“In the first place, my whole financial system has got to be gone over. It is in such bad shape now that it can hardly be called a system. In fact, I don’t think that it can even be called financial. It is more of a carnival.” — Chips Off the Old Benchley by Robert Benchley

Okay, let’s wrap up this series on making good decisions.  Let’s do it with a question.

Who do you think would go down in the annuals of human history as the best decision maker who has ever lived? 

You don’t have to agree with me, but my guess would be the wisest man who ever lived, and that – according to the Bible – would be Solomon.  But (trigger alert!) read how he ended his life:

The result was that in his old age his kingdom and empire began to unravel and within a few weeks following his death his kingdom was divided and his empire lost never to be regained to this day.

How could that have happened!?  How could the wisest man in the world be so stupid. 

Here’s my humble opinion (you can decide if I’m right).  He got caught up in the fast lane of living life to the fullest and the rate of decisions started coming faster than his capacity to apply his God-given wisdom to his decisions. (He didn’t stop to do a debrief.)

Right out of the gate Solomon made great decisions that propelled his kingdom to new heights.  His wisdom at dispensing justice was legendary and his management skills were second to none.  Soon he was building temples and palaces and summer homes.  He was building armies and navies and conquering new lands.  He was developing land and farms and making alliances and business deals and lots of other king-stuff.  It was amazing, like nothing Israel or the other nations around them had ever seen.

But it doesn’t take much imagination to see what happened.  With each new level, the stakes grew higher and the demand on his time and energy grew greater.  Soon he was living in the fast lane and then the faster lane and ultimately in the fastest lane.

Of course the returns were astronomical: fame, power, wealth, pleasure, luxury…everything that life under the sun can offer. For example, he had so much gold that silver was accounted as nothing.  (1 Kings 10:21)

But here’s what had to have happened.  With life being so fast and one decision after another coming at him at the speed of light, little by little he began living in the moment.  Moving from one great decision to the next.  Living the dream, checking off the bucket list but (and here it is) he stopped asking himself, “Is my life and kingdom heading in the right direction?”

Let me give you an example: Let’s talk marriage and sex.

Marriage is good (God-ordained) and marriage and sex is really good (also God-ordained). 

So what would you expect from a powerful, rich, CEO-type young virile godly man to do.  Of course, marry. 

In addition, polygamy was legal in Solomon’s day (we’ll not judge him by our times) and even expected of kings (alliances, politics, status, etc.) so there is no surprise that Solomon had more than one beautiful wife.  But by the end of his life he had seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines! 

Is it just me, or doesn’t that seem a little extreme?!

I wonder if there was ever a point where it may have occurred to Solomon that maybe his household was getting a little to big. 

Was there a morning when he and his dear sweet and beautiful Shulammite wife (See Song of Solomon) were enjoying breakfast in bed after a God-sanctioned steamy night of love-making and he adoringly looked over at her and suddenly realized that it had been a couple years since they’d had last slept together?

Baskin Robbins has the ice cream flavor of the month.  If you have 1000 wives and concubines you can have the woman of the day for almost three years!  When do you decide that enough is enough? 

How could the wisest man in the world keep making the dumb decision to keep legally binding women to himself far beyond the capacity of any man to have a meaningful and healthy relationship with them? 

Simple, he didn’t take the time to stop and think about the last decision he had made.

Somewhere between wife #5 and wife #15 the lines began to blur. 

Okay, he’s got a empire so maybe we can bump it up to 25 or 30 wives (alliances, treaties, and all that political stuff).  But a 100 wives?  500? 1000?!

Somewhere along the way, the wisest man in the world became a fool and ended his life in disgrace, dishonor, and destruction.  All because he didn’t take time to debrief his last decision. All because he failed to remember that you’re not done until you’ve done a debrief.

Dear friend, as we wrap up this series on how to be a great decision-maker, remember this: A great decision always includes a debrief—a moment when you look back over the decision and ask yourself questions like:

1. Did this decision even need to be made? See: Before Making That Decision
2. Did this decision need to be made now? See: Wait a Minute!
3. Was I the one who should have made this decision? See: Pass the Buck Every Chance You Get
4. Now that I’ve made this decision, what should be the next decision that I must be made? See: Before You Throw that Stone
5. How can I make the best of the decisions other made? See: You Don’t Get to Make that Decision
6. Is it time to call a time-out on decisions? See: Is it Okay to Do Nothing?
7. How can I make a better decision next time? See: You’re not done until you’ve done a debrief.

The ONE THING for today: The better you become at making decisions the faster you will be given the opportunity to make decisions.  Thus the wise decision-maker is constantly tapping the brakes to make sure that, before they move on, they’ve taken the time to make sure the last decision was a good decision. 

This is because the great decision makers know you’re not done and until you’ve done a debrief.

