The Art of Decision-Making

I was slightly surprised by the author tackling such a time-tested knot as first-time parent decision-making and "OMG how do we make good decisions about _anything_" decision theory.

But then I realized that in an existential periodical like The New Yorker, there just can't be a final answer. More like some observations about various points of view. Which is cool. But the strange definition of an "ambitious parent" toward the end of the article does read a bit more like a misguided knock on ambitious people in general, ever the clowns of the infinite-pie existentialist world view. :-)

As a coach myself, I'm frequently in situations where clients ask me to weigh in on decisions. While I'm happy to do so, even the best news from me--maybe something like, "you are absolutely on the right track, and I know it, and I think you do too" is not nearly as great as a different sort of piece of news: The decision-making sphere _even after becoming a parent_ or making some other drastic decision is so wide open as to be essentially incomprehensible. Our senses so often tell us lies about our actual options. IMO this is why we have cultural archetypes like Doctor Who. People who come in and show us that our reductionist views and the resulting expressions of judgment are often just so childish and self-protecting. Dive in! It'll be OK and we'll just keep working on it. It's not like you make a decision and _then_ stop making other decisions.

And that's another really important thing that's often overlooked in favor of the decision-theory or intuitive spreadsheeting-weighting stuff: You can build a personal model for navigating change. Using such a model, you will simply be more bad-decision-proof on the negative side, and on the upside you'll be more prepared to capitalize on good decisions.

In fact you can in many cases derive from that change-navigation model a sort of time machine. Ziiip! The worst parts of the decision just got undone. Parenting might seem unique in this way because you probably can't undo that child--there's this new dependency that didn't exist before that now demands your attention. But really, here comes Doctor Who! Look, it's a fascinating new world, not a problem. And in balancing the needs of the subject (I don't know what I'm doing!) and the needs of the object (wahhh!) there is an incredible new world teaching us lessons that apply everywhere else.

I never thought I wanted kids. I had one because my wife wanted one. Then I fell in love so hard that we had two more really quickly and I am in the process of transitioning to stay at home dad. If I had waited until I was ready and certain I would have never known how happy it was possible for me to be.

If it is a common state why shouldn't we assume that it will work? Most people who tried wouldn't give it up, which means that statistically you should be happy being a parent rather than not.

I became a parent at a young age. Here are my observations:

1. Being a parent requires adult-like time management. Time management skills and focus are what separates adults from immature old people.

2. I have become a better manager and professional because of parenthood. Children really are your worst critics and often irrationally so.

3. The things I see childless adults do that I have never had the time or money for are things I have never missed and don't regret. I don't like clubbing and other vain social experiences and I don't drink. I did jump out of planes before having children and if I were interested in investing money in this I would force my children to do with me (regardless of what they want).

4. When I vacation hiking up a mountain is more fun when you can force a complaining child to do it.

5. You become really good at recognizing self-serving interests and immature behaviors in other adults, because you have had expert level practice from parenting children. Its like looking through a one-way mirror, because some people have no idea of their own behavior and how others around them interpret it. Sometimes those self-serving people have children of their own and its clear in the consequences of their parenting.

6. Children are expensive. I am absolutely not exaggerating when I say I have always wondered how childless adults don't have enough money to live in either a mansion, own a Ferrari, or at the very least be an investment millionaire off an average person's salary. After 4 military deployments I could easily live in a cardboard box (if not for spouse, children, and pets) and become a cash millionaire off my salary plus investments in about 7 years.

7. Children make you less portable. I have often thought of moving out to a highly secluded area even if it means getting by on next to nothing. Unfortunately, spouse and kids like money and suburbia. Most adults without children take this for granted and waste it.

8. Children are an unintended predictor of success. If you can convince a child to do it you should have absolutely no problem selling it to an adult for money. You sell something to a child by forcing it on them intentionally driving large amounts of bitching and crying only then to take it away from them. This is how I got them to be self-motivated about competition athletics.