An abundance of choice

As I was staring at the ever growing pile of ironing this morning, I stopped for a moment and thought about all the choices I have to make every day.  I often iron in stages - in between ironing I sit down, do a little internet surfing, TV watching, breakfast eating and today, contemplated the abundance of choice I have in my life.

I live a fairly privileged existence.  At times it doesn't  seem like that to me.  At times I feel constrained and limited by my life, but when I stop and examine my life with a more objective eye, I have to admit that I live pretty well.  I get to go on small, but frequent holidays; I don't hesitate to buy myself a coffee in my local coffee bar; I go to concerts, the theatre and generally say no to myself far less than many people.  I don't have a great deal of money, but then it never was one of my driving ambitions.  I lovingly drive my 14 year old car and  I am still delighted to have a little car of my own.

Yet I still complain and obsess about having too many choices in my life.  I feel overwhelmed by choice.  Today I went to my local small supermarket and wanted to  buy some hot  sauce.  There were 18 (!) different kinds of hot sauce.  How can anyone need 18 varieties of hot sauce?  I stood in front of all these sauces, each of which promised different levels of burn your insides out and decided that I wasn't at all sure of how hot each one was and whether I wanted to make a decision about this, so I did what I often do when presented with so many choices, I walked away and bought nothing.

This happens quite regularly.  I recently went shopping intending to buy bed sheets.  I always buy simple white cotton sheets.  No choice to be made as to colour or size or even fabric, so this one should have been easy.  I got to the shop, found the bedding section and there was an entire display section of white bedding.  Some were cotton percale,  some Egyptian cotton, some had a 200, 300, 400, 500 thread count and some were self-striped and some plain.  I stood there for ages, looking from  one shelf to another and came to the conclusion that I didn't really need sheets and went home empty-handed.

In my work, I talk to people about choice and power.  There are always discussions about how people who have no choices in their lives - where they live, what work they can do,  no money - have a sense of powerlessness, a sense of having no control over their lives.  A lack of choice means little power and therefore it stands to reason that the more choices we have the more powerful we feel.  If you can choose your life circumstances you feel empowered and are able to be stronger and have a greater impact  on the world.

The problem for me is when the choices we have become so numerous and pointless that they lead to just the opposite effect. The amount of choice we are faced with every day just makes decision-making an ordeal and inertia and powerlessness are often the only response. Is this a function of aging?  Am I the only person paralysed into indecision by the number of things I have to choose from.  Even buying an ice cream means I have to choose from about 40 flavours, not to mention cup or cone, toppings, sugar-free or not.  It used to be so easy - strawberry, chocolate or vanilla - finished.

So as I iron I realise I have to iron at least five times the amount of clothing I need for my holiday.  This is because I can't decide what to take with me.  This, plus the amount of time I have to decide, is making choosing my holidaqy wardrobe extra difficult.  By tomorrow I will have less time and so will be forced to make choices.  Usually I hate time pressure, but this time it makes my life a bit easier.