Overthinking can be dangerous especially if you are in that place of growth. Think for a moment, how many times have you thought of doing something and looked again and started weighing up the pros & cons only to make a decision and then think again.
Overthinking your decisions
There is nothing at all wrong with this, as it’s good to rationalize and weigh the risk, but what if you weigh them up and then weigh them up, and then just weigh them up again … this leads to the possibility of ‘What if it turns out wrong?’ more than ‘What if it turns out right’ and back and forth just overthinking.
This overthinking situation is causing you to procrastinate and not do anything at all a better word is ‘stagnation’.
Another scenario is the one where you made a comment in a group and you start to overthink about how it was received, ‘was it taken like this… was it taken like that’… and you stop being yourself. When the reality of this situation is nobody thought anything negative about your comment. It was just you overthinking it.
Result
Overthinking is never a good option it’s dangerous, as it has a way of causing paralysis and nothing gets done whilst pausing and slowing down your growth. The only change that happens in this is time.
When you overthink your mind sends signals by conjuring up disastrous thoughts which in turn gets you stressed out and worried.
How do I cope with overthinking?
Here are a few tips to assist in coping with overthinking:
- There are some things you can control and some that you just can’t eg: you can’t control the weather and you know that, (trying would cause big-time stress) so you make an affirmative choice of not trying. Make good decisive decisions and don’t look or go back on them.
- You are in the right place that you are supposed to be. That place is in the present, the Now! You have no power over the past, so stop overthinking and analyzing what you no longer have power over. But your future is ahead of you and what you do in the now will help direct you to that place in the future. so let go of what’s gone.
- Catch yourself out, yes catch those thoughts that show you visions of negative outcomes. This also happens when overthinking as it is not a reality. Practice replacing those thoughts with ‘What if it does go right, vision it, and smile.
Try some of the above tips, It is said a habit takes 3 weeks to make and 3 weeks to break. Don’t overthink this just do it, keep your brain calm blue like the image above.