The three questions that cut through any big decision

Most people facing a major decision aren't short of information. They're drowning in it. Every option has a spreadsheet, an opinion, and a friend-of-a-friend who did the opposite and swears by it.

After thousands of clarity sessions, we've found that almost any tangled decision yields to three questions. They won't make the choice for you - but they'll show you what you're really deciding.

1. What are you actually choosing between?

It sounds obvious, but most stuck decisions are stuck because the options are blurry. People agonise over a false binary while a third, better option sits unnamed. Write the real options down, plainly. Often the act of naming them resolves half the difficulty.

2. What has to be true for each option to be the right one?

Instead of asking which option is best, ask what would have to be true for each to be best. This flips anxiety into investigation. Now you have something concrete to check, rather than a feeling to wrestle.

3. Which regret could you not live with?

When options are genuinely close, stop optimising and look at the downside. You can live with most disappointments. The decision usually comes down to the one regret you couldn't make peace with - and that's worth listening to.

None of this requires an advisor. But a good one makes the questions sharper and keeps you honest in answering them. That's most of what a clarity session is.