7 Signs (Examples)You’re Suffering From Analysis Paralysis

What is analysis paralysis?

According to Wikipedia…

“Analysis paralysis (or paralysis by analysis) describes an individual or group process when over analyzing or overthinking a situation can cause forward motion or decision-making to become “paralyzed,” meaning that no solution or course of action is decided upon.”

So, in a nutshell, analysis paralysis is the act of overthinking a problem or idea to the point that nothing actually gets done.

Mmm — yep, I’ve certainly fallen victim to analysis paralysis many times. And in different parts of my life too — finances, jobs, relationships, health and everything in between.

This affliction is not unique to a specific type of person, job, industry, genre, socio-economic group — anyone can be affected by analysis paralysis at any time, anywhere.

Normal decision-making includes looking at the scenarios/options; filtering through these in a rational and logical way and then systematically reducing your options until you find the best one and ultimately make the (hopefully) right decision.

Analysis paralysis is the exact opposite of this — too many options or overthinking causes the inability to make the decision, which results in no action.

So, what are the signs? Here are seven signs you are currently or have previously suffered from analysis paralysis.

1. FOMO (fear of missing out) — You’re at a restaurant that you’ve been looking forward to going to for a really long time. You skipped lunch so you could really enjoy the restaurant’s dinner fare. You open up the menu and….there are 50 different main courses to choose from, way more than the last time you dined here. Oh no…should you order your favorite dish that you know tastes incredible or should you be a bit more ambitious and try something new to expand your culinary repertoire? How on earth are you going to get through this? What started out as a mouth-watering anticipation of what tasty morsels were to come has now turned into an anxiety-ridden moment of FOMO. You pour over the menu to see if anything jumps out at you, but it becomes harder and harder to focus. Your eyes dart around the menu as the clock ticks and the waiter is looming near to take your order. You feel the pressure but you just can’t seem to make a decision. The waiter approaches and asks if you’re ready to order…and…you ask for a few more minutes to decide, risking the likelihood of the waiter seeing 10 more customers before heading back to your table — essentially giving you even more time to agonize over a decision that shouldn’t be so hard to make.
2. Loop de loop -You’re working on a small IT project with the goal of improving the outcome times of customer complaints. To define the ‘as is’ situation, data is collected to identify where along the customer process ‘flow’ are there issues, bottlenecks, redundancies etc. The first round of data is obtained and indicates that 75% of customers’ complaints are taking more than the 8 week timeframe which is stated on the company’s website. This initial data is definitely sufficient to build a business case for software improvements, however some colleagues in the project team discuss this data and decide that more data is required to pinpoint the areas which may need improvement. Two weeks have passed and the second round of data is in. Again, this data is discussed and another decision made to request even further data. This has now pushed the ‘Go Live’ date out by four weeks and frustration within the project team starts to creep in. Is the never-ending re-requesting of data actually adding any value to this project? Highly unlikely — it is costing time and money.
3. TMI (too much information) — You’ve decided to become an online entrepreneur because you’re sick of the 9 to 5 grind where you’re ‘working for the man’ and have almost no control over your life. You want to work for yourself, build up some income so you can quit your day job. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that (I’ve gone through this myself). You see people on YouTube crushing it; you see bloggers making a ton of money just from writing and maintaining a website. You just want a piece of the action. You start researching different ways to make money online and think that starting a YouTube channel really seems like a good fit. After watching hundreds of YouTube videos about…well…how to start a YouTube channel, you still don’t really know where to start and ask yourself so many questions like, ‘do I have the right equipment?’; ‘will my friends and family laugh at me’; ‘how will I know what to vlog about?’; ‘can I make a full-time income on YouTube’; ‘what will I call my channel?’; ‘do I look ok on camera?’; etc., etc., etc.,. You’ve almost talked yourself out of it before you have even begun. You’ve watched so many YouTube videos with different vloggers’ perspectives of which most contradict the other. One of my favorite sayings by a YouTuber is ‘you gotta just press record’, by Sean Cannell @ Think Media, but in reality, many analysis paralysis sufferers find this extremely terrifying and difficult.
4. Ambiguity — You’ve saved up enough cash to put down a deposit on a new car— yippee!! It’s an exciting time as you’ve never bought a new car before. You’ve taken a day off to scour the car lots to find your dream machine. You head to the ‘magic mile’ where there are a dozen or so more car dealerships and park your old faithful (little does she know she’s about to be traded in for a younger more attractive model)! You’re blinded by the shine of the many new cars available; you’re intoxicated by the ‘new car’ smell inside of all the cars you look at; you’re bamboozled by the car salesmen who try their hardest to sell you the most expensive car they can and you’re totally and utterly overwhelmed by the impending decision — which car should you buy? You didn’t think to do some research before heading out and didn’t really have an idea of what kind of car you really wanted, or in fact, could really afford. Do you want a sedan, a hatch, an SVU, a 4 cylinder, 6 cylinder, petrol, hybrid, electric, white, red, sunroof, 4WD…aargh!!! You didn’t narrow down your options before you started shopping, and because of this, you could not make a decision. No decision — no new car, on that day at least.
5. Anxiety — It’s true that anxiety can stop people from doing both simple and complex things. However, you don’t need to have been formally diagnosed with anxiety to be anxious to the point of inaction in certain circumstances. This can happen to anyone, and often does. Anxiety makes every decision you have to make important — whether it’s which supermarket you go to pick up some milk and bread, or where you should go on vacation. Lingering over every single worst-case scenario that may occur when you make a particular decision is rooted in some form of anxiety. Unfortunately, your brain is giving you signals that the only way to decrease your anxiety, is to actually analyze more — the thing which causes you to be more anxious and eventually succumb to analysis paralysis.
6. Perfectionism (or perceived perfectionism) — You’ve been looking for a new job as you are unhappy with your current situation. An opportunity arises with a large and reputable company which seems to be a perfect fit. You are so excited and start writing your application. You write…and rewrite…and rewrite again. You wind yourself up because you just can’t seem to get it right. You ask your closest friend to have a look and they provide feedback, which causes you even more confusion. You scrap everything and start again, however this time, you think that your application is even worse. The deadline for submitting the application is tomorrow and at 11:52pm the night before, you are staring at a blank Word document. Out of sheer frustration at not writing what you believe to be the perfect application, you have no choice but to not submit an application at all, and deny yourself the chance at your dream job.
7. Pressure Cooker — You’re a top sportsperson in your field and it’s game day. There are 10 seconds left on the clock, and you’ve just been passed the ball. All the team strategy sessions and all the practice in the world has come to this point — it’s decision time and the game is well and truly in your hot little hands. You have the knowledge; you have the physicality; you have the adrenalin; you have the experience and you intrinsically know what you have to do to win the game. You’ve executed this play a thousand times in practice, but what if it goes wrong? What if there is a better play? The crowd is screaming; the cheerleaders are cheering and your teammates are motioning you to go. But…your feet feel like cement; your heart is pounding and everything is a blur. You freeze, and…the buzzer goes. You have let your team, the fans and yourself down. All due to analysis paralysis.

Analysis paralysis can hit at any time, any place and to anyone. It may be something that only affects you once in a while, or it may be something more chronic. In any case, we are all human, and it is ingrained in our DNA that we always want to make the right decision.

There is absolutely nothing wrong in ensuring that you have all the information to make an educated decision, however over-analyzing, over-thinking, being presented with ‘option anxiety’ and constantly over-scrutinizing the information can lead to not only inaction, but may lead to an increase in mental health issues. Striking a healthy balance between information and action is where you should aim.