What Is The One Thing You Need To Feel Ready? Tip: It’s Not Preparation.

How much do you usually prepare for a meeting? For a customer meeting? For a speech in front of an audience?

I rarely heard an overthinker stating:

“Let’s not worry about it. I will wing it”.

Instead, they most often tend to over-prepare. After all, better safe than sorry, right?

The issue with this adage is that it lacks situational context, therefore, nuances. When we reduce the outcome to “good or bad” — “pass or fail”, we are oblivious of trade-offs and it impacts our performance.

Is it worth it to spend an hour more rehearsing this presentation? Or would our time better be spent on another activity?

In my book Act Before You overThink, I explain that overthinkers (especially the Maximiser type) over-prepare with an excess of analysis. They consume all information they can find to obtain a “perfect” outcome. They claim: “The more data, the merrier!” — misunderstanding the value of information.

If we want to bake a chocolate cake and find an online recipe, does finding a second one provide us with the same value as the first one? Certainly not. What about a third recipe? What is its value compared to the second and first recipes?