It's 9:40pm. The kids are in bed, and you're still replaying the moment in this afternoon's meeting when your manager went quiet after you spoke. You've rewritten tomorrow's email to the team three times. None of the versions are wrong. You just can't decide which one to send.
That's overthinking at work, and it's common among people who are good at their jobs. The same habit that makes you careful (thinking through consequences, caring how things land) starts running without an off switch. The work still gets done, but it costs you sleep, evenings and attention you don't get back.
This guide gives you a four-step method you can use the next time your head won't let a work problem go.
Why capable people overthink
Overthinking usually isn't a confidence problem. It tends to show up in three situations.
- The stakes involve other people. A decision about your own work is easy. A decision that affects your team, how your boss sees you or someone's job is not.
- There's no clear right answer. If the information you need doesn't exist yet, more thinking can't produce it. Your brain keeps searching anyway.
- There's nobody to talk it through with. Once you've been promoted past the people you used to ask, the loop has nowhere to go. So it runs again.
That last one matters more than most advice admits. A thought said out loud to someone else gets tested. A thought kept in your head gets repeated.
Thinking or looping?
Useful thinking moves. Each pass adds something: a new option, a fact, a decision about the next step. Overthinking circles. The same three sentences, the same worst case, the same "but what if".
A quick test: if you've been on this problem for twenty minutes and can't name one thing that's changed since minute five, you're looping. The fix is to get the loop moving again.
The four-step method: name, size, decide, park
1. Name it in one sentence
Write down exactly what you're stuck on, in one sentence. Not "the team stuff". Something like: "I don't know whether to tell Sam his overtime is being cut before or after the roster comes out."
Half the time, writing the sentence shows you the problem is smaller than it felt. The other half, it shows you the real question, which is often different from the one you've been chewing on.
2. Size it
Ask yourself two questions.
- What's the realistic worst case if I get this wrong? Not the 2am version. The version you'd describe to a mate.
- Will this matter in three months?
If the worst case is recoverable and the answer to the second question is no, give the decision five minutes, not five evenings. Most work decisions fall into this group. The ones that don't (hiring, letting someone go, a big call on money or people) deserve real time. That's what step three is for.
3. Work out what would change your mind, then decide
Overthinking often hides a missing fact. Ask: "What would I need to know to feel confident here?"
If that information exists, go and get it. Ask the question first thing tomorrow, then make the call. If it doesn't exist, more thinking won't create it. Pick the option you'd be comfortable explaining to someone you respect, and set a date to review it.
Then write the decision down next to your sentence from step one. A decision on paper is much harder to reopen at 10pm than one held in your head.
4. Park the rest on purpose
Some things can't be settled today. Your boss hasn't replied. The restructure hasn't been announced. For these, pick a specific time to think about it again (Thursday at 8am, say) and put it in your calendar.
This sounds too simple to work. It works because part of the reason your brain keeps looping is to make sure you don't forget. Give the problem a time and a place, and it has less reason to keep tapping you on the shoulder.
Three habits that make it easier
- Close the day on paper. Before you leave work, or in the car before you drive off, write down the one thing still on your mind and the next step. Two lines. It gives the drive home a different job.
- Match the time to the size. Small calls get minutes. Medium calls get a day. Big calls get a week and a conversation with someone you trust.
- Say it out loud. Talking a problem through, even for ten minutes, does what another hour of thinking can't. Choose someone who asks you questions rather than telling you what to do.
What this looks like in practice
Back to that email. Name it: "I don't know how to tell the team the early Friday finish is gone for the next month." Size it: the worst case is a few grumpy days, and in three months nobody will remember the wording. Decide: the missing fact is whether the project end date is firm. You message the project manager first thing, then send the version that's honest about why. Park: you put "check in with the crew" in Friday's calendar.
Total time, about fifteen minutes. The same problem had already taken two evenings.
Try it in Pocket Mentor
The hardest part of the method is step three, because it works best out loud, and most people don't have someone to call at 9:40pm. Pocket Mentor gives you somewhere to talk it through. Open the app, describe what you're stuck on in your own words, and work it through with a mentor built on the thinking of high-performance coaches from AFL and F1. When you're done, you get a written summary of the conversation, so the decision is on paper and out of your head.
You don't need to solve everything today. Just take the first step.
START WITH POCKET MENTOR.