I love this article on why easy decisions are so hard by the ludicrously young and authentic Jonah Lehrer, author of How We Decide and Proust was a Neuroscientist. I’ve mentioned it here on this blog a lot…that I struggle to make the simplest of decisions, like what toothpaste to buy. And other such”first-world problems”. (As an aside, for thyroid disease folk…indecision is a very AI trait).

I loved, mostly, how Jonah confesses that he’s crap at making toothpaste decisions, too, despite being an expert on how we decide. He picks the research apart and finds that we stall with dumb decisions because we allow ourselves to be fooled into thinking they’re important decisions simply because they’ve been made complicated (mostly by too many options):

“Call it the drug store heuristic: A cluttered store shelf leads us to automatically assume that a choice must really matter, even if it doesn’t.”

The analysis paralysis makes us think the decision is important…which intensifies the paralysis. And around and around we go. It’s a very real issue for more of us. We’re bombarded with more stupid options daily.

This is how I simplify decisions?

• Narrow your choices. Actively.

One day I started a blog. I didn’t know where it would head. I spewed forth and it grew like a virus. I just wanted to share things.

Like all things with technology, it moved faster than I was able to adjust. So, truth be known, it’s not really what I thought it would be. But, then, it’s exactly what it needs to be. ‘Cos here it is.

I thought about doing a mass overhaul, to get it ship-shape (redesign, get it looking less “young”, change the name to…a real blog name!). But instead I’ve opted for gentle shifts.

On Wednesday I posted about how I hired a virtual assistant to help with my blog. They’ve kindly decided to offer everyone a discount on Freelancer – three project posts for free! When you register, use this code: “SARAH”. They’re also answering any questions you might have on the post.

Today, though, I want to share two other services I totally dig:

This week I get happy…close to home

Gretchen Rubin calls it her “Beautiful House” moment. As in, “This is not my beautiful house”, the existential lament from the Talking Heads hit “Once in a Lifetime”. Gretchen’s life was ticking along just fine. She had a beautiful house. Two kids. And all the rest. But she woke one day with that feeling of discontent and disbelief and asked, Is this it? Is this me?

It wasn’t. There was more she yearned for and so she set off on The Happiness Project, which launched – as everything does these days – as a blog in March 2006. I’ve been following it for years, often somewhat bewildered by the Cartesian precision with which she pulls apart the bumbling ways we humans happen upon happiness. She’s written thousands of posts over the course of her journey, attracting a monthly following of 300,000 readers. She’s a regular on the American morning TV circuit, contributes to the Huffington Post and has turned her findings into a number one bestselling book that sat on the New York Times list for 18 weeks (and it’s released her this month).

Sweet bonus on a Sunday: I’M GIVING AWAY THREE COPIES of the book today to three readers generous enough to share what they think makes human’s happy. A simple tip will do. I’ll get Gretchen to pick the winners!

Which begs: after such a long, imbedded journey, what’s the one take-home-wrapped-in-ribbon-with-warrantee trick that has resonated with her disciples? What, dear Gretchen, moves us beyond our beautiful house and makes us happy?

On Monday I posed this very question. Gretchen’s response down the phone from New York? You ready for it?

This week I go streamlined on a single-speed bike

You might’ve noticed everyone’s into “simplifying”. It’s very recessional chic right now. People from all walks are chucking stuff out and packing up what’s left to go live in Bali. Or on a goat farm. Luxury car manufacturers and banks are flogging simplicity in their advertising slogans and a new self-help genre has spawned showing us how to consolidate our remote controls and live without a waffle-maker.

Admittedly, I’ve previously ridden this altruistic bandwagon myself, decluttering my books and hosing out my email inbox. But I’m now wondering if “streamlining” isn’t a better way to go. “Simplifying” tends to have a certain The Good Life vibe to it, don’t you think – a bit grubby, earnest and requiring a fulltime commitment to composting. When, let’s face it, most of us could relate to Penelope Keith when she’d look over the fence in despair at her neighbours’ muddy mess.

Simplifying is about reversing our erroneous ways, uprooting our lives and ridding ourselves of things. Which is kind of sad and harsh and really hard to achieve. Streamlining, however, is gentle. It’s about shaving off excess, and perhaps steering the boat a little to the left, for a more flow-y ride. It’s a smooth, glide-y ethos for life, and an elegant aesthetic. No gumboots required. Yes, streamlining makes life better. Of that I’m sure.

This thinking started a month ago when I looked over at my dual-suspension, knobbly-tyred mountain bike in the hall and thought, what a cluttery, clumpy contraption you are!

…down at Bondi, a quick sand run and a float in the ocean, looking up at the sky and getting into the right mood for the day.

This has been my routine for years. I’ve watched one woman, in this time, get pregnant and – bounce back again – twice!! There’s the over-tanned older lady who sand shuffles in a bright bikini with a matching hat. She always matches. And waves. I feel her happinss as she shuffles past. There’s the Russian body builders whose veins bulge at the neck. Dr Chris Brown is a regular. The Bondi Rescue boys always sing out encouragement. I’ve even had two blind running dates (sweat, sand, lycra and a 6.30 rendez-vous…anyone else up for it?)

This is my community. When you have a routine, you can tap into a community.

Routine can also make life simple. Each morning I wear the same green shorts and this red hat (it’s about seven years old now). I don’t have to think about what I wear. I dress and run. I don’t have to think about what makes me happy. This routine does. I just gravitate to it each day and I start my day happy.

This morning I ran into these cheeky kids (Deb and Sammy). Eugene from Aquabumbs took the pic. If you go to his site you’ll also see my mate Stu, who’s in my ‘hood, too.

“It’s the people that you meet, when you’re walking in the street…”.

So, this week, in my journey to find a better life, I outsource my eating.

Now, tell me if I have this right.  You’re feeling fat. No, it’s more than that. You feel stodged up and toxic and traffic has ground to a sluggish, cranky crawl down there. Grandma’s mince pies and sustained cheap champagne abuse has taken its fetid toll.  And now you’re obsessed with “getting back on track”, reforming your eating with a clean start. Accordingly, your head is swirling with a clusterf*ck of messages about food  – No more gluten? No eating after 6pm? Only carrot sticks for a week? You don’t know where to start or what you’re meant to eat any more. So you down a mince pie.

I’ve always found dieting depressing. I’ve never really been on one. Merely observing others wrestle with them gives me heart-sink. Ditto detoxing. Detoxing’s diet-lite, or dieting for those who fear dieting makes them look vain and affected. In principle, they’re useful. In practice, they do our heads in. I reckon (and I’ve mentioned this before) it’s because they’re limiting. They’re about saying no and holding back, which is antithetical to the spirit of human beingness.

But worse, they tend to leave us more obsessed about food than ever. Dieting and detoxing are all about finicky food rules and hyper-body consciousness and explaining to waiters you need the dressing on the side. You can’t fix a food fixation with more food. It’s like mending a wound by dragging the scab through gravel.

But all that said, this week I did a five-day detox, the details of which I post above. It was a juice/soup/almond milk program that ticked all the nutritional boxes (I had a nutritionist check it out). But – and here’s the rub – all the food was prepared for me, and then delivered to my door in a little esky, replete with daily nutritional updates, like “today your liver will be angry”. I didn’t have to do a thing.