“In the first place, my whole financial system has got to be gone over. It is in such bad shape now that it can hardly be called a system. In fact, I don’t think that it can even be called financial. It is more of a carnival.” — Chips Off the Old Benchley by Robert Benchley

Okay, let’s wrap up this series on making good decisions.  Let’s do it with a question.

Who do you think would go down in the annuals of human history as the best decision maker who has ever lived? 

You don’t have to agree with me, but my guess would be the wisest man who ever lived, and that – according to the Bible – would be Solomon.  But (trigger alert!) read how he ended his life:

The result was that in his old age his kingdom and empire began to unravel and within a few weeks following his death his kingdom was divided and his empire lost never to be regained to this day.

How could that have happened!?  How could the wisest man in the world be so stupid. 

Here’s my humble opinion (you can decide if I’m right).  He got caught up in the fast lane of living life to the fullest and the rate of decisions started coming faster than his capacity to apply his God-given wisdom to his decisions. (He didn’t stop to do a debrief.)

Right out of the gate Solomon made great decisions that propelled his kingdom to new heights.  His wisdom at dispensing justice was legendary and his management skills were second to none.  Soon he was building temples and palaces and summer homes.  He was building armies and navies and conquering new lands.  He was developing land and farms and making alliances and business deals and lots of other king-stuff.  It was amazing, like nothing Israel or the other nations around them had ever seen.

But it doesn’t take much imagination to see what happened.  With each new level, the stakes grew higher and the demand on his time and energy grew greater.  Soon he was living in the fast lane and then the faster lane and ultimately in the fastest lane.

Of course the returns were astronomical: fame, power, wealth, pleasure, luxury…everything that life under the sun can offer. For example, he had so much gold that silver was accounted as nothing.  (1 Kings 10:21)

But here’s what had to have happened.  With life being so fast and one decision after another coming at him at the speed of light, little by little he began living in the moment.  Moving from one great decision to the next.  Living the dream, checking off the bucket list but (and here it is) he stopped asking himself, “Is my life and kingdom heading in the right direction?”

Let me give you an example: Let’s talk marriage and sex.

Marriage is good (God-ordained) and marriage and sex is really good (also God-ordained). 

So what would you expect from a powerful, rich, CEO-type young virile godly man to do.  Of course, marry. 

In addition, polygamy was legal in Solomon’s day (we’ll not judge him by our times) and even expected of kings (alliances, politics, status, etc.) so there is no surprise that Solomon had more than one beautiful wife.  But by the end of his life he had seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines! 

Is it just me, or doesn’t that seem a little extreme?!

I wonder if there was ever a point where it may have occurred to Solomon that maybe his household was getting a little to big. 

Was there a morning when he and his dear sweet and beautiful Shulammite wife (See Song of Solomon) were enjoying breakfast in bed after a God-sanctioned steamy night of love-making and he adoringly looked over at her and suddenly realized that it had been a couple years since they’d had last slept together?

Baskin Robbins has the ice cream flavor of the month.  If you have 1000 wives and concubines you can have the woman of the day for almost three years!  When do you decide that enough is enough? 

How could the wisest man in the world keep making the dumb decision to keep legally binding women to himself far beyond the capacity of any man to have a meaningful and healthy relationship with them? 

Simple, he didn’t take the time to stop and think about the last decision he had made.

Somewhere between wife #5 and wife #15 the lines began to blur. 

Okay, he’s got a empire so maybe we can bump it up to 25 or 30 wives (alliances, treaties, and all that political stuff).  But a 100 wives?  500? 1000?!

Somewhere along the way, the wisest man in the world became a fool and ended his life in disgrace, dishonor, and destruction.  All because he didn’t take time to debrief his last decision. All because he failed to remember that you’re not done until you’ve done a debrief.

Dear friend, as we wrap up this series on how to be a great decision-maker, remember this: A great decision always includes a debrief—a moment when you look back over the decision and ask yourself questions like:

1. Did this decision even need to be made? See: Before Making That Decision
2. Did this decision need to be made now? See: Wait a Minute!
3. Was I the one who should have made this decision? See: Pass the Buck Every Chance You Get
4. Now that I’ve made this decision, what should be the next decision that I must be made? See: Before You Throw that Stone
5. How can I make the best of the decisions other made? See: You Don’t Get to Make that Decision
6. Is it time to call a time-out on decisions? See: Is it Okay to Do Nothing?
7. How can I make a better decision next time? See: You’re not done until you’ve done a debrief.

The ONE THING for today: The better you become at making decisions the faster you will be given the opportunity to make decisions.  Thus the wise decision-maker is constantly tapping the brakes to make sure that, before they move on, they’ve taken the time to make sure the last decision was a good decision. 

This is because the great decision makers know you’re not done and until you’ve done a debrief.