So What Do You Want to Do Now?

Sometimes it drives me nuts when I'm in a group of people (whether in person or via email) and it takes forever to make a simple decision; people hem and haw because they don't want to step on anyone's toes or they just don't really care one way or another. This happens more frequently than I would like, where somehow it becomes a lengthy discussion about the various options of what to eat or where to go, and it seems to take more effort to make a decision than it would to actually do the suggested activity and be done with it.

I've lost countless hours to the innocuous question, "So what do you want to do now?" that is often followed by the most unhelpful answer possible, "I don't know, what do you want to do?" The vicious cycle of indecisiveness continuing on endlessly, where neither party wants to cave and make a solid decision. And often as a result, nothing is accomplished.

There are times when I can't take the long drawn out decision-making (or lack there-of) process, so I may narrow things down to a couple of options in the hopes that someone will have a preference (and this usually does help move things along). However, if my suggestions still don't inspire a decision then I may just make the decision myself, because once you make a decision, then suddenly someone inevitably has an opinion about it. [Sigh.]