Overthinking? Toss a Coin!

I’m probably not the only person who has thought about, and thought about, and thought about a problem and what I ought to do, finally decided on a course of action that I thought was “logical,” and as soon as I executed the decision (and couldn’t go backwards) realized “Uh Oh, wrong decision!” (Think “buyer’s remorse” as an example.)

I have found an excellent little trick to reset my brain and figure out what I should be thinking about when I find myself in these situations. When I find myself in a “50-50” dilemma, I take out a coin and assign choice A to the head, and choice B to the tail (or yes I buy it/no I don’t buy it – whatever). I then toss the coin and say the answer the coin dictates out loud. e.g. “Tails, I do it.”

Never do what the coin “says.” Instead ask yourself, how did I feel the instant I called out the answer?  Relieved? Apprehensive? Joyful? Wanting to go “2 out of 3?” Then I ask myself, “why did I feel that way? The answer to that question can help us understand our true feelings and help us figure out the real issues in the decision.

Here’s the brain science.

• Our subconscious does not understand the “trick” we are playing on it. “Tricks” are understood only in the conscious mind.
• Our subconscious mind has already determined, based upon our past experiences and knowledge, which of the choices is “good for me,” and which of the choices is “bad for me.”
• Our conscious mind has told our subconscious we are going to be bound by the coin’s “decision.” Our subconscious is a little anxious right now. We toss the coin.
• And here’s the cool part. Our subconscious mind “sees” the coin result a full half a second before our conscious mind can articulate the concept of a head or a tail. So it responds, for at least a half a second, by pumping chemicals into our blood stream – either good-for-me endorphins; or bad-for-me adrenaline and cortisol, getting us ready for “flight or fight.”

Don’t believe me? Think about how you were startled, say by a bird flying quickly by your head or a loud noise, and how long it seemed before you said to yourself, “oh, it’s just a bird,” or “just a car backfiring.” That realization didn’t stop you from feeling startled, ready to duck and cover, etc. with heart rate flying and skin prickling. Your subconscious was loaded up on “bad for me” and getting you ready to deal with a “bad for me” situation long before you could articulate the situation in your conscious mind.

I have found that when I have to do something, and I’m not sure which choice to make, to always “go with my gut.” That “gut feeling” is caused by those chemicals, since that’s the only way our subconscious can “talk” to us – the chemicals that signal the binary feelings of “good for me” or “bad for me.”

I always go with my gut because I’ve found that while it’s sometimes been wrong, that’s the way to bet. My “gut” is right over 90% of the time. When my subconscious is wrong, it’s because my subconscious didn’t have all the data or had wrong data. That doesn’t happen very often.

Use the coin to help you understand what your subconscious thinks is “good for you” or “bad for you,” understand why those feelings exist, and then go ahead and make a better choice.