As I look back to my early adulthood, during my time as a college student and competitive athlete, I am amazed at how I was making decisions with tradeoffs that now seem counterproductive to the goals I had as an athlete and student. Partying with friends the night before a doubleheader or procrastinating assignments only to end up having to do an all-nighter to complete it because I was "too busy" doing other things that seemed more urgent.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't regret any of these decisions. I enjoyed this period of my life very much. But now, ten years older (and maybe a little bit wiser), I find myself considering the tradeoffs taking place with every decision, small or big, that I make.
I'm not sure where or how this practice started. But my best guess is that as I have lived and reflected on my successes and failures, my understanding of what's important to me has become a bit clearer. And I believe that this, in turn, has given me the ability to weigh long-term benefits versus short-term gratification with a bit more precision.
I say all this only to illustrate that we all have the potential to make better decisions. But before we can make better decisions, we have to be clear about what type of tradeoffs we are willing to make. And these tradeoffs are very often in line with what matters most to us.