Control: the Quiet Panic of Being 'On Top of Things'
You’re ticking all the boxes.
Replying on time, and keeping the house in check. So why does it still feel like something’s about to fall apart?
Being “on top of things” was supposed to feel relaxing. Instead, it feels like walking a tightrope.
You’ve done all the right things, and yet your shoulders are still up around your ears.
Control feels like we’re doing something. It feels productive, but it’s often just panic in motion.
Like we’re getting ahead of the chaos, if we can just get it right or fix it now, we’ll finally relax.
But here’s the reality:
Control is a reaction to fear. Calm is a relationship with safety.
They might look the same on the outside (clean floors, updated planner, inbox zero), but they feel completely different in your body.
Note: Alphabetising your spice rack won’t fix your existential dread.
However, trying to control everything feels amazing… for about 14 minutes. Then the stress creeps back in to make itself at home again.
We confuse control with calm.
Clean the house when you’re overwhelmed? Therapeutic.
Downloading a new routine to finally get your life together? Hopeful.
Rewriting your to-do list again instead of doing anything on it? Progress right?
Control isn’t wrong. It’s just very good at pretending to help.
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How Control Pretends to Help
Control gives the illusion of safety.
When life feels overwhelming or unpredictable, our brains crave something to hold onto and something we can manage. So we reach for what’s visible and measurable: cleaning, planning, reordering, redoing, re-fixing.
Control feels helpful because:
It’s active (doing something = feeling productive).
It’s focused (you forget the bigger chaos for a moment).
It’s structured (and structure feels like certainty).
But here's the catch:
It’s not true safety, it’s just something to focus on and distract your mind from the underlying emotions trying to break through.
You’re soothing the surface.
Not addressing the actual nervous system signal that says: “I don’t feel safe right now.”
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Why Control Feels So Good (At First)
Feeling in control gives us a false sense of certainty.
When life feels unpredictable, we reach for what we can manage. Hello, sock drawer. Hello, spreadsheets. Hello, intense urge to change your entire filing system at midnight.
It’s not about the thing you’re fixing. It’s about the feeling you’re trying to fix.
Totally human. But also, totally exhausting.
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What Your Nervous System Actually Wants
Your nervous system has one job: to scan for safety. Constantly. Silently. Without asking for your opinion.
It’s always asking: “Am I safe?”
Not “Do I have the right planner layout?”
Not “Is the linen closet up to Instagram standards?”
When life feels overwhelming, your brain wants certainty. So it reaches for control, because it feels like safety. Structure. Power. But it’s not the same thing as calm.
Your nervous system doesn’t care about perfection. It’s not impressed by colour-coded apps or spotless bathrooms. It cares about predictability, sensation, and signals of safety.
When you operate from control, your body often stays in a state of hypervigilance:
Tense jaw
Racing thoughts
Irritability
Restless energy
Trouble relaxing even when things look “done”
Being snippy with others who are “relaxed and don’t care”
Why?
Because control is still coming from fight-or-flight. It’s trying to outrun danger. It’s reactive.
Your body doesn’t calm when it’s being managed.
Your body calms when it’s being listened to.
Control is an illusion. Calm is a physiological state.
You can fold towels all day and still feel wired and cranky. You can declutter your entire hallway cupboard and still lose it because your partner chewed weirdly at dinner. (just saying.) You can install five new apps to plan your week and still wake up anxious every morning.
Because none of those things are actually talking to your nervous system.
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The Real Path to Calm
Calm isn’t “earned” by doing enough.
It’s allowed in through nervous-system-friendly signals like:
Repetition (simple routines).
Soothing inputs (soft lighting, warmth, music).
Permission to pause without the guilt or negative talk.
Letting “good enough” be enough.
Control says:
“I can’t relax until everything is perfect.”
“You’re only okay if your environment is okay.”
“Just fix one more thing.”
Calm says:
“You’re allowed to pause even if things aren’t perfect.”
“You’re still safe, even if the laundry’s giving side-eye.”
“Progress is allowed to be slow and messy.”
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So, What Does Help?
Surprise: it’s not more effort. It’s gentler systems that hold you when you don’t have effort to give.
Things like:
Systems that serve you. Not to make things prettier. Not for the family. Not for Instagram. Just one thing that makes your life easier. Like takeaway-for-dinner Fridays or meal planning that allows for toast a few nights a week.
Systems built for bad days, not just good intentions.
Realistic systems that hold just enough structure to stop the chaos
Stepping off the hamster wheel of trying to fix everything and everyone
If things need to fall apart, let them. And then rebuild the new, together
Don’t aim for control, aim for containment and a flexible structure. Enough of a plan to keep the chaos from winning, but not so much that your life becomes a full-time job to manage.
Keeping the house running, remembering everyone’s appointments, managing the mess and the moods, and somehow still feeling like you haven’t done enough? You're holding it all together while quietly falling apart. No one notices, because “you seem so capable”, but capability isn’t the same as well-being.
You’re fine being busy, but when you reach capacity with no backup, that's when you’re nervous system begins to reach for more control and eventually starts to crumble under the pressure.
Your nervous system doesn’t calm down because the floors are clean. It calms down when it stops feeling like the apocalypse will happen if you take a break. If everything falls apart without you, you’re not supported, you’re trapped.
So, how do you get out of this loop?
You don’t do more work. You change your mindset.
For those in the back: you don’t do more work.
More work will make it worse. More systems won’t fix this.
Stop, change your mindset.
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But how to change?
Drop the idea of perfect systems. Perfect anything.
Lower the bar. The bare minimum is okay.
Then, learn to regulate your nervous system on purpose. This doesn’t mean bubble baths and Pinterest quotes. It means 30 seconds of deep breathing. Standing outside for 90 seconds in the sun. Listening to music while you do boring chores. These micro-moments tell your body: “You’re safe. You’re not under attack.” And they actually work better than most elaborate self-care routines we rarely relax into anyway.
If you’re silently seething because no one helps, stop stuffing it down. Name the resentment. You don’t have to give a TED Talk at the dinner table, but you do have to stop pretending you’re fine. You’re not. You’re human.
You don’t fix this by being more efficient.
You fix it by caring less and loosening your grip on the situation. And finally, protecting the energy you’ve been bleeding out for everyone else. And no, this is not giving up and letting everything slide.
You can let the kitchen stay messy for a night while you process the fact that you’re furious, heartbroken, overstimulated, or grieving and allow your body to regulate.
It’s telling yourself it's okay to stop and ask in the chaos and stress, “How do I want to show up in this situation?” Support, not self-punishment.
Ask your body. This will take time if you have buried it deep down for years, but learn to listen, and it will guide you.
Your nervous system doesn’t want another checklist. It wants permission (from you) to chill.