House watch type sea

The revisions of decisions

The luxury of being spoilt for choice can sometimes be a handicap to making decisions. You are presented with options and variations, reviews and options, desires and dislikes that you find yourself wrestling between opportunity and regret.

When you have wide-ranging choices out of affordability and not limited by available resource, other elements come in to play. For instance, when I was shopping for an apartment literally 20 years ago, the issue was not if I could afford it, it was whether after the choice was made, I will be happy with it when compared with other places, I viewed in the process.

Having a good feel

It came down to gut feeling, the place I chose was still occupied, it felt lived in, the departing occupants were friendly, nice, and accommodating, I warmed to the property the first time I saw it compared to the other empty shells that left me undecided and nonplussed. They all looked like hard work when the place I bought presented good ideas on how I would like to live there.

I visited the neighbourhood one evening and made enquiries at the Blockbuster store nearby about the feel and safety of the area, it got to a point that I could not think of living elsewhere, my mind was made up and I enjoyed 10 and half years there.

The tick-tock of time

Recently, I have been thinking of getting a new wristwatch, it has not been easy, and I am nowhere near being able to choose what I want. I have basic requirements, a watch without a busy face, with day and date, self-powered, and with a perpetual calendar. Alas! Every watch I have seen has more dials than an old nuclear power station, I do not need to know my altitude or how far below sea level I need to get before I have a drowning reflex. I just want the time without having to tweedled knobs and dials.

Extend this to getting a laptop and it is a mess, one look at the reviews, and every endearing feature is lost to the tales of woe standing out with just one star. You are left weighing all sorts of options that weeks after, you are none the wiser. Let us not talk of the watch, I have been on this Aegean treadmill for the best part of three years.

Maybe not now

At the turn of the year, I was looking for an apartment in Cape Town to spend the last 10 days of our holiday, we could have extended our stay where we were but decided on trying somewhere different. That was fraught with all sorts of disbenefits, location, safety at night, ease of travel, cost of the deposit, and user reviews. The longer we left it, the fewer the choices we had. Eventually, we just had to go for it, and it was a good choice.

Sometimes, the surfeit of choice is a warning to move on, give it time and hone your requirements to what really meets your needs. If you do not have to decide limited by resource, opportunity, or time, then you are not under duress and you do not have to create undue pressure on yourself. Maybe, you need something completely different, that is what breaking away allows, and with an open mind, you might acquire the unexpected which turns out to be the best.