Ditch Analysis Paralysis And Choose How To Quit Or Grit
Get clear on the life you want to crush overthinking for a peaceful road ahead
I’ve never regretted leaving a job or a relationship.
Although I sometimes wonder ‘what if,’ we only regret the past when we’re unhappy with the present.
If you find yourself overanalysing a decision, try to approach it with curiosity.
While gathering information and taking action is often helpful, it also drives overthink and delays your choices.
My decision-making process varies in speed based on the situation and how I feel. Under chronic stress, we often take longer to decide or have inconsistencies.
Why? These are the 5 main reasons:
Fear and doubt: I’m scared of making mistakes, or unsure of the future impact and wasted time/effort.
Overwhelmed by choices: Information overload offers too many options and data to understand when I’m knackered.
Lost in the fog: I’m unclear about my personal or work goals with no roadmap from here to there.
Stuck in the mud: I can't get started and keep putting things off because it feels hard.
Groupthink and self-doubt: I’m afraid to disagree with others who might know more, or I’m unsure when I lack confidence.
So what simplifies your path to quit or grit? The idea of strategic abandonment and aligning to your core values to decide with no regrets.
Be strategic and accept losses and gains are part of life
Strategic abandonment isn't a new idea and Peter Drucker, consultant, author and educator, wrote "Managing for Results" in 1964, sharing an early concept about it.
He discussed the need for organisations to regularly review their products, services, and activities to identify those that no longer contribute to their success.
At a practical level, this means assessing what works and what doesn’t across all aspects of your life.
If it doesn't contribute to your success, consider abandoning it. Quit.
If it does drive or contribute to success, keep going. Grit.
Netflix does this all the time. Unfortunately for some of us, it might be at the cost of fans who don’t contribute the viewing hours high enough, quickly enough.
I loved the show "Mindhunter". Playwright Joe Penhall and film director David Fincher, known for their dark and psychological storytelling, created "Mindhunter" to explore the origins of criminal profiling at the FBI.
As a true crime fan, I love this show. But it was cancelled after two seasons and we still hope it’ll come back one day.
To Netflix, it took too long, cost too much and didn’t get the viewership payoff. Even if it was popular to some, it didn’t meet their overall strategic goals.
Great for them, sucks for us.
What’s key is to accept you’re going to gain and lose here or there. This is a fact of life. Unless you’ve got unlimited time, energy and resources, you’ll have to narrow your options somewhere.
Strategic abandonment frees you from being all things to everyone all at once. It’s easier to pick a lane and minimise regrets, because you accept you have finite resources and need to use them wisely.
Like Netflix, take a punt knowing it may or may not payoff, but you did your best with the details available to you.
Your fear of not coping if things go wrong is what's truly holding you back. Netflix takes a weighted risk to decide because it’ll get some winners, like Squid Game, amongst the losers. It accepts this is part of business.
Once you recognise how resilient you are (seriously, look at how far you’ve come), and where you want life to go, strategic abandonment becomes much easier.
If you don't decide what matters, someone else will decide for you
Once you accept the need to let go, what do you want your life on this earth to stand for? Big question I know - way bigger than a TV show.
But once you’re clear on this, across both work and home life, you’ll make decisions far quicker and with greater confidence.
What does success mean to you in your work and personal life?
Is it building a freedom business to gain more time for family and hobbies?
Or is it becoming a CEO to create a lasting legacy and generational wealth?
It might be something in between. Consider your current goals, projects, and interests that demand your focus and energy.
If you’re unclear about what truly matters to you and what success means, you may adopt the values of others or societal expectations. This leads to unease in your choices and decisions.
So, what keeps you motivated to do what you do? Is it money? Stability? A higher cause? Helping others? Achievement? Autonomy?
Identify your core values, as they play a crucial role in enhancing your decision-making. These core values, fundamental principles and beliefs, influence your choices and actions, ultimately shaping your life.
When decisions feel emotionally wrong, even if they are logical, this conflict can cause analysis paralysis.
Stress, overwhelm, and exhaustion also impairs our judgment, making it harder to make decisions and leading to indecision.
If you're unclear about your core values and your definition of success, imagine your future to help you overcome current limitations.
Let go of your frustrations to gain clarity on the way forward.
Clarify your Ideal Day and Ideal Life Vision to make better decisions
With my coaching clients, I use the Ideal Day visualisation exercise to clarify their ideal day, core values, and Ideal Life Vision.
This recovery strategy leverages mental contrasting - visualising where you are now and where you want to be - to clarify the choices and path needed to achieve your goals.
We don't often consider how we want to live our lives. We have goals for the big stuff - house, family, successful business, great career, healthy body etc.
But what does it look like on a practical level? Consider:
Your average day and what it currently looks like. What needs to change?
For all your striving, what your Ideal Day and life should look like?
The non-negotiables to create a life well lived?
Who must be there and what you spend your precious time doing?
