The Problem With Paralysis Analysis When it Comes to Transition.
Dr. Z discusses paralysis analysis (analysis paralysis)—how it interferes with transition and makes you get to a point of complete standstill where you may not make any progress.
What is paralysis analysis? A point when you're overthinking, overanalyzing, turning things/worries inside your head, looking at it from all different angles, trying to see all different outcomes, all different ways transition might unfold. As a result of all this overanalyzing inside your head, instead of getting to a viable solution or viable direction, you become paralyzed. Because you become paralyzed, you feel incapable of making a move, incapable of making a decision—it paralyzes your decision-making aspect.
Paralysis analysis (analysis paralysis) is something all of us experience—not just in relationship to transition but in all areas of life when we get into this cyclical loop of overthinking (what Dr. Z calls "mental masturbation" when you're not really getting anywhere and become really stuck).
Paralysis analysis is not very helpful when making decisions about transition or gender because it gets you to this point of standstill where you just don't know what direction to go. Usually the reason it happens: in your head you're overanalyzing every single potential outcome—"if I transition I'll lose everyone, I may not get changes I want, I may get changes I don't want, I may not look passable, I won't find a partner." You're overanalyzing and overthinking all scenarios.
Watch to find out the biggest fallacy about paralysis analysis (you're not overanalyzing your scenario because nothing has happened to you yet—you're overanalyzing a scenario you witnessed or heard somebody else recall, so you're overanalyzing somebody else's life assuming the same thing will happen to you), how to break out of paralysis analysis (sit down and write down everything you're worried about, then go piece by piece asking yourself: do you have factual information that supports this statement? What percentage is likely to happen—10% or 100%? Then look at data and ask: do I have what I need to resolve it or support to go through this? If I don't transition this will never happen, but if I do transition and this does happen, would I still be better off having transitioned because I'm not suffering from gender dysphoria anymore?), why you want cost-benefit analysis not overanalysis based on somebody else's data (you want data relative to you and your context—your support system, your circumstances), and why the mind is helpful and incredibly detrimental (mind operates within sense of self—it can help derive solution, but the minute mind comes up with solution, everything you fear about solution creeps in, then mind says "okay I gave you solution but now you're afraid, now we'll analyze this fear," and it keeps going because mind's goal is to find and solve problems).
