It turns out National Quitters’ Day was January 17th and represents the day people typically give up on their New Year’s resolutions.
I didn’t know it was a thing until I started seeing posts about it, then I had to look it up.
I don’t make New Year’s Resolutions. I did make a decision though on December 10th 2024 – to stop drinking alcohol. I’m writing this on Sunday, so that’s now 40 days clean. ‘Clean’ sounds very dramatic but better than sober.
I thought that sticking to any decision was really only a choice at that moment – I’ll not drink now. Looking into the origin of the word decide though, I discovered that its original meaning is different, and insightful.
Cut Off All Other Options
The word decide originally comes from the Latin verb decidere, which is a combination of the prefix de (meaning “off” or “down”) and caedere (meaning “to cut” or “strike”). The original meaning is that in making a decision, a person figuratively slices through the alternatives, cutting off the unwanted ones.
It leaves only 1 option left – the decision that was made. So in my case – I don’t drink alcohol. It’s not an ongoing decision or a choice, it is my only path forward to drink clean drinks.
When you consider decisions in your life, how many of them are like this? You decide and there is simply no other option available to you from that point onwards. This thought always reminds me of the action movies I love where the hero (or heroine) considers for a second, then does something seemingly reckless, cutting off all other avenues.
Consider this though; you decide to go to the gym 3 times a week. There is no option, only when you go, not if. You decide to leave work on time 3 nights of the week; the only choice is which days, not whether you stay on because someone demands a job is finished. That option is just not available any more.
You delegate to your team and then watch them struggle while they work it out. You do not intervene because that option is no longer available to you. Of course, the win down the line is that they get to grips with the problems and in future can cope fine.
I like the simplicity of this. When you decide, at that moment, you cut off any other options.
Modern Life blurs the edges
Modern life seems to have blurred the edges. Another word like this I found is ‘priotity’ – there can only be ONE priority, the most important. It’s never a case of deciding your top 3 priorities because “priority” is singular. It means only one is possible. Imagine this conversation at quarter planning time; “we’re going to do this only, that’s our priority”. Toys would be thrown from prams.
But deeper than all of this, is the significance of the words’ meanings. To decide is to leave yourself only 1 way forwards, no option to change your mind afterwards. To set a priority is to choose the single most important thing and treat the others as if they are not even there until that one is done.
There is a purity and simplicity that I really love about this.
An Action to Take Now
So you can probably guess what I’m going to ask next. Which decision have you made recently that really ought to be revisited in the light of the real meaning of the verb to decide? Which thing did you say you were going to do and have sort-of-fudged ever since?
Going to the gym? Eating healthily? Leaving for home on time? Leaving the laptop alone on weekends with your family?
Which decisions should be revisited right now and made more firmly?
And how much better would life be – perhaps in a while once the dust has settled – as a result?
