Navigating Through Life

# Navigating Through Life The modern person lives in a landscape that is historically unique in many ways: we have more options than any generation before us. More products, more career paths, more identities to try on, more opinions to relate to, more ways of living — and more channels to compare ourselves with. On paper this can look like freedom in its purest form. In practice, the abundance of choice can do something to us: it can steal calm, endurance and direction. I want to describe this using a psychological image: imagine your mental life is like a fast river during spring thaw. The water runs quickly, and in the current float twigs, leaves, debris and trash. Some things pass by and disappear, some cling to the riverbank, gather and form a blockage. Mental processes can pile up in much the same way. In an increasingly complex everyday life the chance that we experience a kind of *mental constipation*—a feeling of being full, clogged, overloaded or "out of capacity" at the same time—increases. ## The Parallel Brain — Not One Thing at a Time In traditional psychology it was common to think that mental functions could be sorted into clear boxes: we *think* or *feel*, we *remember* or *plan*, we *analyze* or *act*. This is an intuitive model — and it can be useful to explain some phenomena. Newer perspectives in cognitive neuroscience and affective psychology nuance this picture. Rather than being a sequential machine that does one task at a time, the brain is a system with a large number of subprocesses running in parallel. Attention, emotion regulation, impulse inhibition, working memory, interpretation of social information and bodily arousal can occur simultaneously — and continuously influence each other. This is why we can be "in a meeting" and at the same time: - feel unease in our body, - interpret a facial expression as criticism, - plan a reply, - remember something that happened yesterday, - evaluate what we should have said, - and still follow an agenda on a screen. Mental life is not tidy modules taking turns. It is more like the river: many currents at once. And the more complex the environment around us is, the more "things" can enter the flow. ## Choice Abundance and Cognitive Overload In a society with many options we can be exposed to a constant stream of small and large decisions. Some are trivial: which coffee drink, which series, which sex toy, which workout, which route to work. Others are existential: which partner, which place to live, which identity, which career, whether to have children. The problem is not that choices themselves are dangerous. The problem is that choices drain us of cognitive capacity when they become too many, too frequent or too emotionally charged. The brain has limited working memory and limited regulatory resources. We can compare it to a computer running out of memory: the system starts to lag, it becomes harder to run multiple programs at once, and eventually something crashes. Psychologically this can appear as: - more impulsive decisions, - short-term rewards trumping long-term goals, - lower frustration tolerance, - increased irritability and vulnerability, - experiences of decision avoidance ('I can't choose'), - and a diffuse feeling of not being able to trust yourself. Many can recognize this in everyday situations. You walk into a café and face a menu with forty options. You stand there a little too long, feel silly, pick something "safe", and leave with a slightly weird feeling of having used too much mental energy on something unimportant. Over time such micro-events become not just annoyances, but small drops that fill an already full cup. ## Mental Constipation: When the Path to Your Goal Is Occupied Most of us have goals, intentions and values: things we want to live for, contribute to or build. The challenge in a highly complex world is that the path to the goal is increasingly occupied by temptations and options. Temptations can take the form of: - screens, scrolling and endless entertainment, - quick dopamine rewards, - purchases and consumption, - social comparison, - "optimization projects" (biohacking, self-improvement, constant tracking), - or other life alternatives that make what you've already chosen feel less binding. In such terrain it becomes harder to hold a steady course. We are more easily led into dead ends, and each time we change direction the sense of coherence and self-predictability weakens. Many describe it as "losing themselves a bit." Not because they lack willpower as a type of person, but because they live in an environment that requires more self-regulation than the resources they have available. ## Impulsivity as a Symptom of Overload When cognitive capacity is overloaded, we often adopt a more impulsive pattern of action. This is not a moral failing; it is a regulation problem. Impulsivity can be the brain's attempt to do something simple: *Choose now. Finish it. Get relief.* It gives a moment of control, even if in the long run it may lead us away from what we truly want. This is an important psychological mechanism to understand: under load the ability for long-term planning and self-control is reduced, and immediate rewards gain more power. The result can be living more reactively than we intend. ## Stress, Anxiety and the Feeling of Endless Possibilities An abundance of choice creates not only cognitive stress. It can also create emotional stress. A key part of anxiety is the experience of uncertainty and possible catastrophes. When choices feel 'endless', so do the scenarios for what could go wrong. The brain can spend a lot of energy simulating futures: 'What if I choose wrong? What if I regret it? What if I miss out?' It's not hard to see how this can develop into a persistent baseline tension. Not necessarily panic, but a constant inner engine that runs a little too fast. ## ADHD-like Symptoms in an Overstimulating Environment Many today experience symptoms that resemble ADHD: concentration difficulties, restlessness, easy distractibility and the sense of losing willpower. That does not mean everyone has ADHD as a neurobiological