Everyone hates how overthinking makes them feel, but most people struggle to stop doing it. That’s because your brain secretly believes that overthinking is protecting you. In this post, I talk about four types of overthinking and the four skills for overthinking. These are psychological skills to train your brain to quiet down.
Managing Overthinking Through Scheduled Worry
Let’s start with Worry. Worry is the fuel of generalized anxiety disorder. Worry is where you’re constantly thinking about what could go wrong in the future, and…
Worry turns on chronic stress in the body. Even though nothing bad is currently happening, worry triggers the perception of danger. When your brain thinks about danger, it triggers the same physiological response as a low-level threat, turning on stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. And chronic stress can have damaging effects on your health, your sleep, your energy, your mood, your blood sugar and appetite. All sorts of things.
Even though your body doesn’t like how worry impacts it, your brain thinks it has to keep worrying. You see, when you worry about something catastrophic happening, and then that catastrophic thing doesn’t happen, your brain does some “brain-math” and thinks “Phew, all that worrying kept my human alive. I’ve gotta make her do it again, so that she doesn’t die again.” And the cycle of worry just triggers all over again.
So here’s the skill. Stop it. Just kidding- most people have tried to just stop. It doesn’t work. Our brain actually doesn’t know how to do subtractive commands. It rarely works to tell your brain to stop thinking about a delicious, mouthwatering cheesecake, or a pink elephant–don’t think about it! That just doesn’t work. So here’s the real skill.
Scheduled Worry. You tell your brain when to worry. Every day at a regular time, like 5pm, you’re going to sit down for 20 minutes and worry on paper (write it down). Your brain and body are actually really capable of handling acute stress, stress that comes in short bursts. Instead of worrying a little bit throughout the whole day, which keeps the stress response high, you’re going to train your brain to worry each day at a certain time. If you catch yourself worrying during the rest of the day just tell your mind, “We’ll worry about that at 5pm.” I think it’s really helpful for the first couple of weeks of doing this to set a mindfulness bell on your phone. The chime helps you check in and see if you’re slipping into worry throughout the day and not realizing it. (Bell dings, check your thoughts. “Ooh, I’m worrying. Brain, we’ll do that at 5 today.”)
OK, so there’s the first skill. With worry, do scheduled worry and a mindfulness bell to catch yourself and redirect.
Breaking the Power of Intrusive Thoughts
Now let’s talk about Intrusive Thoughts or Unwanted Thoughts. Intrusive thoughts are super common. Large studies with thousands of participants have found that 95% or more of people experience unwanted or intrusive thoughts. These commonly involve scary thoughts like “What if I hurt someone else? What if I do something sexually inappropriate, “What if I swerve into traffic?” “What if I don’t really love my partner?” “What if I touched some bad germs?” “What if I lose control?”
Almost everyone has these thoughts, but there’s a clear difference between all those people who have intrusive thoughts that don’t bother them, and those who develop problems like OCD or Anxiety around them. The people who handle them well brush them off: “Oh that was a weird thought, oh well”, and they go back to doing what they were doing. The people who struggle, struggle against them. They try to fight their brain, reason with it, force themselves to not think about it
The more you try to prove these thoughts wrong, the more your brain flags them as important. When we believe a thought is dangerous, when we think a thought will harm us or make us take action, we accidentally show our brain that the thought is actually dangerous (which it is not), and that tells our brain to make it louder. When we fear, avoid, argue with, or debate, or even believe thoughts, our brain makes them louder. And when we do safety behaviors like avoiding driving, or avoiding cutting meat, or avoiding touching stuff, (and we don’t die) our brain accidentally learns “See, those thoughts really were dangerous! I’d better make my human more anxious!”
So here’s the skill. It’s called Cognitive Defusion. Label your mind as a “word machine” and when you notice an intrusive thought say, “Thank you brain for that thought. Thanks for trying to keep me safe. I’m good.” You notice it, name it, “That’s an intrusive thought,” and if it keeps yelling that something bad is going to happen just say, “Maybe, maybe not.” Redirect your attention to the present moment.
There’s a few other ways to practice cognitive defusion. Sing the thought in a ridiculous voice, over and over. Or imagine the thought as a “part”; give it a name. “Oh there’s Negative Nancy again,” or there’s “Bob”; he’s always worried.
If you feel stuck believing that thoughts are actually dangerous, then I’d encourage you to work with an OCD trained therapist who can help you practice noticing your thoughts and not acting on them. Not doing the safety behavior. (Holding a knife while also holding the thought, “What if I cut someone?”) As you practice this, you’ll show your brain that thoughts are just thoughts, your mind is a word machine. Thank you for those thoughts, let’s move on.
I’ve made a bunch of videos on Cognitive Defusion, and we also have an entire course on how to overcome intrusive thoughts.
Control to Trust: End the Cycle of Overthinking
Do you find yourself going over every possible scenario, trying to plan to make everything perfect? “I need to get this exactly right.”
Overplanning is when your brain…
- Runs scenarios
- Makes lists
- Rewrites messages
- Tries to avoid mistakes
The nervous system is trying to control outcomes so nothing goes wrong.
“If I say it just right, no one will be upset.”
“If I plan this trip perfectly, nothing will go wrong.”
“If I analyze enough, I won’t get hurt.”
The brain likes this because it does two things:
- It pretends that it can control everything, this is a great way to limit anxiety in the short term, because it feels like you’re in control, and…
- Intellectualizing is a great way to avoid emotions. Analyzing is so much more comfortable than being present with your uncertainty, vulnerability, or fear, or hurt. Strangely, intellectualizing is a form of emotionality. You’re secretly running from your emotions by thinking about them instead. (This is one of my favorite ways to pretend that I’m dealing with problems by avoiding them.)
