Ask Rami: I am scared of making decisions.

Studio co-founder here. I feel a bit overwhelmed by all the big, existential decisions I have to make. Should I take this deal? Is this prototype worth building? Should I hire this person? Or fire someone? Am I being too perfectionistic? Am I not perfectionistic enough? I keep getting stuck, sometimes for weeks, sometimes to the point of cancelling projects I love, on not being sure I am making the best decisions.

Dear studio co-founder,

This is an eternal struggle not just for game developers, but for creatives of all kinds. Coming to terms with how we think, feel, and affect the world around us can be quite daunting and intimidating. As creative entrepreneur, you exist on a strange intersection point of creativity and economy: very few jobs in the world involve betting years of your life on something you can't measure, has no objective value, and that has no consistently dependable creation processes.

Perfectionism is a topic that we've softly touched in Levelling The Playing Field, including in the 2013 popular article on Harnessing Regret. That said, despite being an impedance to many game developers and creatives, we've never really taken it head-on, so let's talk about the two faces of perfectionism.

The Two Perfectionisms

Perfectionism exists as two separate dynamics: high perfectionistic strivings (PS) and high perfectionistic concerns (PC). High striving expresses as a want to be excellent, to achieve great things, and to dedicate oneself to a goal. High concern expresses a fear of failure, an anxiety to deliver bad work, and a reluctance to commit to things that might be less than perfect.