(I'm fully vaxxed, and will get a booster shot if I can)
It's a complicated risk assessment situation.
My thought process was like this:
a) Realization: No strategy will be risk-free. COVID will not magically disappear.
b) Because of my work and my preferred way of living, I will interact with a lot of people, including international travel on planes, etc.
c) I am therefore very likely to be in contact with COVID infected people, of which I cannot guarantee they will be masked, or considerate.
d) It is therefore very likely that sooner or later I will contract COVID. It is likely, indeed, that I would contract it more than once, as long-term protection from infection seems lower than vaccination.
e) I'm not super likely to die from it, but the likelihood of short, mid and long term consequences is high.
f) I do not want to be the reason somebody else gets it (parents, friends,...)
Because of e and f, I think the risk of a vaccine is much lower. By now, we see very small risks for serious short and mid term effects. We know how long the mRNA survives in the body (I don't think we know that from the COVID virus, that could potentially hide for a very long time, as other viruses demonstrate), virtually eliminating direct long-term effects.
What remains are the unkown unknowns. Can it trigger something? Sure, we have observed that in other vaccines. But it is very, very rare, not only that vaccine can cause it, but also that if the vaccine can cause it, one is affected. Additionally: It is very likely that a COVID infected person would have a similar risk -- much of the immuno-response is the similar to a vaccination (but maybe broader). Since I assume a close to 100% prob to get infected at some point if unvaccinated, it's not an additional risk.
To explain the last point a little: A way you can construct a long term effect goes like this: If the presented spike protein is close enough to a natural,i.e. normally expressed, protein, the antibodies could affect both, and potentially destroy an important body function. That risk, I think, is actually higher with a full infection, since the antibodies learn not only the spike protein, but potentially more of the virus, so there is more chance of similarity with something else.
In any case, as far as we know, the chance for something is remote.
RE approval process: What calms my mind there is that all countries for which I normally trust the approval process gave their OK, including those which went with a different strategy, or where it was less of a political issue. While it's possible that they all got corrupted by political pressure, that's less likely.
