The Cost of Impatience and Not Following Sound Advice

Last week I made a bad decision, one that cost me about $4,000 more than an alternative would have.

And the thing is, if I had just waited 24 hours to make the decision, I would have made the right decision. Turns out I could have waited, if I had just thought about it. But, nope … my impatience, and a feeling that I had little choice, led me to make a decision without going through all of the right steps.

In addition to the money, what upsets me is that I know better. I actually give sound advice on my Keen PDA site about how to make decisions. (Not bragging: it’s nothing I invented … it is all based on research and lessons learned.) And a few hours AFTER I made the decision, I began working my way through this and got some good advice from others during the evening. During these evening discussions, an alternative arose that would have been much preferable. And, I tried the following morning to implement it, but it was too late.

Impatience has been a characteristic of mine for years, and it only worsens with age. Couple impatience with a feeling that there are no alternatives, even though there probably are, and you can really set yourself up for a regret. It is all too common for us to think we have no alternatives, when we really do have alternatives: we just have to take the time, and get in the right frame of mind, to think of them.

I mention this because I see signs of impatience everywhere I go. It’s not just me that’s impatient. From what I see in local traffic, and from traveling, impatience is an epidemic in this country. So, if you share this characteristic with me and a lot of others, hopefully you can learn from my mistake. I hope I can.