What you’ll look back on when you're old and reflect:
'I'm so glad I spent my time on xyz'.
This is what matters in life, and your Ideal Life Vision. Know what you’re aiming for, and what’s at stake, so your current day decisions are quicker and easier.
Ideal Day visualisation exercise to identify your core values:
Find a quiet spot and get comfortable
Focus on your breath for 2-3 minutes to bring your heart-rate and energy levels down (close eyes if you want to)
Do a gentle body scan from your toes to the top of your head, noticing and relaxing any tight spots
Transport yourself 5-10 years into the future
Starting from when you wake up, reflect on where you are, what you're doing, and who you're doing it with, hour by hour
Work through this Ideal Day through to when you get into bed. If you struggle to visualise, reflect on concepts, feelings and ideas appearing
Open your eyes (if you had them closed)
Sit quietly for 2-3 minutes more, reflecting on what appeared
Grab a piece of paper or record voice notes on your device. List the top 3 things you'd always need in your Ideal Day
What single word describes each one? E.g. family, autonomy, community, peace, accomplishment, honesty etc
Your core values shape your Ideal Day - they serve as guiding principles for your Ideal Life Vision. Consider expanding this vision to encompass more days - weekdays, weekends, holidays, and celebrations - to thoroughly explore your desires and needs.
This is what inspires you to decide and weigh up the pros and cons.
It gets you up in the morning, keeps you focused during the day, and ignites your curiosity at night.
Use your Ideal Day core values to make the quit vs grit decision
Now you've got a better idea of your Ideal Day and Ideal Life Vision, pick a home or work area giving you sleepless nights.
You'll know instantly what it is, or at least try to avoid it. This is the area to focus on.
What needs the strategic abandonment treatment, and which core values will you uphold to get to your Ideal Life Vision?
Reflect on the choice or decision to make and consider which option fits the best:
Option 1: You're wobbling, unhappy with progress, and wonder whether it's worth your time. The outcome might be valuable but it won't move the needle towards your Ideal Day and Ideal Life Vision.
Option 2: You're on track, know it's tough but accept you have to hunker down and get through it. The outcome is so worth it and contributes to your Ideal Day and Ideal Life Vision.
Option 1 gives you a clue to quit or apply strategic abandonment.
Don't let self-criticism or imposter syndrome colour your view. If this is your inner voice, ask a trusted friend for a balanced or external view.
How much time, energy, and resources have you put into it? Do you want to keep going for the outcome? Is it driving poor mental and physical health? What do you need to let go?
If you’re held back by the effort you’ve already spent, the Sunk Cost Fallacy keeps you stuck. This is the tendency to continue with something, even if not beneficial, because you've already invested in it.
Don’t let it distract you from walking away.
Option 2 gives you a clue of when to grit.
No matter how hard things are, how many resources you need, and how long it takes, you sense you’re moving in the right direction.
In this case, check what to optimise or improve. Who or what helps you achieve it quicker and easier? Are you resting enough to sustain momentum?
Prioritise rest and recovery to keep going.
Key takeaways
Analysis paralysis is common when you’re making big decisions. It’s more likely under chronic stress or burnout, because emotional and physical fatigue messes up your cognitive control.
Stay on the path to your Ideal Day and Ideal Life Vision, even if it's gnarly and tough. It'll be worth it, so prioritise and get stuck in for the long haul. Find others to help.
But if it's draining, moves you in the wrong direction, and you're miserable or unwell - consider moving on. Quitting doesn't mean you're a failure. It’s smart when you use it strategically.
When to quit and when to grit is about this:
Reallocating resources: Where are your precious resources (time, money, effort) best used? Spend wisely.
Focusing on your core values: Prioritise values-based choices leading to your Ideal Day to cut through the noise.
Responding flexibly: Manage goals, energy and attention flexibly using strategic abandonment where needed.
Sustaining your mind/body: Indecision or pursuing the wrong path wastes attention and hope. Don't wear yourself out for useless things.
Core values help you make better choices, keeping you motivated through the tough stuff. Strategic abandonment helps you let go and redirect your energy to pursue what matters.
Use these approaches and you won’t regret it.
By the way…
If you need to express your decision-making frustrations and get clarity on next steps, the Angry Art Deep-Dive Masterclass is happening on Monday 28 October at 9pm-10pm GMT (convert to local time).
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If you’re not a paid subscriber yet, now’s the perfect time to level up. Join us, and you’ll get access to this Masterclass and a steady stream of cutting-edge burnout recovery, stress resilience and leadership goal-achievement strategies every week.
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I think about how many of us actually evaluate how we want our lives to be. Personally, I wake up and commit to appointments and general life to drive me along before thinking about what I actually want out of life. ...until I get reminders like your article. Thank you, Sabrina.
'When decisions feel emotionally wrong, even if they are logical, this conflict can cause analysis paralysis.' This resonated deeply. I've often felt this dissonance, and your words gave it a name. It's a powerful reminder to honor both head and heart in decision-making.