What’s actually happening

Looks like responsibility at first

Caring about choosing correctly

Replaying options

Imagining outcomes

Trying to avoid regret

Decisions feel heavier over time

Simple choices feel loaded

Delaying and revisiting

Second-guessing

Mind keeps checking for mistakes

Decisions don’t settle

Why this keeps repeating

Overthinking feels safer than committing

Mind treats decisions as threats

Constant risk scanning

Trying to predict every outcome

Searching for certainty

Certainty never arrives

Each thought adds noise

Attention fragments

System stays in analysis mode

Resolution never happens

Caution turns into paralysis

My experience

Showed up when stakes felt high

Worse when I was tired

Looped on low-stakes decisions

Told myself I was being thorough

Actually avoiding commitment discomfort

Depletion led to more thinking

Thinking harder made it worse

Where this lives in the Cosmic Mirror

Clarity layer

Attention and perception

Not a thinking problem

An attention problem

Scattered attention distorts signal

Everything feels equally important

What actually helped

Shifting from right answer to stable position

Choosing what I could commit to

Limiting decision time

Making smaller decisions faster

Regulating the body first

Narrowing attention

Letting “enough” be sufficient

Things to try

Set time limits on decisions

Decide, then stop revisiting

Reduce decision scope

Make low-stakes choices quickly

Regulate before choosing

Notice when analysis becomes avoidance

Common traps

Believing more thought equals better outcomes

Waiting for confidence before choosing

Confusing anxiety with intuition

Trying to eliminate regret

Reopening decisions repeatedly

Related paths

Attention fatigue

Anxiety loops

Decision paralysis

Regulation and clarity