Stamped: March 21st, 2006 | Toggle Similar
Tagged: unsolicited advice.

There is not a situation in our shared human existence that cannot be benefited from a little over-thinking. We’ve seen how decades of weighing multiple sides and perspectives have benefited areas like world hunger and AIDS research, so what if we took similar decision making strategies and applied them to our less grand but admittedly equally important daily quandaries?

Over-thinking past events and their future implications can lead to productive periods of emotional paralysis. While that may sound like a paradoxical state of being, I assure you that you will get more done than if you shackled your ankle to the oven with the faux leopard spotted fur lined shackles of self-analysis. After centuries of dealing with sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste all at the same time, most of us have adapted to only be able to deal with more than one mental process at a time. In our daily routines, we IM about the nagging force of our ennui while we work inputting spread sheets, drive while discussing the sociological relevance of “Failure to Launch” on our cell phones, intake various forms of nutritional substance while expending bodily waste products. Mental distractions will bring new efficiency to routine household chores. While mentally replaying every vocal inflection in a post-coital conversation you had with your almost-sort of-maybe lover, you will find the impetuous to get off the couch and clean out cabinet under the sink or reinforce your connections to your MySpace friends. Some people consider these mundane duties as a good way to “clear your head”. I think of it more as time to “maximize your efforts”.

Over-thinking can also keep you from subjecting yourself to unnecessary risk. Nothing can kill the early bloom of dating like calling him unwarranted and you can’t avoid romantic destruction if you’re not absolutely sure he wants you to. And once you’re sure he wants you, how can you be absolutely sure it’s the right time for you to call him? The two-three day standard can pass but how can you be sure that while he wants you to call him and enough time has passed for it not to be “weird”, how can you be sure that he is not the leader of a posse of pinko renegades who are robbing 7-11s to finance their ‘zine-based revolution. After all, he did make a few references to his dislike of mainstream politics as well as his affinity for staple guns. A girl needs to be careful lest she wake up one day hiding out in a nylon tent somewhere on the grounds of a radical’s parents’ estate.

But perhaps most the most beneficial side effect of over-thinking is that vocalizing each critical thinking twist in your head makes you more socially valuable to your surrounding peers. Articulating your grasp of the multitude of answers to common queries like how many communication-less days have to go by before your relationship is automatically defaulted or how much visible body hair is too much to every acquaintance in ear shot, is a major bonding method. Since primitive man was able to climb out of the cave and find solace in viewing weakness in others, human beings have been actively seeking friends who make them feeling better in comparison. By being open about the acknowledgeable cracks in your outer shell, you inform the herd that you will not make efforts to pull outside of the pack because with all your apparent need for reinforcement, you don’t have the time or remaining mental capacity to plan your escape. Nor will you disrupt proper public conversation rules by questioning the existence of God or goodness, just the propensity of the other gender to call when they say they will.

Now I acknowledge that not everyone has time to do the over-thinking necessary to really work through life and love’s army of conundrums. So I humbly offer up my services as the extra nagging voice in your head. Email your seemingly simplistic situations to me at mona@girlspoke.com and let’s see if we can’t discover some hidden levels of nonsense and dire implications.

Last 5 posts by Mona

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