How to Stop Second-Guessing Yourself and Trust Your Decisions

Have you ever made a decision, felt reasonably comfortable with it, and then started questioning yourself a few hours or days later? Perhaps you remembered another option, heard someone else’s opinion, or began imagining everything that could go wrong. If this sounds familiar, you may be wondering how to stop second-guessing yourself.

Sometimes, reconsidering a decision is necessary. But when you keep questioning yourself without any new information, you may be struggling less with the decision itself than with the uncertainty that comes with making a choice.

Why Do You Keep Second-Guessing Yourself?

You may be afraid of making the wrong choice. When a decision matters to you, it’s natural to want to avoid regret. Reconsidering your options can feel like a way to prevent mistakes, but at some point, further thinking stops providing useful insight and becomes an attempt to find an answer that may not exist.

You might interpret uncertainty as a warning sign. If you still feel uneasy after making a decision, you may assume you’ve overlooked something important, even when you can’t identify a specific problem.

You may feel pressure to make the right decision, even when nobody else expects it of you. Internalized expectations can make you believe that you should be able to make the right choice with the information available. When things don’t turn out as hoped, you may blame yourself for not thinking things through more carefully, questioning both your judgment and your ability to make good decisions.

Perfectionism can make it difficult to accept a decision that isn’t guaranteed to be the best possible option. You might keep comparing alternatives, wondering whether another choice could have produced a better outcome. Even when your decision is reasonable, the possibility that you could have done better may leave you dissatisfied. If this sounds familiar, you may find it helpful to explore how perfectionism can affect your sense of self-worth.

Sometimes, you look for reassurance from other people. You ask what they would do, compare your choice with theirs, or revisit the same arguments in the hope of finally feeling confident. While another perspective can be helpful, repeated reassurance may not resolve the underlying uncertainty.

These patterns can overlap. For example, the desire to meet others’ expectations can feed perfectionism, making a reasonable decision feel inadequate if another option might have produced a better result.

If you recognize yourself in these patterns, our article about what’s behind overthinking explores why thinking through every possibility can become mentally exhausting rather than help us move forward.

Not every uncomfortable feeling means you need to change your decision. Sometimes, the discomfort simply comes from having to make a choice without knowing how it will turn out.

Doubt Doesn’t Automatically Mean You Made the Wrong Decision

Imagine that you’ve received two job offers. One offers a higher salary, while the other provides a better work-life balance. You consider the advantages and disadvantages of both, think about your priorities, and eventually accept the second offer.

A few weeks later, you hear that someone you know accepted a similar position with a considerably higher salary. You start wondering whether you should have made the same choice.

Did you make the wrong decision?

Not necessarily. We generally make decisions based on the information, opportunities, and priorities available to us at the time. A thoughtful choice can still lead to an unexpected outcome, and recognizing this doesn’t mean excusing careless decisions. It means distinguishing between what you could reasonably have anticipated and what you can only see in hindsight.

Returning to the job offer example, you might learn to research salary ranges more thoroughly or negotiate more confidently next time. You can use that experience to make better-informed decisions in the future without assuming you should have known better all along.

In psychology, outcome bias describes the tendency to judge a decision more favorably or unfavorably based on how things turned out, rather than evaluating the reasoning and information available when the decision was made. Research by Jonathan Baron and John Hershey demonstrated that knowledge of an outcome can influence people’s assessments of decision quality, even when the decision-maker had the same information in either case (Baron & Hershey, 1988).

This doesn’t mean that outcomes are irrelevant. They can reveal mistakes, expose risks you underestimated, or teach you something valuable for the future. The point is to distinguish between a decision that was poorly considered and a reasonable decision that didn’t produce the result you wanted.

You can learn from an outcome without automatically condemning the choice that preceded it.

When Should You Reconsider a Decision?

Trusting yourself doesn’t mean sticking to every decision regardless of what happens. Sometimes, reconsidering your choice is the most sensible thing to do.

Perhaps new information has emerged, your circumstances or priorities have changed, or you’ve realized that you overlooked an important concern. In these situations, revisiting your decision can help you respond more effectively.

But sometimes, the urge to reconsider comes from a different place. You may have made a choice to please someone else or dismissed a concern that mattered to you.

The important question is whether you have a meaningful reason to reconsider your decision or are simply struggling with the uncertainty that remains.

Has something important changed, or are you simply uncomfortable with the uncertainty that remains?

This question doesn’t require you to dismiss your feelings. It helps you examine what they might be telling you.

Perhaps your discomfort is drawing your attention to a genuine concern that deserves further thought. Alternatively, you may have already considered the relevant factors and reached a reasonable conclusion, but still find it difficult to accept that you cannot predict the outcome.

If the second situation sounds familiar, you might also relate to our article about why we need certainty. Wanting a clear answer is understandable, especially when a decision matters. However, the desire for certainty can sometimes keep us searching for reassurance long after we’ve gathered enough information to make a considered choice.

You don’t have to ignore a concern simply because you’ve already made a decision. Equally, you don’t have to reopen the entire question every time uncertainty returns.

