Try these easy ways to improve your mental clarity in decision-making (especially when you’re overwhelmed)

Decision-making is always hard, many of our day-to-day decisions at work come with such costly ramifications if they are incorrect. Money, layoffs, and client relationships all ride on the ability to make good choices quickly.

But even in the best of times, navigating our choices at work is hard. And most of the time we are not at our best. We are exhausted and burnt out. The demands of our job and personal life have overwhelmed our cognition and emotions. We are often stuck in fight or flight, the body’s stress response that releases hormones to keep us vigilant in high-pressure situations, and that causes chronic health and mental fogginess if sustained over time.

Fight or flight is extremely helpful when used for its intended purpose. If we see a bear, our body becomes stressed and releases hormones and brain signals to prepare our body for one task, to survive. Our sympathetic nervous system kicks in, and we become extremely hypervigilant, only focusing on the potential threat in front of us. Our hearts beat fast, blood flows more quickly in our body, and glucose is released into our blood, giving us the energy to fight or flee to avoid the dangerous bear.

But in modern times and the workplace, things that stress us out aren’t physical dangers, they’re highly advanced cognitive problems. But our body is still triggered by the stress we are experiencing and launches our body into fight or flight. Therefore the response to a potential layoff is on the same spectrum as if a bear began to approach us. This is not terribly helpful, because we are not in danger in the office, fight or flight only wears us down and causes our decision-making to be less effective.

So, we are running on empty but have to show up like we’re not.

So how do we improve our decision-making when we are stuck in this exhausted state of existence?

Find facts

Emotional decision-making will kill your work efficiency. Even when we think we are being totally rational, we usually aren’t. Check yourself by gathering facts about the situation you are trying to navigate. For example, if you’re thinking “The boss won’t like this”, find examples of similar situations where she actually didn’t. Is it true that she won’t because you can prove it or are you worried she won’t?

Face things head-on

Avoidance leads to hasty decision-making. Burnout often causes people to procrastinate because the decisions they have to make feel overwhelmingly hard. Eventually, they have to face what they’ve been avoiding, and because they haven’t spent any time preparing, they make an abrupt choice and hope for the best. Which generally doesn’t breed tremendously good outcomes.

Stare into space

The greatest ideas are often discovered by mistake. We are so programmed to be doing all the time, we forget that just being is actually extremely helpful when it comes to making decisions. Personally, some of my greatest ideas have come from periods where I felt guilty because I “wasn’t doing anything” and was just thinking about nothing in particular in the middle of a workday. As a clinical psychologist, I do actually recommend staring into space to clients all the time. Even just 10 minutes to let your mind wander can generate some really useful and creative ideas, leading to a well-thought-out decision-making process.

Be boring

Many people think wellness interventions are all or nothing and employ grand gestures to reap the benefits, which they certainly don’t have time to do. But in reality, the small and boring changes that lead to the greatest life impact. Things like adding a vegetable to your diet here and there, walking up the stairs occasionally, lying down, and resting for a few minutes will improve your nervous system, help combat burnout, and reduce fight or flight. Not only because the intervention itself is impactful, but because being conscious about these tiny changes will shift your mindset and lead to other small changes you probably won’t even be aware of.

Delegate

The less you have to worry about, the more brain power you have to devote to the things you are in charge of. Offload all tasks when it isn’t absolutely mandatory that you yourself complete it, and learn to be ok with the good enough job that other people will do. Be ruthless in giving away both professional and personal tasks and decisions.

While you can’t remove the stress of high-stakes decisions, you can certainly improve your mental clarity while making those decisions, and feel good about managing well despite the intensity of your work environment.