Have you ever come home after a long day at work, ready to relax and watch something on Netflix, only to spend half an hour scrolling through options and eventually decide not to watch anything at all? That happens to me more often than I’d like to admit.
Have you noticed how, when you’re at a restaurant and everything on the menu looks tempting, it suddenly becomes so much harder to decide what to eat? By the time you finally order, you start second-guessing yourself. You begin to wonder if you should have gone for the fried rice instead of pasta.
We’re constantly making choices all the time, from what to wear, which career to pursue, what to buy, who to date, and even which hobbies to take up. And yet, the big question is still there: are we really happier than our parents or grandparents, who didn’t have this level of freedom?
Back then, things were simpler. Buying toothpaste was almost laughably easy. You’d pick between two or three options like whitening, fresh breath, or cavity protection, and that was it.
The other day, I wanted to buy toothpaste, and I was standing in the supermarket aisle staring at all the options. There were herbal blends, charcoal, sensitive teeth, enamel care, salt, green tea, herbal, organic and more. What should have taken thirty seconds now took me five minutes, and instead of feeling relieved, I started to feel overwhelmed.
In the Indian community, marriages are another example. A few generations ago, many were arranged. People weren’t spending years swiping through apps looking for “the one.” Whether they liked it or not, choices were made for them. And while that didn’t guarantee happiness, it meant they rarely faced what we now call decision fatigue or in other words, mental exhaustion that comes from having to choose all the time.
The thing is, when you don’t have a hundred forks in the road, you don’t waste as much energy doubting yourself. Life feels more structured. Maybe restrictive, yes, but a lot less tiring.
Fast forward to now. We can pick from endless career paths, browse online stores with millions of products, and meet more potential partners on apps than our grandparents could have met in an entire lifetime. On paper, that looks like progress. We’ve got freedom, independence, and control.
But here’s the deal. Research shows that too many options often backfire. Two things usually happen. First, there’s paralysis. You stare at all the possibilities and end up choosing nothing. And second, there’s opportunity cost. Even when you do decide, you keep thinking about the options you didn’t take.
It’s like ordering ice cream. Out of thirty flavours, you finally settle on one, but instead of enjoying it, your brain starts wandering to the twenty-nine you didn’t choose. What if the chocolate hazelnut was better? Or the pistachio? And suddenly, the one in your hand feels disappointing.
Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice, explains this really well on his TED Talk. In the past, if people ended up unhappy with a purchase, they blamed circumstances or the world around them. Today, with so many choices, if we’re unhappy, we tend to blame ourselves for making the wrong call.
This is because self-blame leads to dissatisfaction. And the more options we have, the more perfect we expect the outcome to be. We start believing there has to be the “best” partner, the “best” job, the “best” version of everything. But perfection rarely shows up, and when reality falls short of our expectations, disappointment creeps in.
This gap between what we imagine and what we get is one of the reasons why so many people in modern societies feel restless, even when life is objectively better than before.
Psychologists have proven this overload effect in clever ways. One famous study showed shoppers either twenty-four flavours of jam or just six. Guess what? The bigger display attracted more people, but hardly anyone bought anything. The smaller display actually led to more purchases and happier customers.
There was another study on chocolate ice cream on the same pattern. One option felt limiting, thirty felt overwhelming, but a handful gave people the most satisfaction.
And if you think about dating, it plays out the same way. In older generations, many Indian marriages offered little to no choice. Control over happiness was limited. Today, apps give us endless swipes, but instead of feeling free, many people feel drained. They struggle to commit because they always wonder if someone better is just around the corner.
The sweet spot lies somewhere in the middle. Not one option. Not endless options. But just enough to give us freedom without burying us in doubt.
Whether it’s toothpaste, careers, or partners, happiness comes from making a decision and embracing it, instead of staring back at the doors you didn’t open. Because at the end of the day, too many choices don’t always bring joy. Sometimes, they only steal it.