Daniel Pink shares a decision-making trick: ask yourself what you'd tell your best friend to do. People are bad at solving their own problems but good at advising others. Framing a choice this way surfaces the answer you already know.
The best way to make a decision that I have discovered is to ask yourself, what would I tell my best friend to do? Now, the reason this works, the reason this heuristic is effective, is that we tend to be terrible at solving our own problems, but pretty good at solving other people's problems. And I have found when I use this decision-making tool, when I'm deciding to take on a project, when I'm deciding to go on a trip, when I'm deciding to to pursue whatever interest of mine is, and I'm not sure, I say to myself, what would I tell my best friend to do? We are better at solving other people's problems than our own. And if you apply this to yourself, what I have found is people know instantly what to do. So in a way, this technique surfaces what you actually know you should be doing.
