Sorting and choosing

A picker feels overloaded by choice. A chooser focuses on what makes a decision important and imagines alternatives if necessary, but then moves forward without regret or imagining every other foregone choice they could have made. Be a chooser.

Barry Schwartz says we have to become “choosers” instead of “pickers.” A picker selects from the options available, leading us into false dichotomies created by the options we see in front of us. But a chooser “is thoughtful enough to conclude that perhaps none of the available alternatives are satisfactory, and that if he or she wants the right al

People handle having lots of choices in two ways: by “maximizing” or “satisficing.” Maximizing is exploring all the options, weighing them, and trying to get the best. Satisficing is thinking about what you need and picking the first thing that fulfills those needs. Satisficing is living by “good enough.”