Are You Suffering From TMI Paralysis?

TMI -- Too Much Information. It's one thing to gather the facts you need to know the choices you have. It quite another to drown in tangential and irrelevant material.

But how can you know when enough is enough? Start with becoming aware of what process will work best for you.

If you tend to be more intuitive than logical, tune in to your inner sense of when you know all you need.

• Seek out the feeling or sensation or inner knowing that you've hit upon the right amount, or the best direction. Then stop the gathering.

If you prefer a goal-oriented approach, start with being clear about the end result you want -- what's your purpose for gathering information? What decision needs to be made with it? What factors do you need to learn about in order to make that decision or move in the direction of the desired result?

• Search for info to fit your criteria, then stop when start seeing the same advice more than once.

If a preponderance of evidence approach works best for you, start with a pro and con list. You might frame it this way: If I find 5 pieces of info in favor and 3 pieces against, the pros win.

• Set your criteria for what constitutes a pro and a con, do your search, and stop gathering when you reach your pre-set number.

If you have a different process, I'd love to hear about it. Oh, yeah, there's another method right there -- asking others what they know or do. Then have a way to determine if that method would work for you.