How To Stop Overthinking: 4 Tips That Help

If you’re reading this, you’re probably no stranger to overthinking. Whether they are about something you did, the past, your future or otherwise, the same thoughts and worries play on repeat in your mind, making you more and more anxious but never giving you any answers to your problems. But if you want to break out of this cycle, and become more calm and happy, here are some good things to start with.

Think About Your Reasons

Before anything else, it is important to think a bit about what exactly your situation is, and what your motivation and reasons for wanting to stop overthinking are, so that you can keep those motivations in mind as you go forward. What has been your experience with overthinking so far, and how has it affected your life? It probably isn’t surprising that overthinking can lead to problems such as anxiety, depression and insomnia, among others.

Try to think also about how much your life could change if you didn’t overthink things so much. To start with, you would probably feel much calmer, more at peace and less likely to worry about things you cannot change. You would probably also be better at making decisions, as you wouldn’t feel the need to overthink about whether you’re making the right choices.

With enough motivation, effort and the desire to change, there is nothing stopping you from overcoming your overthinking.

Journalling For Stopping Overthinking

Journaling could also help you a lot in stopping your overthinking. In particular, you should consider doing the Morning Pages, a technique created by Julia Cameron and introduced in her book, The Artist’s Way. The idea is to begin journaling as soon as you wake up, aiming for three full pages of your thoughts. You should write anything that comes to your mind, no matter if it seems worth writing down or not.

Although this technique is supposed to be done first thing in the morning, for three pages, if that doesn’t work for you there’s nothing wrong with doing it at a different time of day, or writing less, especially if you’re doing it to help yourself with overthinking.

When we overthink, we tend to go through the same thoughts and worries over and over again. We seek some closure to these worries, but can never find it just by ruminating about them. When you write these thoughts down in your journal, you might notice that kind of pattern, perhaps a fear, or something else important to you, that you cannot stop thinking about. It’s extremely useful to know what kinds of things trigger overthinking for you.

Writing down your thoughts like this will hopefully give you a new awareness and perspective on the problems that cause you to overthink, allowing you to think of new solutions to them. After you begin journaling in this way you will hopefully feel much more free, as you no longer have so many thoughts cluttering up your mind, and you should be able to come to some kind of decision on the thoughts that trouble you most, whether that is to take action to resolve the problem, or just realising that continuing to worry about it gives you no benefit. So don’t hesitate, make sure to give journaling a go and see how it helps you.

Stop Overthinking with Meditation

Meditation is another fantastic tool for stopping overthinking. If you haven’t tried meditation before, you’re probably wondering why that is, and how to do it right.

There are many types of meditation, and you shouldn’t stick to just one kind if it doesn’t work well for you. But generally, meditation begins with trying to focus on something, such as your breathing, an object, or how your body feels. While you attempt to focus, you’ll inevitably be interrupted by other thoughts that come into your head. You should notice your thoughts, and, without trying to fight, judge or analyse them, allow them to pass by and return to what you were focusing on. Over time, meditation trains you to be more present, understand your mind better and stop yourself from overthinking.

However, meditation is a skill that has to be learned, and it takes practice. It won’t cure your problems with overthinking overnight, but with time and effort it can make a huge difference in clearing your mind, making you calmer, make you better at making decisions, and it will help you in accepting your thoughts, even the negative ones, so they don’t seem more scary and important than they are.

Learn To Be Present

There are many benefits of being present. One of them is stopping overthinking everything. I recommend you to read Eckhart Tolle’s book “A new earth”.

After I read the book and start implementing the teaching in my everyday life I noticed many improvements. That’s why I made a video and a blog post about Eckhart Tolle A New Earth Review – 5 Benefits I Experienced.

Another way to calm your mind, and be more present and grounded is activating your Earth star chakra.

Transformational Life Coaching

For the last tip, you should consider finding a transformational life coach. A transformational coach can help you with overthinking in many ways.

A meeting with your life coach is a place where it’s safe to speak openly and honestly about your thoughts, what is bothering you, and what you want to change in your life. They can help you examine all of the unanswered questions and issues that you’ve found, whether through journaling or other introspection, and guide you on your path to finding answers for them.

They can help you with finding your motivation, by asking questions and helping you to examine and discover your goals and values, so you can keep your focus on what is most important for you. Your life coach will also help you examine your mindset. Has something been preventing you from doing what’s best for yourself and creating change in your life? Your life coach can help you to figure out what puts you on the path to overthinking, and how you can change that and put yourself on the path towards your goals instead.

Last Words

Hopefully making use of these 4 tips in this article will allow you to confront this problem and help you with overcoming it. Change may not happen overnight, but with enough time and effort, you will surely be able to break the habit of overthinking and return to a more peaceful and happy state of mind.