Overthinking can drive you to conjure up unnecessary anxiety and stress that can derail you from success. Here are 3 steps to stop overthinking and limiting your potential.
Every week as I prep to research and create content for my blogs, I go through a cycle of over-analyzing and over-researching to appease the overthinking loop in my head.
The overthinking voices sound something like this.
What if no one is interested in this topic?
What if my information isn't enough to add any value to this topic?
How can my experience be helpful to anyone?
The same thing sometimes happens when I take on a new project or client. My overthinking voices taunt me with the possible ways that the project can go wrong before I even get to the client pitch. Even though I have a successful track record with projects and clients in the past.
If unchecked, my tendency to overthink can impact my confidence and my potential for success. It can delay decision-making, execution and overall productivity. Not to mention the unnecessary stress and anxiety that I put myself through on a regular basis.
Luckily, my passion and desire to add value and help others with self-development drive me to get past the overthinking episodes.
As I continue to work on breaking this habit more efficiently, I am making headway as I learn new tools and put them into practice. I know I am not alone in this struggle to overcome overthinking, so this week I am sharing my 3 steps to help stop overthinking and limiting our potential.
1. Recognize When You Are In An Overthinking Loop
Sometimes, you may not even realize you're looping a negative thought pattern like a hamster running busily on its hamster wheel.
The first step to stop overthinking is to recognize when you are doing it.
Oftentimes, overthinkers don't recognize they are overthinking. Instead, they think this is their process for working through concerns and being diligently thorough.
It's one thing to be cautious and think out pros and cons constructively. It's overthinking when there is excessive focus on the same thought stream to the point where it becomes difficult to make decisions and take action.
Overthinking is a negative thought pattern that can have harmful effects on a person's well-being and even disrupt our day-to-day lives. It can contribute to perfectionist behaviours and lead to cyclical negative thoughts, anxiety and stress.
People who struggle with overthinking tend to be ruminators who rehash past events or hyperfocus on anxious concerns about the future. Both of which they cannot change or control.
Here are some signs you may be on the overthinking hamster wheel.
Repetitive Thoughts: Worrying or ruminating about the same few stressful thoughts on a loop.
Feeling Indecisive: Being overwhelmed by repetitive worry over the same thoughts and second-guessing yourself after making decisions and rehashing the same worries.
Having Problem-solving Difficulties: Imagining too many possible outcomes (often catastrophic ones) that hinder finding productive solutions.
Sleep Difficulties: The hyperfocus thought loops make it hard to turn off the brain at bedtime or cause interrupted sleep.
If you are nodding yes to these symptoms, it's time to get off the overthinking hamster wheel so you can move on and be productive.
2. Sort Out the Overthinking Thoughts
The thought streams that manifest when in an overthinking loop tend to be passive ruminations that rehash the past or hyperfocus on anxious concerns for the present and future. All of which are out of your control.
Focusing on these passive and negative thoughts can leave you feeling overwhelmed, helpless and out of control. It's a vicious cycle that leaves you in analysis paralysis leaving you unable to take action and find solutions.
Step 2 breaks you out of overthinking loops by sorting out your thoughts and redirecting your focus on what you can control vs what you can't.
Writing down your overthinking thought streams can help you to recognize and disempower the passive negative thoughts and empower legitimate proactive concerns.
Here's how:
Start by brain-dumping and writing a list of your overthinking streams.
Identify the passive negative thoughts that you cannot control and put an X next to them.
Identify the thoughts that are proactive concerns you can take action on and put a checkmark next to them.
Focus on the checkmarked proactive concerns and move them to a new list titled "Actionable"
Now focus on action steps to mitigate your proactive concerns and execute.
Taking action to mitigate the situation you are overthinking alleviates stress and feelings of helplessness so that you can take back control and be productive.
Here is what my brain dump looks like for my blogger overthinking:
Thought Loop | Passive Negative | Proactive Concerns | Actionable |
|---|---|---|---|
What if no one is interested in this topic? | ❌ | | |
What if my information isn't enough to add value to this topic? | | ✔️ | - Define my message and objective for this blog. - Conduct research to support my message and objective. - Avoid too much information that distracts from my message and objective. |
How can my experience be helpful to anyone? | ❌ | | |
3. Reframe Overthinking Worries With Mindfulness
Practicing mindfulness is beneficial for overthinkers because their focus is rooted in ruminating about past, present and future possible worries.
Step 3 is using mindfulness to refocus mental energy on the present moment to relieve the pressure from focusing on thought loops.
When you feel yourself overthinking do the following:
Calm down by sitting in a comfortable position and take 4 deep breaths.
Slowly and deeply inhale for 4 counts and then slowly release the breath for 8 counts.
Notice how your body is feeling as you breathe deeply. Take additional deep breaths if needed until you feel more at ease.
Become aware of your thoughts and identify the thoughts that make you feel anxious or stressed.
Detach emotional reactions from them to take away their power.
Objectively challenge the negative thoughts with affirming proactive ones.
Regularly conducting mindful self-reflection will help you to recognize negative, unproductive thoughts more easily so that you can change them.
Here is an example of how I use mindfulness and reframing with my blogger overthinking:
Passive Negative Thought | Mindful Reframing |
|---|---|
What if no one is interested in this topic? | If this topic interests me, there will be someone else who may also find it interesting. |
What if my information isn't enough to add value to this topic? | I have conducted your research and have my own experience to draw from to add value. I have enough to support my message for this article. |
How can my experience help anyone? | We all have unique experiences in life that can help one another. |
Break the Overthinking Habit
Overthinking is actually part of our brain's automatic self-protection response to stressors in our lives. We don't choose to overthink, it's habitual.
However, when overthinking is focused on passive negative thoughts that are out of our control, it keeps us from being productive and achieving success in the very situations that we worry about.
It took me a long time to realize that my overthinking thoughts are not facts and that they were limiting my potential. The more I have become aware and in tune with my overthinking habit, the more I have been able to neutralize it and not let it waste my valuable headspace or time.
So whether you overthink a lot or occasionally, it's beneficial for your overall well-being to be able to catch and stop your overthinking loops from causing unwanted anxiety and stress. And most of all, stop limiting your potential and regain control of your productive focus.
"You cannot always control what goes on outside. But you can always control what goes on inside."
Wayne Dyer
Additional articles to help stop overthinking:
5 Ways to Stop Spiraling Negative Thoughts from Taking Control - Online Article - healthline.com
Overthinking: Definition, Causes and How to Stop - Online Article - berkeleywellbeing.com
I would love to hear your comments!
What challenges do you have with overthinking in your life?
How has overthinking limited your potential in the past?
What do you do to break out of your overthinking loops?
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