977.How Confident Are You in Making Decisions for Yourself in a World That Trains You Not To?

In this episode, I’m asking a question that sounds simple—but hits a lot deeper when you truly reflect on it. 

How confident are you in making decisions for your own life?

This one was sparked by a conversation I had with my daughter about risks as you get older, and how easy it becomes to stop thinking for yourself and start following someone else’s narrative. Add to that a moment from Kevin Hart on Diary of a CEO, where he said, “Nobody has the confidence in making decisions for your life like you do,” and it made me stop & think (& of course write :).

We talk about why, as we get older, we become more cautious.
 Why following someone else’s decisions feels safer—but quietly costs us freedom.
 Why “research mode” is often just procrastination in disguise.
 And why there really are no bad decisions—only decisions you can course-correct.

This isn’t about being reckless.
 It’s about taking ownership.
 Agency.
 Staying in the game long enough to learn, adjust, and grow.

If you’ve felt frustrated… boxed in… or like your life isn’t quite coming together the way you hoped—this episode will help you see why.

Make the decision.
 Then make the decision right.

If this message resonates, share it with someone who needs to hear it. And as always—keep it simple, keep it moving, never settle, stay tough. 

Transcript

0:00

Alright, 3, 2, 1. Let's get it. Lemme tell you a little bit about what's on my mind today, and it's about, you know, the question I had for myself is like, how confident are you in making decisions for yourself? And I got to thinking about this because, you know, I was, I was talking to my daughter the other day and she's young, she's graduating high school, and I was talking about taking risk and you should start taking these risks. And I told her, I, I, I told her like, look, start taking risk. It's okay to take these risks. You're young so you can recover. And I got to thinking about this and it's, you know, it's something about when you, and I told her this, I'd like, as you get older, you get more cautious and you kind of start following someone else's narrative, someone else's decisions because. I don't wanna lose it all. I got a lot. I got a lot to lose. But I think also that comes with a steep price because then you start kind of getting frustrated in life and it seems like things aren't really coming together for you like you were hoping. And this thought came to me when I listened to the conversation between Kevin Hart and Steven Bartlett, and Kevin was on Steven's podcast and Kevin was talking about a time when he had made the decision. He was just a total screw up. He's got a great book. It's back behind me. Um. About his life and, and you know, Kevin was really just really a screw up. Didn't really know what he wanted to do in life or anything like that. And he decided he wanted to be a comedian. And so what do you always do when you make a decision? You tell your friends, which is sometimes the worst thing because they just piss all over your dreams. And he told 'em, he is like, you know, I wanna be a comedian. And they questioned him like, wait, what do you mean? Like comedian, like as a job. And they were, he was like, yeah. And they were like, Kevin, bro, you're funny man, but like, you're not like Eddie Murphy. Kind of funny. And Kevin was like, yeah, I know, but I still wanna be a comedian. And he said this, and this is the thing that that really triggered this, this whole question for me. He said, nobody has the confidence in making decisions for your life like you do now. I'll just put the should in there. Nobody should have the confidence in making decisions for your life like you do. See, it was at that point, he just made a decision. He declared it and then he went after it. And Eddie Murphy was kind of his north star. Now he blew past Eddie Murphy and has now, created a media empire that Eddie Murphy didn't even have access to. It gets me to thinking what if he would've listened to their opinions? And then based on those opinions, what if he would've said, well, like, what do you mean? And then they gave him some decisions about his life through their narrow lenses and whatever age they were. Let's call it 18 years old. And so he got a decision for his life. What if, what if that would've happened for Kevin Hart? Where would he be today? Nobody. Has the confidence in making decisions for your life like you do. And this begs the question like, why do we do this? Why do we do this? And I think we do this for a couple of reasons. Number one, it's, it's hard to think for yourself if you think about it since. Since you were a child, someone told you what to do, and so you just follow that path. You went all through grade school, someone told you what to do, where to show up when a test was due. When a project, then you get to a job. I mean, somebody has been telling you what to do this whole time. And so I think one reason why we don't make decisions for our own life is because we've gotten into a habit of someone making decisions for us. That's number one. But going even further than that, it keeps the blame off of us. We don't make decisions for our life and we follow someone else's decisions for our lives. Because it's easier to blame someone else than to take agency for your own life. I think this is why a lot of athletes, you know, they, they had hundreds of millions of dollars and they're, they're flat broke, they're on their ass and they're like, this person, was supposed to be investing my money for me, and they, they weren't. Well, really, and