If you’ve recently found yourself thinking, “Well, I’m just lazy,” I want to stop you there.
We often get wrong with blame for a lot of things we are not responsible for. Procrastinating on tasks. Being forgetful. Neglecting to-do items that we otherwise care about. Feeling foggy-brained and strangely fatigued even though we have not accomplished much.
We often call that laziness. In fact, what we’re likely calling laziness most of the time is not laziness at all, but overstimulation.
Why “Laziness” Is Usually Overstimulation
The truth is most people do not feel a lack of motivation because they don’t want to work. They feel that way because they already have too much on their brains. Too much input. Too many tabs open (virtually and mentally). Too many things to pay attention to at once.
When your nervous system is full, motivation doesn’t escape you. It retreats from you.
What Overstimulation Actually Feels Like
And overstimulation isn’t always a state that feels loud. Sometimes it feels like nothingness.
You sit down to do one thing, and the next thing you know, you’ve been sitting there for an hour, staring at your phone, your eyes glossed over. You’re unable to focus on a small task, despite knowing you should be able to. You start things but never finish them, even though you care about finishing them, because starting them feels heavier than they are.
Your brain is not being melodramatic. Your brain is overloaded.
How Modern Life Keeps Us Overloaded
Constant input is the natural state of modern human life. Notifications. Background noise. Conversations you’re only half-listening to. Podcasts and videos playing when you eat and work and rest and recharge.
Even the empty times of day are filled with stimulation. Very rarely do our brains have a chance to experience absolute quiet long enough to come back to center.
So when it finally comes time for our brains to slow us down, we hear that as a verdict.
Lazy.
Fail.
But what’s actually happening is what any organism does when the system is at capacity: it sends you into shutdown.
Lazy vs. Overstimulated: How to Tell the Difference
And here’s how you can know if you’re lazy or if you’re overstimulated:
Lazy feels indifferent.
Overstimulation feels anxious. Overstimulation feels foggy.
Lazy doesn’t really care whether things get done or not.
Overstimulation cares a lot, but can’t move.
Lazy is not common.
Overstimulation is the norm.
And here’s a great way to tell if you’re feeling lazy or overstimulated: If you would, at this exact moment, prefer to be doing something but not starting, that’s a pretty great indication.
Why Pushing Harder Makes It Worse
The problem is, what most of us do when we get in this state is try to add motivation on top of an overloaded system. With discipline. With more shoulds. With more rules. With more self-criticism.
And of course the result of all that is… more overloaded.
Instead, what helps is to cut down on input, not up on effort.
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What Actually Helps When You’re Overstimulated
Close some tabs, mentally and physically. One thing at a time. One screen instead of three. Silence instead of ambient music or television.
Force yourself to only do one task for a small period of time. Short bursts of no stimulation are a great way to let your brain catch up.
Another great change you can make is to stop measuring productivity the same way. If your brain is overloaded, “doing less” might be the single most productive thing you can do.
You have to restore clarity first before you can have output, not the other way around.
You Don’t Need to Disappear to Feel Better
You don’t need to stop all input.
You don’t need to go full hermit.
You don’t need to overhaul your entire life.
You need a few moments of low stimulation in which you are not filling with media. You need to give yourself permission to stop multitasking. You need to stop viewing exhaustion as a moral failing.
The Truth
You are not lazy for finding it difficult to function in a world that never sleeps.
Your brain is not broken. Your brain is simply overwhelmed.
When you stop beating yourself up and instead start changing the space around you, life becomes more possible. Not perfect, but possible. Focus returns. Motivation follows. Not because you finally mustered up the willpower but because you finally gave your mind space to breathe.
You’re not lazy.
You’re overstimulated.
And you can work with that.
