Tetralemma and decision balance

Open tetralemma and decision scales

Faced with an important decision, we usually think in two categories: for or against. That narrowing is often the problem rather than the decision itself. Both parts of this tool work against it, in different ways, and they live in the same file: you can first explore a question in the tetralemma and then weight the arguments on the scales.

The tetralemma: five positions instead of two

The tetralemma comes from Indian logic. In coaching, the form used is usually the one introduced by Matthias Varga von Kibéd and Insa Sparrer as part of Systemic Structural Constellations. It leads out of the division in two through five positions:

• The one – everything that speaks for the first possibility.
• The other – the opposite pole, honoured at full strength, without being argued away straight off.
• Both – what if the opposites could be combined?
• Neither – here ambivalence gets a place of its own: what is still open, unclear, not yet decidable?
• None of this – and not even that – the position that questions the frame itself. What if the question is not the right one? This is frequently where the solutions arise that are neither yes nor no.

In the tool you describe each position on the left and judge how right it feels. If you prefer to think while moving: the positions can be walked in the room using floor anchors, and the editor records what emerges.

The decision scales: weight instead of lists

A list of pros and cons treats every point alike – even though a single argument sometimes weighs more than five others together. The decision scales make that weight visible. First you choose the variant:

• Two options – A or B, when two concrete paths are available.
• For and against – when a single course of action is at stake.
• The change scales with four fields: advantages and disadvantages of changing and of staying as you are. This form is known from motivational interviewing among others, and it brings out what is often overlooked – that staying also has advantages and exacts a price.

You weight each point from 1 (hardly important) to 5 (very important). The scales tip towards the heavier side – not a verdict, but a mirror of the present tendency and a prompt for conversation: what would it mean to follow it? You can also record your gut feeling, and that is deliberate: the scales only calculate. What matters is how right the result feels. Where the arithmetic and the feeling diverge is the most interesting point in the whole procedure.

What else the tool can do

• Clicking a field or a point in the picture jumps to the matching input field on the left.
• Undo and redo with Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Y, save with Ctrl+S, open with Ctrl+O.
• Saving as a *.entscheidung.json file holding both parts – tetralemma and scales together.
• Export to PDF, PowerPoint, LibreOffice Impress, Visio, SVG and PNG; the table as a CSV file contains all texts and weightings for further calculation.

What it is good for

For choosing a career, changing jobs and questions of location. For decisions about investments and projects in a company, where a group assigns the weightings together – often the conversation about the weighting is worth more than the result. For genuine either-or situations in self-coaching. And for guided work, where the five positions provide a conversational structure nobody forgets.

An important qualification

In coaching, the tetralemma and the decision scales serve as models for reflection and conversation, not as diagnostic instruments. They make no decision and say nothing about right or wrong. Coaching is not psychotherapy (§ 1 (3) of the German Psychotherapy Act).

Your data stays with you

The tool is a single HTML file that runs entirely in your browser. It loads nothing from the internet and sends nothing – which is the decisive point for professional decisions nobody is supposed to know about yet. Your work lives in your own files on your own computer. The tool is free of charge and is free software under the GNU General Public License (GPL-3.0-or-later).

Related tools

If the conflicting arguments are less matters of fact than inner voices, my inner team is the better route. To set up a decision spatially with everyone involved, take the systemic board. For an opening through images rather than words there is card work. All tools are listed under Resources.

If you would rather not make a decision on your own, I am glad to accompany you in business coaching or personal coaching – get in touch for a free initial consultation.