Imagine yourself as a child, standing before both of your parents. The feeling in the room is heightened. Both parents are talking to you at the same time. One of them is talking in a firm tone, demanding you go to your room because you’ve done something wrong. The other is talking in a warm and supportive tone, urging you to go outside and play with the new toy they purchased for you as a reward for being good.
You feel stuck, unable to make a decision. You’ve been taught from before you were aware that you are aware that both voices are authorities that should be minded. There is no solution, no way to choose a correct answer. Either choice is wrong because by choosing one, you will have disrespected the other.
This is how overthinking plays out in your mind. However, in this case, the two parental voices are your intellect and intuition. You want to mind the authority of both voices in your head. But they contradict each other, so you can’t choose a correct answer. The tension created by not being able to choose grinds you to a halt.
Overthinking is a form of resistance. There is a choice to be made or insight to be realized, but you don’t want to disrespect your intellect or intuition. The only way to keep from making the wrong move is to resist making a move altogether. Allowing yourself to get pulled further into the drama of your mind is often the next step, which is an attempt to validate stagnation.
Adding more nuance and complication to what you are already overthinking is a way to create a smokescreen. It tries to prove that making a choice is impossible and gives the illusion of relieving you of your duty to choose. Doing this is the opposite of what will relieve you from the tension of overthinking.
Don’t waste energy fighting with yourself about questions you already know the answer to.
Your intellect is an incredible data-processing machine. That’s what makes it easy to confuse it with your inner compass. It’s important to understand that your intellect is there to draw the map. Your heart and intuitive feelings are there to tell you where to go.
Overthinking makes us get in our own way. It keeps us from growing because it lures us into spending so much energy second-guessing ourselves that we become too tired to move forward.
How To Stop Overthinking
Notice when you’re overthinking. You will feel tight, heavy, and like you have two parents giving you conflicting orders inside your head.
Now, practice underthinking.
Slow down, relax the muscles in your body, and stop trying to figure out an answer. Tune into what’s happening under your intellect.
Refocus your attention on what you’re feeling rather than what you’re thinking.
What emotions or insights are rising from a gut level?
What feels right in your chest?
Can you let go of the direction you’re trying to force yourself in so that you can feel the direction you’re being drawn in?
Create space inside of yourself. Relax your body. Stop trying to pressure yourself for an answer. Doing this will bring your intellect and emotions back into balance.
When you stop trying to come up with an answer, your body is open enough to receive what feels right and put your mind to work in service of your heart.
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