Health

How to Stop Overthinking and Reclaim Control Over Your Life with these 7 Easy Strategies

By Paige Reist | Posted: July 12, 2018

Overthinking can be one of the most frustrating, debilitating habits you can develop. Besides putting you through undue amounts of stress, overthinking can put your life on hold by preventing you from succeeding at work, damaging your relationships, and keeping you from chasing your dreams. It can throw your sleep patterns out of whack, cause you to stress-eat, and hold you back from appreciating your life for the gift that it is.

Next time you find your thoughts spiralling out of control, try these seven ways to stop making mountains out of molehills, get control of your thoughts, and start living with more freedom and courage.

Don’t confuse thinking for living

You might trick yourself into thinking that you’re being productive by circling around every single detail about your situation, but nothing quite does the trick like actually taking action. It’s impossible to truly predict every single possible outcome to every single situation, and to adequately prepare for each of them, so practice diving in and figuring it all out on the go. The more you choose action over obsession, the more comfortable it’ll become.

Choose communication

Nothing cures overthinking quite like clear communication. If you think a conversation has gone poorly, or you’re worried that something you might have said could have been misinterpreted, don’t be afraid to return to the conversation and ask for clarity. You won’t come off as annoying or dull, but as someone who is considerate and who values interpersonal harmony and mutual respect.

It’s not about you

The world doesn’t revolve around you, and that’s a good thing! Once you can reframe your perspective to realize that other people are not really thinking about you as often as you might believe, you can learn to relax a little, not judge yourself so harshly, and believe the best in other people. You are not responsible for maintaining the balance of the world, so don’t put yourself under so much pressure to make the perfect decision.

Exercise

Sometimes you just need to sweat it out. Exercise is a fantastic way to avoid overthinking--when you get your blood pumping, your brain benefits too. Exercise helps you process and understand your thoughts in a more meaningful way, as well as helping you come up with creative solutions to your problems and boosting your confidence and self-worth to empower you to act upon those solutions. Yoga, in particular, is a discipline that is both gentle and powerful for both your body and your mind.

Act according to your values

Live a life that you are proud of, and you’ll vastly decrease the chance of becoming overwhelmed by anxiety or guilt. Being secure in the knowledge that you’ve acted according to your values and to the best of your ability will help you stop worrying about what else you could have done. There’s only so much control we have over life, so having control over ourselves is sometimes the greatest security we can rely upon.

Meditate

Meditation helps you remember that all that really exists is the present moment. The future is unwritten, and the past is behind us. Meditation calms anxiety, improves brain function, and helps you cultivate the clarity of mind you might need to react to unexpected situations.

Write it down

Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way, recommends writing morning pages to sweep out all of the mental dust that collects and swirls around throughout the day. Writing things down makes them tangible, and can help put them into perspective for a more balanced approach to solving your problems.

So next time you catch yourself chasing a thought around in circles, take a nice, deep breath and roll out your yoga mat, crack open your journal, or send that person a message instead. Overthinking doesn’t serve you and never will.