#96 The Mapless Navigator: Overcoming Decision Outsourcing

Many professionals struggle with the hidden weight of unmade choices that drain their daily momentum. Francois Esterhuizen works with leaders to identify these internal blocks, providing the clarity needed to transition from avoidance to decisive action.

Imagine a captain who keeps the ship’s engines burning and the crew working, yet refuses to look at the map because they don’t want to have to make a choice.

In your life, this looks like "open files": projects or decisions that are pending not because of external delays, but because they carry enough discomfort or uncertainty that you’d rather just not have to deal with it right now.

You hope that by the time you reach the first clearing, the "future you" will have decided on the route, but you usually only to find yourself further from home, more exhausted and with less time to solve the challenge ahead of you.

Decision outsourcing

This process is called decision outsourcing. This happens when we take a complex choice and push it into an undefined future, assuming our "future self" will inherently be more resilient or capable. This psychological delay provides temporary emotional relief but comes at a heavy cost to our personal momentum and clarity.

Many people treat their future selves as a high-capacity storage unit for the choices they find uncomfortable or "boring" today. There is a common, unexamined belief that the version of you waking up next Tuesday will be more disciplined, more refreshed, or better equipped to handle the weight of the moment.

They rarely are.

This isn’t about postponing a decision because you are waiting on critical information that is likely to come. This is about deferring discomfort that will almost certainly carry the same dataset and emotional weight that it does now.

The cost of creative accounting

By deferring that choice you are not saving energy; you are simply ensuring that the decision must eventually be made under greater pressure and with less time.

This form of "creative accounting" suggests you can borrow clarity from tomorrow to pay for the comfort of today’s indecision.

In reality, that future version of you is simply the same person, now further burdened by a growing backlog of avoided responsibilities and unresolved questions.

What is one decision you are currently outsourcing to a future version of yourself who will be no better equipped than you are right now?

Recognised as a trusted and sought-after clarity and leadership coach, Francois Esterhuizen works from Stellenbosch with South African professionals worldwide. His work empowers individuals and leaders to transform emotional resistance into clarity, sustained momentum, and meaningful impact.