condition. But it is relevant to ask: how does an environment of constant stimulation affect our attention and self-regulation? If the brain is constantly interrupted — by notifications, impressions, opportunities, information and comparison — it is trained to shift tracks. Over time it can feel as if concentration "disappears." Many describe it as being unable to hold on to a thought without something pulling them away. Again: this can be understood as a result of cognitive overload. The mental river runs faster, fills with more debris, and more things get snagged on the banks. ## The Soros Paradox: Grey Areas, Categories and Difficult Definitions To navigate the world we need categories: right/wrong, dangerous/safe, relevant/irrelevant, inside/outside. Categories create order. The problem is that reality often does not respect our categories. Here it is useful to introduce what I call *the Soros paradox*: it can be very difficult to draw clear lines for when something goes from being one thing to being another. Transitions are often gradual. The distinction between 'X' and 'not-X' can be theoretically appealing but practically impossible to delineate precisely. The paradox is that we still often *must* draw a line, especially in legal, medical and ethical matters. One of the most demanding examples is the abortion debate, where disagreement often concerns definitions: When is something a person? When does it have moral status? What is life? What is consciousness? Where do we draw the line? When society tries to make rules in a field that itself is characterized by gradual transitions, there is a risk of creating rigid systems that can have catastrophic consequences for individuals. At the same time the individual may experience great inner unrest: 'If I can't define this clearly, how can I know I'm doing the right thing?' The Soros paradox points to a basic psychological truth: many of our mental conflicts are not about lacking information, but about reality being nuanced and our deep human need for clear categories. ## The Black-and-White Trap and the Importance of Nuance Mental health is largely about flexibility. Not in the sense of 'never standing for anything', but the ability to hold that the world contains contradictions, grey areas and complex relationships. Black-and-white thinking can give short-term relief: 'This is right. This is wrong. I am like this. You are like that.' But it often comes with a psychological cost: - relationships become more conflict-ridden, - self-image becomes more vulnerable (either worthless or perfect), - and emotional life becomes more extreme (shame, rage, panic). Learning to navigate nuance does not mean becoming passive or relativistic. It means tolerating that something can be partly true, that you can be in doubt, that you can change your mind, and that a decision can be 'good enough' without being optimal. ## Awareness of Decision Processes: a Psychological Skill A large part of navigating better is understanding how decisions actually get made. Many believe they choose by analyzing their way to 'the best' option. In practice many choices are made: - under time pressure, - in emotional activation, - with limited information, - and influenced by habits, social pressure and immediate rewards. Becoming more aware of this is not meant as self-criticism but as self-insight. The better you see *how* your choices are formed, the easier it becomes to create a life that more closely aligns with your values. ## Limiting Choices as a Mental-Health Strategy One of the most concrete steps for better mental health in a complex everyday life is to reduce the number of choices you expose yourself to. This is not a call to a minimalist ideal that everyone must follow, but an acknowledgment that cognitive capacity is a limited resource. In practice 'choice reduction' can mean: - standardizing simple routines (breakfast, clothing, workout time), - creating fixed systems for finances and shopping, - cutting down on apps/notifications, - limiting information flow, - and setting clearer boundaries for what you actually evaluate. The point is not to make life less rich, but to free up mental energy for what matters most. ## Flexible Thinking as an Antidote to Binary Categories At the same time as we reduce unnecessary choices, we need more flexibility when facing the choices that are unavoidable. Flexible thinking is about being able to: - hold two perspectives at once, - tolerate uncomfortable uncertainty, - revise a stance without losing dignity, - and see that there are multiple 'good enough' solutions. This is especially important in a society that often rewards strong, simple opinions. Psychological maturity often lies in the ability to live with the unresolved without becoming paralyzed. ## A More Satisfying Life in a More Complex World Navigating life today requires something different than it did before. Not necessarily because we have become weaker as people, but because we live in an environment that continuously burdens attention, regulation and decision systems. If we understand that the brain is not a tidy machine that does one thing at a time, but a parallel system that easily becomes overloaded, it makes more sense that we can lose direction. If we understand that an abundance of choices can create mental constipation, it becomes easier to meet ourselves with realism rather than self-blame. If we understand that the world is nuanced and that clear lines are often psychological comfort more than objective reality — as the Soros paradox illustrates — it becomes easier to tolerate doubt and complexity. A satisfying life is rarely about finding the perfect route. It is more often about finding a direction that feels meaningful, and then making it a little easier to keep course: fewer unnecessary choices, more awareness of your decision processes, and a greater tolerance for grey areas. --- **Want to dive deeper into this topic?** This is a topic psychologist Sondre Risholm Liverød talks more about in the podcast episode of the same name. You can find the episode as part of the practice material at [BeBalanced.ai](https://bebalanced.ai).