Positive vs Negative Opinions

[Dwoops]

so I was wondering if anyone else struggles with something I do. To put it simply, I struggle forming “positive” opinions.
In my mind a positive opinions is (when there are 2 or more choices) when you have absolutely no preference for one over the other. For example you don’t care wether you eat a sandwich or chicken for lunch so you get whatever is easiest/more efficient.
A negative opinion would be when your decision is based off of not liking an aspect of one or the other. For example not wanting to eat mashed potatoes because you can’t stand squishy foods.
Most people tend to call me indecisive because of this, but that really just isn’t it. There have been many times where my family is going out to eat and we ask around for decisions and they can never get an answer from me because I just can’t come up with a reason to go somewhere specific, all I can do is say I don’t want seafood or something.
The examples I gave are for food because they were easy to think of, but I have trouble with this in a lot of areas such as free time activities/hobbies, and more importantly life decisions such as career choice. I’m currently in college, middle of my sophomore year and I have no clue what I want to do because I have no positive preferences for anything. I have the intelligence to do practically anything I set my mind to(4.0 GPA in biomedical engineering currently), but I have no clue what I want to do. I just struggle with deciding one thing over another because it doesn’t seem to make a difference to me.
I do want to make it clear that it isn’t that I do not like anything, it is the preference of things that I like that is the problem.
It is really only the things that I dislike that seem to affect what I care about.
Sorry for the long rant/explanation.
Does anyone feel similar, care to share anything you do to help distinguish beyond just not disliking something. (I know it’s a double negative and I hate it, but it fits)
Thanks all for your input.

 

[Sherlock77]

That is I believe a common symptom of Asperger's or Autism, so I'm told...

When I'm faced with a menu board at a restaurant, I see so many good choices that I find it hard to make a choice, I'll go back and forth, other friends or the people behind me are so decisive, probably get frustrated with me... I find the same thing happens with me in other areas of my life as well

I'm not sure what the solution is, this is one area where I haven't really conquered it, going back to the restaurant example... If there are only four simple breakfast choices, it makes life much simpler... A larger restaurant with many choices can be more difficult for me... I find that I often simply choose the same item (if I'm a regular customer), at one place I regularly eat breakfast at I choose the same menu item 99% of the time, makes life simpler...

 

[Progster]

Yep, I often have difficulty making decisions. I often spend ages in the supermarket trying to decide which item to go for. When most people make choices, they do so on an emotional or intuitive level, and that's often how they form preferences, but I seem to lack that or can't connect with it at the time of making the decision, and get stuck in a loop and can't decide which one is better. I think this is another right brain versus left brain issue, the two halves don't connect to make the decision.

 

[pjcnet]

I have similar issues looking at the negative side and I take ages to choose in places such as supermarkets, I don't enjoy it anyway, especially if it's busy, but the worst is if I have my impatient NT "friend" with me as he will try to rush me, I'll then end up not buying much, apart from a few well known items I've bought in the past, but then he'll moan about that too saying that I always buy the same old things. It's worse if we decide to get a takeaway in when he asks me to decide which restaurant to go to, I will go through thinking about bad things about each and every choice, then I'll often get to the end of the long list still without deciding, I would go the same place tried and tested, but he will often moan wanting to try somewhere different, then he'll start moaning that I take too long choosing somewhere. Occasionally he might come up with a suggestion and I will usually go for it, but I will still often think of something negative about it and if I mention it, it can cause an argument.

Whenever I've thought about moving home I've always focused on the negatives, E.g. the hassle of moving, moving Internet + utilities and the things that can go wrong, the risk of bad neighbours, possible noise, the negatives about the area, costs Etc. Etc. It usually prevents me from moving, but I was forced to move around 8 years ago when they decided to convert my housing complex of studio apartments into a homeless hostel, to cut a long story short it was hell even though I ended up in a 1 bedroom low rise flat (a lot bigger than a studio apartment). The anxiety of moving and change is too great for me even though people think it would be better for me to move to a place more suitable.

It's not quite the same thing, but where-ever there is a debate where the vast majority of people take one side I will always look at the other which some will say is negative. For instance I will look at Kim Jong-un's side (the leader of North Korea) and even Saddam Hussein's side (the former leader of Iraq) before he was executed to give people an alternative view point, once during the 1st Iraq war I was in my regular pub in the UK listening to the views of a single Saddam Hussein supporter amongst a pub full of people cheering on the air attacks and bombings (which also killed masses of innocent civilians including women and children), I was the only person trying to seriously understand his view point and you'd be surprised how convincing it was if you only listened, while everyone else wanted him barred from the pub and sadly eventually succeeded (so much for a free country and freedom of speech). I will even look at the side of who most would describe as "terrorists" because one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter or in some cases resistance fighter. For instance the French resistance during WWII were seen by most as brave heroes, but to the Germans at the time they were seen as terrorists and look at it another way, they killed German soldiers that had no option but to do their "duty" and they're bound to have killed some innocent civilians too. The so called "terrorists" who try to attack American soldiers in countries like Iraq and Afghanistan could also be called freedom or resistance fighters against their country's occupation that they see as illegal. Similar was true when the IRA were still active, they were called "terrorists" by the majority, but to others they were freedom and resistance fighters against the British occupation of their country, to many Irish they'll always be honoured as brave war heroes.

 

[Ambi]

It was choosing to avoid the negatives that finally got me into work that is suitable for me. It did require actual experience to figure it out though.

 

[WereBear]

When I'm faced with a menu board at a restaurant, I see so many good choices that I find it hard to make a choice, I'll go back and forth, other friends or the people behind me are so decisive, probably get frustrated with me... I find the same thing happens with me in other areas of my life as well

Menus, yes. Careers, yes. Supermarkets, no...

I always figured this was an example of my fantastic imagination. I can imagine me doing a lot of things and enjoying them, so getting a college major going took some experimenting and trying things out. And still, situations conspired to keep dragging me back into IT, which was never, and has never, been an actual career choice. As I say, I am the Michael Corleone of computers!

But that's fine... it's the one which turns out to be practical and needed.

And I can make big decisions with a lot of confidence, like going for the two apartments and deciding our business expansion would (eventually) pay for it. But that move broke the writer's block that was holding me back, so, no regrets.

When in doubt, make an emotional decision. Do what you most want to do.