Control > Option > Command: A New Mental Shortcut for Overthinking.

31 Oct

The Keyboard Shortcut That Turns Rumination Into Action.

We live in a world that encourages us to believe every challenge is solvable. Sometimes I lie in bed thinking, ‘come on Lucy, go over it once more’, where ‘it’ is some puzzle I’m trying to solve - a conversation I wish had gone better, a project that’s getting too big, or a relationship that’s concerning me.

It’s easy to operate under the delusional pretence that we are always in control. If we can just think harder, search longer, or find a different approach to the problem, surely we’ll hit upon the answer. Sometimes though there is no ‘right answer’. Or, in fact, any answer at all. When our relentless problem-solving and overthinking traps us in loops of anxiety, perfectionism and self-blame, it becomes the problem.

In those moments I have to remind myself to stop striving for the perfect answer.

The other day I stumbled upon an unexpected heuristic for moments like these.

Looking down at my keyboard - at that familiar bottom-left trio I use countless times a day - I thought: what if these keys were mental shortcuts too?

What if Control, Option, Command provided a new framework for navigating stress, uncertainty, and change? What might that look like? So here it is, let me know if you find it useful.

Keyboard showing Control Option and Command keys. — **Control > Option > Command**

**Control: Focus on what you *can* control.**
*What can I actually control here? What’s beyond my control?*
**Option: Conjure some alternatives.**
*What are three possible approaches to the problem? Options create flexibility.*
**Command: Take deliberate, values-driven action**
*What’s one (maybe small) action? Make sure it aligns with what/who you value, and who you are.*

Control: Focus on what you can influence

I find it helpful to write two lists for what’s in my control and the stuff that’s beyond it. In the middle of the night I picture letting ‘plates’ (problems) beyond my current control fall to the ground. This helps focus attention where it matters and release the rest. As psychologist Ellen Langer’s pioneering research on perceived control shows, believing we should control the uncontrollable is one of the fastest routes to stress and burnout.

Option: Are there any alternative options?

When we’re under pressure, our minds often insist there’s only one right way forward. But options open space for alternative perspectives.

Try writing down three possible approaches to the problem, however small or imperfect. Naming possibilities shifts us from helplessness to agency. It gives us options.

In the face of loss or change, this might sound like:

I can ask a friend for their help, or their opinion.
I can check in with them to see if my interpretation is accurate or way off the mark.
I might just have to pause and allow time to do its work.

Options create flexibility — and flexibility is the foundation of resilience.

Command: Take deliberate, values-driven action

Finally, choose your next action - however modest - and command it into being. [I know the ‘command’ word’s a bit annoying and overly shouty/imperative but I’m going with the metaphor here…it might just prove useful for me/some of us and, if it does, who cares if it’s a bit commanding.]

If I view command as commitment to action - taking one step in the direction towards something I value, or even just a moment of peace and clarity - then that works. Perhaps command is about momentum: the small daily acts that move us from (over)thinking to doing.

Taking command means stepping out of rumination and into momentum: doing what matters, even when outcomes aren’t guaranteed.