Wanna know something not many people know about me?I can be very indecisive. For me, even the smallest decisions can be hard to make. What shoes should I wear? What should we have for dinner? Should I take my dog, Jack, for a walk or play fetch instead? I spend so much energy trying to make decisions. I overanalyze every situation, I procrastinate making decisions, and sometimes, I just completely avoid making decisions by deferring to others. I say, “Oh, it doesn’t matter to me! You decide!” Or… my husband hates it when I do this… He’ll say, where do you want to go to dinner? And I’ll say, “I don’t care, you decide,” and then he’ll choose a restaurant, and I’ll say, “Oh no, not there!” because really, the decision DID matter to me! Spending too much time on daily decision-making can be a huge waste of time and energy! Making decisions is something that didn’t come naturally to me.  It was uncomfortable, so I put it off and that’s when it became exhausting and stressful.  Does this sound like you at all? If so, you have probably felt the effects of being indecisive in every corner of your life, especially when it comes to your nonprofit. Think about all the decisions you have to oversee at your organization – how you help people, how to raise money, who to hire, how to lead your volunteers and staff, how to market your organization, what your brand – your logo, your colors, your website, your EVERYTHING looks like! You have so many decisions in your basket as a nonprofit leader – and those are just a few of the decisions you make!  But here’s what I’ve learned about making decisions in my life: If I set aside time to think about my bigger choices BEFORE the moment I need to say what I think or act, it’s a million times easier for me to decide. I take time to think about things beforehand, then I don’t get as stressed out or worry, I don’t waste time overthinking the situation, and I don’t say, “Oh I don’t care, you decide!” I end up with what I actually want!  Here’s the good news… Decision making is a skill that you can practice. Yes, you can practice making decisions and get better at it. It can actually become easier for you! Don’t we all want that? It’s not hard or magic and you can start practicing today. Three little tricks that help me make decisions every day. 1. Stop overanalyzing My friend Sherrie said something to me the other day on the phone… She said, “I’m 62 years old, and I’ve spent so many years of my life worrying about what might happen, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that most of the time nothing happened, but I sure did lose a lot of sleep over it.” If you struggle with overthinking things – you’re not alone. I’ve had my fair share of sleepless nights and stressed out days worrying and overanalyzing decisions I needed to make. I thought every decision had to be the perfect one. Overanalyzing is like when you’re doing the dishes, and the sink is getting clogged up with water. You want to turn on the disposer, but you’re afraid there’s a spoon in the drain. The water keeps filling up, it’s not going anywhere, the sink is not going to drain unless you turn on the disposer, but you don’t want to put your hand in the drain to feel around for a spoon. So, you just sit there and watch the water rise. Maybe you turn off the water, but the sink isn’t draining. It’s stagnant. It’s better to turn on the disposer and drain the water – and if there’s a spoon in there, that’s OK! Maybe next time you reach in to check because you learned that this time when you didn’t check – you slightly damaged a spoon. The point is – you have to be willing to make a choice. You can’t just live with a clogged sink. You can rebound and learn from a poor decision. You can learn quickly and move forward. Whereas with no decision, you’re not making the situation worse, but you’re not making it better either. You can only move forward or backward in life – if you make a mistake, or a poor choice, you can learn from it and move