Your Brain’s Secret Side Hustle: Professional What-If-ing

Have you ever felt the heavy swirl of your brain caught in a worst-case scenario loop, like it’s trying to solve every possible future problem all at once?

Maybe it’s what-if-ing about whether your job is safe with all the layoffs happening. Or what-if-ing about your budget, because it feels like things costs more while your paycheck stays the same. Or what-if-ing as you watch restructuring happen at work, not knowing if you’ll be impacted.

That what-if-ing is real, and it serves a purpose. (Purpose? I know, it sounds ludicrous. Stay with me, I promise to explain.)

For a long time, I chalked it up to having an overactive brain. But moving back to Kansas City after nearly four decades in Arizona showed me just how active that “what-if” engine can get.

• What if my sister and I drive each other absolutely bonkers living together and we stop liking each other? (Yes, we consciously chose to live together because we genuinely do like each other. But let’s be real, we’re two grown women who’ve been doing our own thing for decades.)

• What if I can’t figure out how to make friends again after being gone for nearly four decades? Because making friends as an adult feels awkward enough as it is.

• What if I can’t continue to grow my business while getting settled into a new space and new routines? Goodness knows I didn’t want to add financial stress into the mix as my sister and I got reacquainted as roommates.

Your what-ifs might be different, but I’m betting our brains do some similar mental backflips when the unknown is present. Because let’s face it, we’re still running outdated survival wiring from our prehistoric ancestors’ days of roaming the earth.

So… What’s the Purpose of All This What-If-ing?

The purpose of all the what-if-ing and filling in the blanks of the unknown is to keep us safe and conserve energy. No safety and no energy? No bueno.

Here’s the thing about our brains and uncertainty: They treat each “what if” like an emergency. So instead of one worry, you’ve got a full-blown internal alarm system going off. It’s like your brain becomes that friend who turns, “I have this minor issue,” into, “The sky is falling and we’re all going to perish.”

Honestly, your brain would rather make up terrible scenarios than just sit with the not knowing. Even imaginary disasters can feel “better” than no plan at all.

The What-If-ing Antidote (and an Experiment to Try)

There I was, totally overwhelmed by all the what-ifs of the move, when I remembered something psychologist Rick Hanson once said: “We have a tendency to overestimate our challenges and underestimate our resources.”

Being a neuroscience geek, I know that having the right number of resources and choices feels like a plan to the brain. And I also know that when I write them down and use them like a menu, my brain gets super amped. (Choices and the anticipation of making a choice equals brain excitement, which results in a release of feel-good chemicals.)

So, I grabbed a piece of paper and, for each of my big what-if-ing situations, I answered these questions:

• Who’s got my back? (Like, really got my back)

• What am I legitimately good at? (Even when everything feels messy. This is where I listed skills and strengths.)

• When have I figured out hard stuff before? (Because I totally have.) What did I learn that I can apply here?

• What other resources do I have that I haven’t named yet?

This isn’t just feel-good fluff. Nope, making a list of your resources and using them helps rewire your brain.

Each time my brain starts to what-if like a boss, I go straight to identifying my internal and external resources. I then choose the best resource(s) to use. That takes me from stuck, stalled, and stressed out to calm and creative.

Give it a whirl the next time your brain launches into what-if mode and see what happens. And if you do try it, I’d love to hear about it.

The Outcome of My What-Ifs

Living with my sister? We’re almost two years in, and we just bought a house together. Do we occasionally get on each other’s nerves? Yep. But we still like each other.

As for the what-ifs about settling in, making friends, and growing my business? I’m now fully rooted and having an absolute blast going out with my sister, mingling, and meeting new people. And fun twist, I feel 100 percent more creative business-wise in this new space. (The NeuroLab is proof of that.)

It’s funny how some of the scariest what-ifs never come to fruition, isn’t it?

Speaking of which, I’d love to hear one of your big what-ifs that never happened, and what you learned from it. 

Until next time, I’m wishing you lots of what-if free moments.