How To Stop Overthinking

Reasons for overthinking

Excessive thinking is directly related to anxiety, as anxiety is one of the main and most important reasons for excessive thinking about everything, and forces a person to imagine the worst scenarios and events when thinking about something. Here are some of the reasons that lead to anxiety and excessive thinking:

• The social anxiety of what ought to be said and what ought not to be said.
• Anxiety and fear of society’s view of the individual.
• fear of failure.
• Previous difficult experiences and their bad results on the individual.
• Obsessive-compulsive disorders.

Disadvantages of overthinking

Thinking is what distinguishes man from other creatures, which helps him analyze ideas, make decisions, and create opinions, but it becomes a double-edged sword when a person exaggerates it and thinks a lot about things that happened in the past or things that are expected to happen in the future, causing him to do so. Many psychological and even physical problems, including:

• Lack of access to answers. When thinking a lot, a person asks himself questions such as “Why did you do that? Or what if this happened?” They are questions without answers, which leads the person to a dark dead end, and when continuing in this way of thinking, the person does not reach solutions to any of his problems.
• missed opportunities; This is because when a person thinks a lot about a problem, he is not able to make appropriate decisions and act quickly to solve it, and many opportunities may pass before him to fix things, but his mind is busy thinking about the reasons instead of trying to move quickly and find a solution.
• depression and anxiety; This is because a person who thinks a lot sees all the people around him as a threat to him because of thinking only about the negatives of problems, which may lead him to lead an unhealthy life, and take wrong actions as a way to get rid of depression.
• Negative thinking. Studies have shown that excessive thinking leads to ignorance in decision-making, inability to solve problems, blocking realistic thoughts, and causing sadness, as a person loses his ability to look at the half-full glass; For his preoccupation with empty thinking of the other half of it.
• Insomnia, when a person continues to think about events that happened in the past and relive the experience with all its feelings and effects, it becomes difficult for him to enjoy a calm and comfortable sleep, which increases the chances of him suffering from psychological and physical problems.

Physical damage

Excessive thinking and anxiety can cause many human health problems; This is because it pushes the body to secrete anxiety hormones such as cortisol, which affect the levels of sugar and fats in the blood, prompting the body to perform reactions such as:

• Difficulty swallowing.
• Dry mouth.
• Rapid heart rate.
• Dizziness.
• Headache.
• Inability to focus.
• Muscle aches and spasms.
• Nausea.
• Sweating.

Ways to get rid of excessive thinking

Thinking is a required and good thing, but when it comes to excessive thinking, it becomes difficult to overcome it to control our lives and destroy many successes, so you must follow some methods that help get rid of excessive thinking and be convinced of the following:

• The conviction that human perfection does not exist and therefore cannot be attained under any circumstances.
• Stop guessing and rely directly on existing facts.
• Stay away from idleness, and prefer the application instead of just thinking.
• Optimism and the search for the causes of the problems, if any, to determine their basis.
• Take advice.
• Minimizing justification for all actions, and dealing with honesty, regardless of the results.
• Writing down successes and positive thoughts; To help make the right choice.
• Relax and try to empty the mind of thoughts at the same time.

The dangers of overthinking

Most agree that excessive thinking negatively affects human health, as it directly causes mental problems, and not only that but excessive thinking is linked to emotional problems, which many resorts to getting rid of through incorrect methods such as excessive drinking or eating, as she emphasized. Studies have shown that excessive thinking leads to reduced hours of sleep, which directly affects the health of the body.