological inflexibility.