When Everything Feels Urgent, Nothing Feels Clear
Decluttering Your Mind in a VUCA World
Most people don’t feel overwhelmed because they have too much to do. They feel overwhelmed because they have too much undecided.
In volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) environments, the brain goes into a kind of cognitive hoarding mode. It tries to keep everything “on the radar” just in case it might become important. That instinct makes sense from a survival standpoint… but in modern life, it’s a recipe for exhaustion.
☑️You can clean off your desk.
☑️You can organize your inbox.
☑️You can color-code your calendar.
And still feel mentally fried because the real clutter isn’t physical. It’s psychological.
The Hidden Cost of Mental Clutter
When uncertainty is high, people carry more:
◆ Unfinished decisions
◆ Unspoken worries
◆ “I should probably…” thoughts
◆ Emotional residue from hard conversations
Neuroscience gives us a useful lens here. Your brain has a limited capacity for working memory - the mental “scratch pad” where you hold things while you think, decide, and plan. When that space is overloaded, your ability to focus, prioritize, and regulate emotions drops sharply.
That’s why people in high-change environments often report feeling: foggy, reactive, and scattered, and strangely tired, even when they haven’t done that much. They’re overloaded, not lazy.
Research by cognitive psychologist George Miller and later by Nelson Cowan shows that working memory can only hold about 4–7 items at a time before performance degrades. Everything beyond that creates noise, not clarity.¹
VUCA floods that system.
Why Uncertainty Makes Clutter Worse
When the future feels unstable, the brain does something sneaky. It tries to stay safe by keeping everything open:
◆ Every option
◆ Every risk
◆ Every possible outcome
It feels responsible. It feels vigilant. But it also means nothing ever gets fully resolved.
That’s how leaders end up lying awake at night running the same mental loops:
◆ What if this fails?
◆ What if I choose wrong?
◆ What if I miss something important?
Those loops are open tabs, and they drain far more energy than most people realize.
Clarity is Not the Absence of Complexity
Albert Einstein once joked, “If a cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind, of what, then, is an empty desk a sign?”
It’s a great question because clarity isn’t about having less on your plate. It’s about knowing what deserves to be there.
A clear mind doesn’t mean: no stress, no problems, and no uncertainty. It means fewer open loops, fewer unmade decisions, fewer things pretending to be urgent
That’s what creates space for thinking.
A Simple Way to Clear Your Mental Desk
You don’t need a productivity system to reduce mental clutter. You need a way to close loops.
Try this five-minute reset:
Write down:
⭐What’s on my mind right now?
⭐What actually needs action this week?
⭐What am I worrying about that I don’t control?
This does two powerful things:
⭐It moves thoughts out of your head and onto paper
⭐It separates responsibility from rumination
That’s the beginning of clarity.
Why This Matters for Leaders
In VUCA, people don’t just look to leaders for answers. They look to them for cognitive safety.
When a leader can say: “This matters. That can wait. And this part is outside our control.” …everyone’s nervous system settles just a little.
That’s strategic, not soft & fluffy.
Clarity is contagious. And in a noisy world, it might be the most valuable thing you bring into the room.
Source
Cowan, N. (2010). The magical mystery four: How is working memory capacity limited, and why? Current Directions in Psychological Science, 19(1), 51–57.