Or at least, that was how it felt.
I stayed in bed rolling around with one of my cats until noon. I went out for lunch. I vacuumed. I played with my new vacuum, because yes, a new vacuum deserves playtime when you bought it at a good deal. I mopped the floor sometime around 4 or 5pm.
I had plans.
I wanted to prepare some content for the coming weeks. I thought about bringing one of the cats out for some training. I wanted to finally go back to the gym.
I did none of them.
Even my usual lazy activities felt boring. Games? Meh. Watching a series? Meh. TikTok and Instagram? Also meh.
By evening, I was bloated, tired and wondering why I had so little energy when I had barely done anything all day.
Then I realized something.
I hadn’t done much physically.
My brain, on the other hand, had been working overtime.
The day before had already been packed. I had three separate social activities from morning until evening. Then I woke up today to messages from a friend about an unresolved conflict involving another friend.
And there went my supposedly quiet Sunday.
The conflict itself wasn’t new. We had already discussed what happened. I had already gone through my own behaviour several times.
Was I too harsh?
Did I contribute to the situation?
Could I have handled something differently?
What might she be feeling?
Should I reach out?
Should I give her space?
Am I being unfair?
Am I being an asshole?
I don’t mind asking myself those questions.
I actually think self-evaluation is important. I don’t want to walk around assuming my interpretation is always correct. There are usually perspectives I haven’t considered.
You don’t know what you don’t know.
The problem is, at some point, I had considered everything available to me.
I simply didn’t have enough information.
The missing information belonged to the other person.
And she wasn’t talking.
So my brain did what brains apparently love doing when information is missing.
It started manufacturing possibilities.
Maybe she’s angry.
Maybe she’s overwhelmed.
Maybe something else is happening in her life.
Maybe she needs more time.
Maybe she doesn’t know how to respond.
Maybe we misunderstood her.
Maybe she misunderstood us.
Maybe I should try again.
Maybe trying again would disrespect the space I’m trying to give her.
Then something else happened.
I noticed she had suddenly changed a lot of things on social media within a short period. Old posts disappeared. The account changed. A large number of new posts appeared.
Immediately my brain found new material.
Is she okay?
Is she stressed?
Is this escapism?
Is this completely unrelated?
And there I was again.
Trying to solve a question without access to the person who holds the answer.
That was when one question suddenly made the whole thing much simpler:
Do I have new information?
If the answer is no, there is nothing new to evaluate.
It sounds ridiculously obvious.
Yet I needed to hear it.
I don’t need to stop myself from thinking about something. I don’t need to tell myself I shouldn’t care. I don’t need to force myself to “move on.”
I need to check whether my brain is processing information or recycling speculation.
There is a difference.
Self-reflection asks:
Have I considered my part fairly?
Overthinking eventually becomes:
If I run through this one more time, will I finally find an answer nobody has given me?
I think I had crossed into the second one.
I had already acknowledged my part in the conflict. I had considered how my words might have landed. I had considered other explanations. I had tried to leave room for the other person’s perspective.
What I didn’t have was her perspective.
No amount of thinking would produce it.
This also made me think about what friendship means to me.
I’ve had conflicts with people I love before.
I once had a three-month cold war with a family member while we lived under the same roof. Three months. We barely spoke despite seeing each other constantly.
Then one day I came across something related to one of his interests. I casually told him about it.
That tiny interaction restarted the conversation.
We got over it.
I’ve fought with close friends too. We’ve disagreed. We’ve been angry with each other. We’ve eventually sat down, talked about uncomfortable things, reconciled and remained friends years later.
Those experiences shaped what I expect from close friendships.
I don’t expect us to never hurt each other.
I don’t expect us to agree all the time.
I don’t even expect immediate reconciliation.
I do expect a friendship to eventually tolerate an uncomfortable conversation.
If I’m close to someone, I don’t want to spend the relationship constantly tiptoeing around their feelings. I want my friends to tell me difficult things when they think I need to hear them.
I might get hurt.
I might disagree.
I might need time.
But I’d rather know.
Of course, frankness doesn’t automatically make someone right. Good intentions don’t excuse poor delivery. Being a friend doesn’t give anyone unlimited permission to interfere.
That’s exactly why I keep checking myself too.
But accountability has an endpoint.
“I played a role in this” does not have to become “I must continue feeling guilty until the other person responds.”
And caring about someone doesn’t make me responsible for solving their problems.
This became especially obvious when I started thinking about this friend’s business.
I want the business to succeed. I’ve bought the products. I’ve shared them. People from my wider network have apparently bought them after seeing my content.
Part of my spending was genuine product trial. Part of it was also friendship.
Then I caught myself thinking about placing another order.
Did I need another order?
Not particularly.
Was I convinced enough by the product to keep paying the price?
Not particularly.
So why was I considering buying again?
Because perhaps buying something would communicate:
I still support you.
I’m still here.
Our conflict hasn’t changed everything.
And then I realized I was trying to use a transaction to manage a relationship.
No.
If I genuinely want the product, I’ll buy it.
If I want to finish the trial properly before evaluating the results, that’s also a valid reason.
But I don’t need to buy something to prove I’m still a friend.
Caring about somebody doesn’t require financially supporting every decision they make.
Supporting somebody also doesn’t mean taking responsibility for whether their plans succeed.
Sometimes you offer what you know how to offer.
Then the other person decides what to do with it.
Perhaps they don’t want your help.
Perhaps they need a different kind of help.
Perhaps they don’t know what they need.
Perhaps they’re dealing with something you know nothing about.
Again:
Do I have new information?
No.
Then I don’t know.
And “I don’t know” is a complete answer.
By the end of the day, my supposedly lazy Sunday suddenly made more sense.
My body had spent most of the day at home.
My brain hadn’t.
It had been reviewing a friendship, questioning my own behaviour, considering someone else’s perspective, discussing the situation with another friend, wondering whether someone was okay, thinking about boundaries, reconsidering what support means, and repeatedly trying to solve a problem with missing information.
No wonder making content sounded tiring.
No wonder the gym sounded impossible.
No wonder even games and TV felt meh.
I hadn’t done nothing.
I was mentally tired.
So I’m taking one small framework away from this Sunday.
When I catch myself circling around the same unresolved problem, I’ll ask:
Do I have new information?
If yes, I can reconsider.
If no, there is nothing new to solve.
The answer might arrive tomorrow.
It might arrive three months from now.
It might never arrive.
Until new information appears, I don’t need to keep holding another meeting about it inside my own head.
