Overthinking (the excessive use of mental energy) at the detriment of your health is exhausting and holds us back from making real progress.
When you are in the habit of retreating by default, you rarely make progress.
Overthinkers are stuck in a cycle of inaction.
They’ve convinced themselves that the worst thing they can do is take action.
They write but can’t convince themselves to publish. They read but rarely commit to the good habits they find in good books.
They know what to do but can’t get off the thinking train to take action. Everything unfamiliar becomes a reason to procrastinate.
There are also health implications of spending too much time in your head.
“Persistent overthinking can result in a wide range of symptoms such as insomnia, trouble concentrating and loss of energy which, in turn, often leads to further worries regarding one’s symptoms, thereby creating a vicious cycle of overthinking, says Pia Callesen, a therapist and metacognitive specialist.
Overthinking leads to action paralysis.
Instead of spending time in the moment, doing more great work, enjoy the present or making better memories, overthinkers spend a greater percentage of their time on what has already happened or what could happen tomorrow.
The burden of yesterday and worries of tomorrow can be too much to bear, especially if you can’t give yourself a break to live in the moment.
Overthinking gives you something to do in the present but never actually get you anywhere. If you must think, ponder over a better way forward in life, and take action when you find a way forward.
“Take time to deliberate but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go.” Napoleon once said.
How to break the overthinking cycle
“Worrying is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do but doesn’t get you anywhere.” — Erma Bombeck
To break the cycle of ruminating, start with a reminder and make it a mindful practice. When you start overthinking, worrying, spending a lot of time in your head, remember to catch yourself in the process and remind yourself to take a different action.
Or better still, remind yourself of what you are missing (time and opportunity to change your life) whilst you are stuck in the past or the future.
If you’ve been doing it for years, start with small post-it notes at places you can see every day in your house.
It’s a radical way to get on track quickly. Every time you see the note, remind yourself to be mindful at every opportunity.
You could even set reminders on your phone a few times every day to remind you to be mindful or focus on the present.
It’s a better way to get out of your head every day, stay present or take action to make progress.
“Another good practice is to simply go for a walk. This engages both sides of the brain and helps to kickstart rational thinking and decrease obsessive unhelpful thoughts” writes Rosie Allabarton of Blinkist.
You can also embrace short and long walks to improve your mindfulness and ability to observe nature without staying in your head.
The brain is an insanely active organ. And you produce thousands of thoughts every day. To remain sane and thrive mentally, learn to derail your thought train. If you pay attention to almost everything you think about, you won’t have a mental break.
In his book, Meditations, Marcus Aurelius encourages us to remember that life is short and that worrying only robs us of the little time we have left to live a better life.
“Don’t waste the rest of your time here worrying about other people — unless it affects the common good. It will keep you from doing anything useful. You’ll be too preoccupied with what so-and-so is doing, and why, and what they’re saying, and what they’re thinking, and what they’re up to, and all the other things that throw you off and keep you from focusing on your own mind.”
Learn to separate proactive thoughts you can do something about from those that leads to persistent rumination.
Thoughts on what, why and how often lead to even more questions about everything that is not right or what could get worse.
“Rule number one is, don’t sweat the small stuff. Rule number two is, it’s all small stuff,” says Robert Eliot.
If you keep engaging in these thoughts, they will drain you and lead to extensive worrying. So, learn to recognise thoughts you can’t do anything about and those in your control.
And if you can control them, take action to solve the problem, or write them down and write your proactive solution for every thought, issue or obstacle.
Schedule “worry time”, and when you are done writing them down, focus on something else until another “worry time” to review them or add to the list.
To overcome overthinking, remind yourself to step outside yourself and start writing down your thoughts at specific times of the day.
Remember to step into nature more often and find an activity or a project you can do every day that brings out the best in you. Overthinking is a habit you can break — but the good actions require practice daily.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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