The Difference Between Doubting a Decision and Distrusting Yourself

Imagine two people who have carefully considered the same career change. Both recognize the risks, but they respond to their remaining doubts differently.

Imagine that both have carefully considered a career change. Neither knows whether the new role will meet their expectations, and both recognize that the decision carries some risk.

One person thinks, I’ve considered what matters to me, and this seems like a reasonable choice. It might not turn out exactly as I hope, but I’ll respond to the situation as it develops.

The other keeps thinking, What if I’m making a mistake? What if the other option would have been better? Why can’t I feel more certain?

The first person accepts that a thoughtful decision can still involve risk. The second may feel that they need to eliminate their doubts before they can trust their choice.

This distinction matters because self-trust isn’t the same as certainty about the future. You can have doubts and still believe that you’re capable of making a considered decision.

You may also trust your ability to respond if circumstances change, even when you can’t be sure what the best response will be.

When uncertainty becomes a reason to question your competence or worth, the issue may extend beyond the decision itself. If you tend to turn mistakes into conclusions about who you are, you may recognize a similar pattern in our article about the inner critic.

A decision can deserve a second look without becoming a verdict on your ability to make decisions.

What Happens If Things Don’t Go as Planned?

When things don’t turn out as expected, it’s easy to question not only your decision but also your judgment. You might think you should have known better or considered every possible consequence.

But careful decision-making cannot eliminate every risk. Circumstances change, other people make their own choices, and some factors remain beyond your control.

This doesn’t mean dismissing mistakes or avoiding responsibility. It means learning to distinguish between something you could reasonably have anticipated and something you couldn’t have known at the time.

Instead of automatically blaming yourself, ask what the experience can teach you. Perhaps you need to gather more information next time, consider a risk you previously overlooked, or approach a similar situation differently.

There is also another question worth considering: Do you trust yourself to respond if the outcome isn’t what you hoped for?

This doesn’t mean assuming every problem will be easy to solve or using uncertainty as an excuse for reckless choices. Some decisions require careful consideration of significant risks. The aim is to make a reasonable effort before acting while accepting that you cannot control everything that follows.

You can take responsibility for your choices without expecting yourself to predict every outcome.

How to Stop Second-Guessing Yourself After a Decision

If you’re wondering how to stop second guessing yourself after making a decision, these three steps can help you decide whether your doubts deserve further attention.

1. Identify what is driving your doubt

Before reconsidering the entire decision, pause and identify what has triggered the uncertainty.

Did you learn something new since you made your decision? Have your circumstances changed? Did you realize that you overlooked an important factor? Or did the same what if thought return without any new information?

You don’t need to dismiss the feeling of doubt. Simply try to understand what is behind it before deciding what to do.

2. Evaluate the reason, not just the feeling

If you identify a genuine concern, examine it. Consider whether it changes the balance of advantages and disadvantages or calls for a different course of action.

If you cannot identify a meaningful reason to reconsider the decision, ask yourself whether you’re trying to solve a problem or trying to make the uncertainty disappear.

Self-reflection is useful when it helps you understand a situation, recognize a mistake, or identify a next step. It becomes less useful when you repeatedly revisit the same thoughts without gaining a new perspective.

Research has explored the distinction between constructive self-reflection and rumination, including how the way we approach our thoughts can influence whether reflection helps us process an experience or keeps us caught in it (Kross, 2009).

A decision doesn’t have to be perfect to be reasonable. The possibility that another option might have turned out better doesn’t automatically mean you made the wrong choice.

The goal isn’t to eliminate reflection, but to recognize when it stops being useful.

3. Consider what you can do if the outcome is different from what you expected

You don’t need to know exactly how everything will unfold. Instead, consider how you might respond if things don’t go as planned.

If things don’t turn out as you hoped, can you respond to the situation without automatically treating the outcome as proof that you should have known better?

Perhaps you could reassess your options, seek advice, make adjustments, or choose a different direction. In some situations, you may need to accept that you cannot change the outcome and focus on what remains within your control.

Not every problem has an easy solution, and you don’t have to pretend otherwise. The point is to remember that making a decision doesn’t mean surrendering your ability to respond to what happens next.

For significant decisions, it can also help to identify in advance what would justify revisiting your choice. This gives you a reason to review the decision when circumstances warrant it, rather than feeling compelled to reconsider it whenever doubt returns.

Trusting Yourself Doesn’t Mean Being Certain

You won’t always feel confident after making a decision. Sometimes, you’ll have to choose without knowing whether the outcome will match your expectations.

If something important changes, you can reconsider your decision. If nothing has changed, you may not need to keep questioning it simply because you still feel uncertain.

Self-trust doesn’t mean knowing you’ve made the perfect decision. It means making a thoughtful choice, accepting that you cannot predict everything, and trusting yourself to respond when things don’t go as planned.

Further Reading

• Baron, J., & Hershey, J. C. (1988). Outcome bias in decision evaluation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 54(4), 569–579. Read the research
• Kross, E. (2009). When the self becomes other: Toward an integrative understanding of the processes distinguishing adaptive self-reflection from rumination. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1167(1), 35–40. Read the research

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