- Friends
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- Nov 07, 2020
Decision Quotes
The weight of a choice, before and after it's made.
This page collects decision quotes spanning military campaigns, a wartime scientific effort that ultimately went nowhere, and the personal calculus behind everyday choices, like skipping a workout for a role. One entry recalls the internal tug-of-war before founding Teach For America. See our Choice for a closer look at that moment of deciding.
- Last Updated on May 30, 2021
- Day
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- Nov 07, 2020
Both of my sisters have been teachers and they used to say you get asked between 300 and 600 questions every day which you have to answer. That's exactly what directing is. And the vast majority of those questions are not very interesting really, but they need somebody to make a decision - a good one or a bad one - and they follow it.
- Getting
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- Nov 07, 2020
The effort invested in 'getting it right' should be commensurate with the importance of the decision.
- Happy
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- Nov 07, 2020
My interest in well-being evolved from my interest in decision making - from raising the question of whether people know what they will want in the future and whether the things that people want for themselves will make them happy.
- More
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- Nov 07, 2020
If you're making a bunch of little decisions - like, do I read this email now or later? Do I file it? Do I forward it? Do I have to get more information? Do I put it in the spam folder? - that's a handful of decisions right there, and you haven't done anything meaningful. It puts us into a brain state of decision fatigue.
- Hands
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- Nov 07, 2020
Obama is making a choice now that will lead to the deaths of many thousands of civilians in Afghanistan by American hands. By ordinary standards of presidents, he is a decent man. But those standards aren't good enough. He's in a position either to kill or not to kill, and he's made the decision to kill.
- Focus
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- Nov 07, 2020
My parents made the decision never to focus on my looks, and I had no sense of myself as beautiful.
- End
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- Nov 07, 2020
The mistake I really learned from was in 2005, leading the Indianapolis 500. I had a decision whether or not to save enough fuel to finish the race - which meant slowing down - or going all-out for the win. I went conservative and saved enough fuel to go to the end but finished fourth.
- Life
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- Nov 07, 2020
Mormonism truly was a part of my every decision since the day I was born. It taught me to serve others and to feel comfort about the next life. Who doesn't want to live for eternity and have a 'mansion in heaven'? It sounded like a rad deal to me when I was in my teenage years.
- Living
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- Nov 07, 2020
The last time I had to make a career decision, I was 17. I could have gone to Ballet Theatre or National Ballet of Canada. There were options. But as I became exposed to the Robbins repertoire, I realized that there was a living genius in the house.
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- Nov 07, 2020