Creating a Decision-Making Framework That Actually Works – Extract from lecture 32, part 2 of The Calmness in Mind Process by John Glanvill.

Most people never sit down and define what they actually value. They operate on childhood conditioning, inherited “shoulds,” and the loudest anxiety of the day. Decision-making stays slow, energy stays low, and the same patterns keep repeating.

Clarity changes that. When you know what you believe, what you need, and where you are heading, choices become simpler. If something lines up with your framework, you do it, regardless of how it feels in the moment. If it does not, you leave it. The internal debate shrinks.

Start with the foundation that shapes everything else: what do you think happens when you die? Is this life a short flash between two stretches of nothing, or does a formless part of you continue? You cannot sit on the fence. The answer you choose influences how much risk, effort and meaning you are prepared to bring to the years you have now. Decide, then live accordingly.

Next, build a needs hierarchy. List the areas of life that actually matter right now — health, work, relationships, creativity, money, calmness — and rank the top four by genuine priority, not by what the anxiety wants you to obsess over. Then decide the style of thinking and behaviour you will bring to those needs. Will you be more active or passive, more logical or more feeling? Write the benefits of meeting each need and why it matters. This is not vague self-help. It is a practical filter that stops you spending ninety per cent of your energy on the wrong things.

After that, examine values and beliefs. Go through a list of words — honesty, playfulness, calmness, responsibility, rebellion, connection, discipline — and ask three questions of each: Is this important to me? Do I want to stop or change it? Might it be worth adopting? Group the ones that matter, separate core values from nice-to-haves, and prioritise the top ten. For each one write a short statement that covers four points: why it is important, what you used to do, what you will now do, and what positive difference it will make.

These statements become your operating system. An example for honesty might read: “I used to stay silent to avoid conflict and ended up angry and anxious. I will speak my truth politely. Unless people know what I need, they cannot respond accurately and I stay inauthentic.” Values can contradict each other according to context — family versus work, settler versus nomad — and that is fine. The point is conscious choice rather than automatic reaction.

Once the document is complete, print the key pages and keep them visible. Reading them daily retrains the reticular activating system, making opportunities and decisions that match your framework more noticeable. Decision-making stops being a daily emotional battle and becomes a simple alignment check.

A useful secondary tool is the LEAP model: a simple grid with passive–active on one axis and logical–emotional on the other. Most people get stuck in one quadrant. Depression often sits in passive-emotional. Classic OCD behaviours can look passive-logical from the outside even while the mind races. Pure O tends to affect repressed nomads; conventional OCD often affects repressed warriors. The goal is behavioural flexibility — the ability to move deliberately into whichever quadrant the situation requires without the old self-sabotage stories dragging you back.

The work is not quick. Your conditioned mind will claim you are too busy, too tired or still do not know what you want. That is the sabotage talking. Those who complete the process usually notice that life becomes quieter and more directed. You stop wasting energy on decisions that do not matter and start using it on the ones that do.

Write it down. Keep it in front of you. Act on it. That is the practical difference between knowing about change and actually making it.

The workbook is available as part of the course.