say it out loud?

I heard someone say to make good decisions you have to have a process between opportunity and decision.

A lot of times when you hear of someone talk about a bad decision they made, you ask them what were they thinking, they respond with "I don't know!" What if there was a way to limit the damage of a decision.  Here is a suggestion on a way to put that process in place: Say it out loud. Say it out loud? - yep

That's right. Before you do something, say it out loud. When you say it out loud put a question mark at the end of it. It helps you be intentional about what you do and takes away most excuses. 

Here is an example. Let's say you are not happy in your relationship and you start talking to someone online. It is intended to be totally harmless but you choose not to tell your spouse. Say that out loud and it would sound something like this - "I am talking to another person instead of talking to my spouse and I am hiding it from my spouse?" - it doesn't sound like a good idea now does it.

Let's try another one. You sit down to eat and have 2 cheeseburgers a large fry and a huge coke. Here is what it would sound like in form of a question. "I am going to spend money so I can eat a lot of incredibly unhealthy fried food that is going to harm my body?"

Here are some quick ones: I am going to say mean and hurtful things to my spouse until she won't forgive me? / I am going to lie until no one can trust me? / I am going to neglect my children and allow them to be raised by video games and the television? / I am going to look at trash on the internet and lie about it? / I am going to ... you fill in the rest of the question.

My point: if you have someone you can trust it is always a great idea to run it by them. If they are not around to talk to, ask yourself. Ask out loud and form it as a question to see if it sounds like a good idea. 

I am going to blog about saying it out loud? - see how good this little nugget of wisdom works...