You Don't Need More Discipline. You Need Fewer Decisions.

The Decision Tax

Count the decisions in your first hour awake:

• When to get up (snooze or not?)
• What to wear
• What to eat
• What to check first (email? news? Slack?)
• How to respond to the notification that just appeared
• Whether to exercise
• What route to take
• What music/podcast to listen to

That's maybe 20 decisions before you've walked into work. Each one small. Each one depleting the same cognitive resource you'll need for the hard decisions later.

Decision fatigue is real. Research shows that judges make different rulings at 9am vs. 4pm - not because the cases change, but because their decision-making capacity degrades. You're not different.

The Discipline Myth

We frame productivity as a willpower problem. "If I just had more discipline, I'd..."

• Start my day with deep work
• Not check email constantly
• Exercise consistently
• Make better decisions under pressure

But willpower isn't a character trait. It's a resource. And like any resource, it can be depleted. By afternoon, after hundreds of micro-decisions, even disciplined people make poor choices.

The High-Cost Decisions You Don't Notice

The big decisions are obvious. Hiring. Strategy. Budget allocation. Those are clearly important.

The hidden decisions drain you faster:

1. What to work on next

Every time you finish a task, you decide what's next. If you're choosing from scratch each time, that's dozens of decisions daily.

2. How to respond

Each email, each Slack message requires a judgment call. Reply now? Later? Delegate? Ignore?

3. Whether to say yes

Requests hit constantly. Coffee chats, meetings, committees, favor asks. Each requires evaluation.

4. How much effort to give

Is this a "good enough" task or a "do it right" task? That judgment call happens constantly.

5. When to stop

When is a document finished? When have you spent enough time on a problem? When do you go home?

These decisions happen so frequently we don't register them. But they accumulate.

The Elimination Strategies

Strategy 1: Pre-decide routines

The same breakfast. The same morning routine. The same first task of the day. The same shutdown ritual.

Steve Jobs and the black turtleneck is a cliché, but the principle stands: routines convert decisions into defaults.

Your opportunities:

• What you wear (work "uniform" or prep the night before)
• What you eat (meal prep or standard options)
• When you exercise (same time, non-negotiable)
• First task of the day (decided the night before, not morning-of)

Strategy 2: Time-based defaults

Instead of deciding when to check email, decide once: "I check email at 8, 12, and 4."

Instead of deciding when to take meetings, decide once: "Meetings are only Tuesday through Thursday."

Strategy 3: Pre-set criteria

Instead of evaluating each request fresh, create decision rules:

• "I say yes to first meetings with anyone in my industry. I say no to generic coffee chat requests."
• "I attend events where I'm speaking or where specific stakeholders will be present. I skip the rest."
• "I respond to parent concerns within 24 hours. Other emails get batched processing."

Strategy 4: Delegate the decision, not just the task

Bad delegation: "Handle this, but check with me before deciding."

Good delegation: "Handle this. Here's the framework. I trust you to decide."

The first creates two decision points. The second creates zero for you.

The Morning Fortress

Your mornings set the tone. A scattered morning = scattered day.

The goal: Arrive at work with your decision capacity intact.

The tactics:

• Night-before prep: Tomorrow's outfit, bag packed, first task identified. Wake up with a plan, not a question.

• Morning automation: Same wake time, same breakfast, same sequence. No decisions until you're at your desk.

• Delay inputs: Don't check email or news before arriving at work. Every notification is a decision prompt.

• First task protected: Your first 60-90 minutes should be your highest-value work. Decide what it is the night before. Just start, don't decide.

The Hard Decisions Get Better

Here's the payoff: When you've eliminated 150 unnecessary decisions before noon, you have capacity for the 10 that actually matter.

• The staffing conversation you've been avoiding
• The strategic question that requires real thought
• The difficult parent situation that needs your full presence
• The creative work that doesn't happen when you're depleted

Decision quality improves. Not because you became smarter or more disciplined, but because you stopped wasting capacity on trivial choices.

The Common Objection

"But I need flexibility!"

Routines aren't rigidity. They're strategic defaults. You can override them when genuinely necessary.

The difference is:

• Without defaults: Every moment is a decision point
• With defaults: Exceptions are decisions, routine is automatic

You still have flexibility. You just don't pay the decision tax for things that don't require judgment.

Your Decision Audit

Track for one day:

1. Every time you decide what to do next
2. Every time you evaluate a request
3. Every time you choose between options

Don't try to change anything. Just count.

Most people are shocked at the volume. That shock is useful.

Start Here

Pick one area to pre-decide:

• Easy: Tomorrow's first task, decided tonight
• Medium: Fixed email check times for one week
• Hard: A decision rule for a request type that hits you frequently

One change. See how it feels. Notice what capacity opens up.

The goal isn't perfect efficiency. It's having something left for the work that actually matters.