Paralysis of Choice

The ceiling fan in our bedroom failed the other day. It had been making a ticking sound for awhile and my mild efforts to correct this, tightening any available screws, somehow killed it. The same day, I made pancakes and finally got fed up with the stickiness of our frying pans. Then I set out to procure replacements for both of these items I ran smack dab into the overwhelming wall of choice.

Do we want a non-stick frying pan? Stainless steel? Cast-iron? What brand? Which is best? What do I plan to use it for? What size? How long should it last? What kind of maintenance do I want to put in?

What style should the fan be? Do we want pull-chain? Do we want a smart fan? Can it be integrated into the other smart devices I have? Is it worth it or better to just go ahead and replace the switch like I’ve been meaning to for 6months? How big should it be? Integrated light? Do I feel confident enough to install it myself? I’ve done it before but with a 50/50 success rate. Do I dare do it again? Do I really want to pay over $100 for something I could do myself? If I do it poorly I have to try to sleep why it makes an annoying noise.

All of these options for what should be relatively simple things. I ended up spending an hour learning about different pan types, picking out one on Amazon, deciding against it, buying two different pan types when I was at the store next, regretting the choice as soon as I got home, spending another hour considering options. With my brain distracted here, I stared at fans for a few minutes at Home Depot and walked out not wanting to make a decision.

Now, this is all an extreme example of ridiculousness. My personal bandwidth has been eaten up by some other things lately so when these were dropped on top of it I had no capacity to make a decision. And instead of putting it off, and addressing other matters first, I tried to make this seemingly simple decision and be done with it.

My failure speaks to one of the underrated problems with the world today; too many choices for us to be able to make informed decisions. The internet compounds this issue by making all the options available to you along with opinions that seem reasonable to a layperson that are in direct contradiction of each other. And every decision has to be made now, now, now.