How Do You Know What You Need to Do?

I don’t know about you but sometimes when I am given lots of facts about a problem or challenge I feel strongly about, it can trigger over-thinking.  I want to meet the challenge. I want the answer right now, especially if it is something that I am fearful about.
Be it a business pitch, a client who is showing resistance, be it advocacy on behalf of my son or be it a tricky meeting. I somehow believe that if I keep on and on at working with it in my head, then I can figure it out QuickTime and all shall be well.
The reality is that all humans have a finite concentration span. We also have a finite capacity to absorb and analyse new information in one sitting. We all have differing abilities in these areas, but they are, nevertheless, finite.
So researching a researching and googling and persecuting ourselves with too much information that has been generated by others, can be counterproductive. We can overload ourselves with so many opinions and so much information that we are overwhelmed and don’t know which way is up.
When I was healing from a nearly catastrophic emotional pounding a couple of decades ago, my wise therapist advised that ‘it is not possible to ‘do therapy’ all the time’. His advice was to boundary it to the sessions we were having & to go out and live my life, trusting that it was all working itself out inbetween times. He was right. The brain is a very clever mechanism that continues to do the work on our behalf even when we are not looking at our problem. When we revisit the subject later in the day, or in the next coaching session, often the solution has generated itself. If we feed in the information, leave the brain to deal with it, our true answer will be provided because we focused elsewhere and allowed the natural process to continue unhindered.
So next time you feel so full of information and emotion that your brain might explode and suspect that you are further away from knowing the answer than when you first began. Try doing exactly what your whole being is telling you to do – leave it alone. Trust you have done enough, hand it over & walk away. Whilst you are doing something necessary or enjoyable, you will suddenly know just what it is you need to do.
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