What is overthinking?
Overthinking is the state in which a person obsessively and repeatedly thinks about a thing. The thing a person overthinks about can by anything, from something as big as starting a buisness, or just simply going up to someone and talking to them.
As someone who worries about nearly everything, I overthink a lot, in practicaly every aspect of my life. Whether that be starting a new creative endeavor, or getting the nerve to talk to my crush, I over think all the time. And for me at least, overthinking has had its benefits, but it has mostly been a struggle.
Why overthinking is a double-edged sword
Some of my best ideas have come to me by overthinking, but the problem is overthinking often diussades me from taking action on my ideas at all. This is why I believe people who overthink wield a double-edged sword.
In my expirience, when I have the figment of an idea, I’ve found that sitting with it, analyzing it from every angle, and mentally obsessing over it have led to some of my best personal breakthroughs (Please note that when I say “breakthrough”, it could literally just mean a better way to organize my room). The issue is once I finally have a complete idea, I take the thinking too far and overthink. I start analyzing everything that could go wrong with the idea, every single consequence that could happen, I think about it. And while that can be a way to avoid mistakes, it often completely turns me off from the idea before I even give it a try.
How I handle my overthinking
I still overthink every day (the lack of public videos on my YouTube channel is proof of that), but I have found ways to manage my overthinking, and even use it to my benefit. I want to share the things I have learned with you about overthinking, and maybe you’ll find something useful in it.
1. Journaling
For over a year now, journaling has been a very big part of my personal life. I write everything in my journal, from my thoughts and feelings to my plans and ideas.
After awhile, I realized that I could use my journal to help with my overthinking by writing it all down. And when I say all, I mean all. I write the idea, every angle, every possible consequence, and every possible possibility. Once I have all my thoughts neatly ordered on a piece of paper, instead of floating around in my brain, I’ve found that either, there’s really no reason to overthink or I find a new problem but instead of overthinkink, I also find the solution.
2. Talk it out
When I’m with my family or friends, we talk about anything and everything. And while I don’t do this as much as journaling, when I’m really anxious about an idea, I often turn to my family or friends.
I don’t usually ask for their advice, but more their feedback. Ten people could have completely different perspectives on the same topic, and that’s why I talk my ideas out with them. Often times I need a fresh perspective on a subject to have a clearer view of it, and talking to my family and friends is my way of getting that fresh perspective.
3 – Take action
I am no where near the first person to talk about overthinking. If you’ve ever seen any piece of productivity media, you’ll know one of the things most talked about is taking action. But I believe the reason it’s so talked about is that it really works.
Even if I’ve written out every single thing about an idea, or talked to every single person I know, I still find myself overthinking. Once I’m at this point, I have two choices. One, give up and two, just do it. If I believe in something, but my overthinking is making me second guess everything, I need to shut that voice up. And the best way to shut that voice up is to just do the thing.
Conclusion
Overthinking is a big part of my life. I know I won’t get rid of it anytime soon, and frankly I don’t want to. But like almost anything in life, moderation is key. If I don’t do enough of it, I might make some life changing mistakes, but if I do it too much, I could lose so many possibilities.
This very blog post is a testament on me moderating my overthinking. I hope I did well.