I, my heart bleeds for him. But see, you never took ownership of your money. You take somebody like Floyd Mayweather. Mayweather controls everything. It's his money, it's his fight, it's his decisions, he's the one who writes the check. He doesn't tell anybody else to write check. He's the one who writes the checks. He took agency, and I think a lot of times we kind of have these millionaire athlete. Mentalities where we're like, I mean, so when someone, when we follow someone else's decisions for our life and whether it be in where we live, to who we marry, to what jobs we take, or what jobs we leave and take something else. Like if you think about it, like it's probably shocking how many. Decisions you take from others versus how many decisions that you make for yourself. And I'm not talking to you, man. I'm, I'm talking to me too, especially as I get older. I'm 52 years old. I I don't wanna make a mistake. And dude, that's, that's a complete wrong way of actually looking at it. I want you to realize this. Number one, there's no bad decisions. There isn't. Maybe you didn't take into, into consideration. I'm not saying reckless, like nothing like that, but I'm saying at the end of the day, there's no bad decisions. You can make a decision and then you can course correct. You can make the decision. Right, but sometimes I think you have to be wrong on the way to being. Right. How else would you learn? I mean, if everything was just the money shot you, you'd never learn anything. I mean, that's really not even learning. And really, if you're hitting the money shot every time, your goals are probably low and you're probably following someone else's decisions now that I'm sitting here talking this out, and so you, you can't make a wrong decision. Your job is just stay in the game. If I lose more than you, I'm winning. Your job is to just. Be able to still stay in the game. So you can't have an all chips in mentality and no recovery. So a, there's no wrong decision if you do make the wrong decision, okay? Make the decision, right? Don't sit there and just sit in your own stool there. Learn from it. Course correct. Keep going.'cause remember, I gotta just stay in the game. I gotta keep playing the game because things will go your way. You just, as you do, you course correct. You just adjust for the way. And there's so much learning. I mean, how many wrong things have happened in your life, quote unquote, and they ended up being right because you sift out what worked for you. The rest of it you didn't, you didn't pay it any mind. I discarded it. Sometimes you may need that experience 10 years later. I've talked about that before. And if I keep playing the game, stay with me now. If I keep playing the game, I learn to make decisions for myself. That creates independence. And freedom, which is what you want in your life, right? You don't want people, you don't wanna be nursing on somebody's tit for the rest of your life, you don't want people hanging that over your head, and you do wanna start making decisions for yourself. That creates the freedom, the decisions you make creates the independence and freedom that then creates the confidence. The confidence, not that everything's gonna go right, but when it goes wrong, I have a faith and trust in myself that I can make it right. That forges your commitment, that increases your curiosity, that utilizes your creativity, and then you keep going. And so that's the only thing, man. I want you to just stay aware of. As you go today, number one, how often am I making decisions and begin to play in other areas? Just begin to play with this a little bit. Uh, first thing, have an awareness. Second thing is begin to play with it a little bit. Okay? You can visit it and then come back to the, to the safe thing. But as you do, man, you'll get a little bit further out. A little bit further out, a little more. Sure. Okay. And then you'll begin to increase your confidence and actually it'll make life a little more fun. I mean, some of the, some of the best days are the days where I tried something new or got out there, it was totally foreign to me. And E even the result may not have been perfect. Dude, you, you get kind of like an energy about you. You ever had that feeling? So that's the only thing I want you to do, is I want you to have an awareness of what you're doing. I want you to have an awareness of am I making decisions for myself? And then also how many decisions. Am I just following? Because that's the easy thing to do. Case in point, like high schoolers graduate and go to college. Why? Because everybody else is doing the same thing. They don't know why they're doing it. They're just doing it. And I think a lot of times we, we continue to take that same mentality into the rest of our lives. Okay? So just pay attention to that today. Play with it a little bit. Begin to make decisions for yourself, that awareness, you'll get stronger, it'll be more confident. And remember, there's no bad decisions, right? You make the decision, then make the decision, right? Alright, who needs to hear this episode? Who needs to start making decisions for the life? They're just, every time they call you, man, they're just upset on life. They're probably, they're upset with their life. They're probably doing that. Because they're following someone else's decision path instead of creating. And that's the scary part, man, because then you gotta, you own both ends of it, but it's worth it. It's definitely worth it. Alright, share this episode with one person who needs it. Let's get outta here. Keep it simple. Keep it moving. Never settle. Stay tough peace