"We don't know what will happen next. We just know we must be ready." | 5R Decision Protocol

"We don't know what will happen next. We just know we must be ready." This phrase graced the front of a letter I received from Médecins Sans Frontières who has resumed its activities in Gaza. Working with MSF in 2006-7 in South Sudan was one of the most vivid, intense and fulfilling experiences of my life. Decisions had to be made fast with rifles in the room.

We can't know the future. But we can become more responsive to rapidly changing conditions.

In life-threatening situations, you can't rely on your emotions and you don't have time for a pros and cons list. Intuition is only useful in proportion to your experience. Simple protocols applied with awareness save lives. It's how you know that it's not about responding to the loudest voice at the scene - but going to the quiet one that's slowly losing consciousness.

But what about ordinary life, when you have more time to make a decision? When you know change is coming but you're not immediately at risk? Either going for or ending a role, a business, a relationship or big move of some kind. Endless optimising can become a recipe for low-level anxiety and overthinking. And often we already know the answer.

I once had a conversation with a senior engineering exec who wanted to retire. He’d planned a sailing adventure with his family. But he was delaying thinking he should stay longer to improve the finances and see if other opportunities might come up in the company. A week later, he messaged me to say he’d been fired.

Decisions that drag on - dilemmas - often take the form of:

I want X but I don't want to lose Y.

A classic: I want the freedom and creativity of independent work, but I don't want to lose the status and salary of employment - especially in an economic crisis. And so the loop runs for years, visiting us at night or whenever we pause.

The equation cannot be solved by further thinking. But by realising the mental mechanics of decision making.

So why do we spend so much time thinking about decisions if they keep us stuck?

BRAIN FRICTION

Stuckness appears when core functions of the brain come into friction. It’s when your thinking about the situation and pros and cons calculation are clouding the reality of decision-making. Decision comes from 'decidere' which means to cut off. Opening up certain options cuts off others. And our mammalian brain doesn't like loss.

Awareness of the sources of brain friction reduces its power:

1) Desire hijack:

The loudest voice in the brain is the reactive impulse - craving and fear. These optimise for short-term gratification not long-term contentment. This is our internal terror and propaganda machine.

2) Information blindness: 

We don't have all the information - but further research and external opinions don't always help because we might weigh it incorrectly through our biases, traumas, and cultural norms. Further information just feeds our biased inner-algorithm - like a bad social media feed.

3) Mirage effect: 

We're not very good at knowing what will make us happy. We may spend our lives chasing something, only to get it and realise it’s not what we really want because it's not what we thought it was.

It's not our fault. We haven't been trained to make decisions. We've been trained to absorb information, process it, perhaps think critically. Many intelligent people are trapped not because they’re irrational, but because they’re trying to think their way out of the fear of uncontrollable uncertainty.

So what can we do? Especially as decision fatigue rises due to a sense of increasing uncertainty...

LIBERATING DECISIONS AND THE 5RS: thinking to live well not living to think well.

Choice always involves risk but we can make choices we’re aligned with and proud of. Liberating decisions cannot be made from endless strategising or reactive impulses. But they can be made through full awareness by connecting to real needs prioritised through a deeper vision and values. 

For me, that vision is liberating others as I liberate myself. If I ever feel trapped - or that I'm trapping others - I know that's a signal to pause, wake up, and reorient towards that vision.

You can’t prevent unintended consequences but you can act from what really matters to you, your deeper vision of what's possible. That may feel scary. But you can act with courage and use thinking to live well rather than living to think well. 

We make our best decisions from full awareness of the uncertainty of life - the vulnerability and exhilaration of it. What Zorba the Greek and mindfulness famously called ‘full catastrophe living’.

The 5R Decision Protocol is designed to cut through thinking noise, open awareness of the decision-making mechanics you’re in, and reveal the clear signal. Tibetan meditation masters call this Trekchö - cutting through to reveal what's really true. From there, actions flow. The 5Rs decision process:

• Recognise: your mind is predicting and proliferating, trying to solve an unsolvable equation

• Refrain: pause and cut through. This is the hard part.

• Relax:  once the thinking loop stops, you'll feel what's really underneath - the propaganda of reactive impulses and inaccurate thoughts clouding your mind. 

• Reorient: connect with your six deeper needs and unique vision. This is a specific experience, not just an idea. 

• Respond: from this expanded awareness of your decision-making habits and possibilities, the next step becomes obvious. It's often a liberating and pleasant relief.

Making one decision the 5R way shifts your relationship to decision making entirely. Uncertainty is no longer a problem but a path to ongoing liberation.

If this resonates, I'd love to coach you through it. We'll journey into your experience so you can come out with clarity, relief and dopamine-rich momentum.

We don't know what will happen next. We just know we must be ready — with better decision-making.

Book your 5R Decision Session here.

Amina

P.S. This offer is for you as a Wise Wednesday reader. You're welcome to refer someone. The anniversary rate is available until May 31st. The session itself can be used until the end 2026.