When we overplan, overanalyze, we’re seeking to manage our anxiety, our uncertainty, by controlling the outcome. By making sure we never mess up, by guaranteeing that the trip goes perfectly, this accidentally shows our brain that we are fragile and can’t handle it if things don’t go smoothly.
If we want to regain power over our anxiety, we have to transition from control to trust—from controlling outside circumstances, to trusting that we can handle it when things don’t go smoothly.
We’re putting all this effort into controlling the outside stuff, how people see us, how comfortable our life goes, but we’re accidentally training our brain to be less secure on the inside.
And here’s the thing, we can’t just tell our brain to chill out. We have to show it by taking action, noticing things not going perfectly, and then surviving. Then our brain learns through experience that we can handle it. Here’s an example.
For years, I’ve tried to manage social situations to make sure that people don’t dislike me. I’ve hidden what I really think, masked what I really like, and tried to not say stuff that might be offensive. But, little by little as I’ve grown, I’ve started being more authentic. I’ve focused more on saying things like, “I can handle it if people don’t like me.” Being on YouTube has helped me practice that one. But I do read the comments and it’s ok. I have other mantras that help: “It’s ok if I’m not perfect.” “I can feel anxious and do it anyway.” “I can practice going with the flow.” I’ve focused more on embracing my inner experience and showing courage to my inner anxiety, than on manipulating the external world to make me comfortable.
Last fall I went to Harvard to be on a panel. I had a goal not to say something ignorant. Guess what happened–-I accidentally did. In a panel discussion about content creation I said, “The algorithm is not inherently biased.” And I was quickly informed that it actually is. I had a blind spot and they let me know it in a rather public way. I was super duper embarrassed. I wanted to run away, hide my face, never see any of them again. But instead, I handled it better than ever. I reminded myself, “It’s ok if I’m not perfect.” I stayed present, I connected with people, I learned more about things I didn’t know. I was gentle with myself: “Mistakes are human.” And I stayed with it. I haven’t done a lot of public speaking, but what I learned from this experience is that I can handle my own feelings when I’m not perfect. I actually came away so much more confident because I no longer have a rule “I have to handle things perfectly or else it’s the end of the world.” I now believe “I can show up authentically, offer what I have, be imperfect, and I can handle that discomfort.” I feel so much more confident, because I’m letting go of that control a little. I can trust myself to handle my feelings when things aren’t perfect.
So here’s the skill. Focus on building up trust, not control. Trust in yourself that you can handle it. You can’t just tell your brain to do this, you have to show your brain that you can handle uncertainty by doing something imperfectly. Go on a spontaneous trip without having every detail figured out. On purpose, say something silly in a social setting and watch how people don’t actually care. Make a beautiful piece of art and add an intentional flaw. Publish a video to YouTube that isn’t perfect. Watch yourself and the anxiety you feel around it and say something like, “I am getting so good at being imperfect. I’m getting so good at tolerating uncertainty. I can do hard things. Today is a great day to feel a little discomfort.” Over time your anxiety will decrease, and so will your need to overthink, overplan, and be so dang perfect.
Let me give you one more example. This guy, Jia, practiced desensitizing himself to rejection by intentionally getting rejected every day for 100 days.
Turning Negative Thoughts into Present Action: Rumination
OK, lastly, Rumination.
Rumination is literally chewing on the past.
Where you keep dwelling on your past mistakes, or the wrongs you were wronged. Where you wish you’d done something differently, or taken a different path, or just had the eagles drop you off at Mordor.
Rumination is like a deep rut in a muddy road, or like an icy ski path. The more you travel it, the harder it is to escape. And rumination can be the fuel of depression, hopelessness, and despair. Our thinking patterns get stuck and rigid. And they can be hard to escape.
Now, rumination secretly feels good. When there’s nothing you can do about the past, your brain pretends that it IS taking action, by thinking about it.
Once when I was in college I had been on a handful of dates with this guy, let’s call him Alexander. Things didn’t go anywhere after that. Then, about 6 months later, I’m visiting my parents on Christmas Day and guess who knocks on the door–Alex, I had no idea he was coming and was pretty surprised to see him. It was kinda weird, but we found a quiet place to catch up on life, talked for a bit and then he said, “I really wish we had tried to see if this relationship would work. I really regret that we didn’t keep dating”.
Now just to clarify, I didn’t break up with him or anything. We just never were exclusive. We still lived in the same town, so I basically replied, “There’s no reason we can’t try dating again. We’re both single, I’m willing. Let’s give it a shot.” And then he got super awkward and said something about needing to go fix something on his car, and basically that was the end of that.
For all I know he had a dozen reasons why he didn’t want to date me…that’s cool, but if we take it at face value, what he said is the essence of depressive rumination. You dwell on your regrets, but you do nothing about them in the present.
The essential skill to escape rumination is to identify the value, and then take action on it here in the present.
So what do you do with the regret that comes with making a mistake?
Rumination:
“I ruin everything. Why can’t I do anything right?”
Value:
So what do you really value? A value is something within your control. I value trying hard. I value learning from my mistakes. I value taking responsibility. And the best thing about values is that you can always take action in the present.
Present-moment action:
- Fix one small part.
- Apologize.
- Learn one thing.
By acting on your values, you shift out of rumination toward action here in the present moment. Here’s another one.
“I didn’t speak up when I should have.”
Rumination:
“I should’ve said something. I’m such a coward.”
Value:
- Honesty
- Self-respect
Action:
- Write what you wish you had said. You’re practicing a different action, training your brain to act differently.
- Say something small but honest now.
- Speak up in the next tiny moment.
You practice the value now, instead of beating yourself up for before.
What if you snap at your kid?
Rumination:
“I’m a terrible mom. I always mess this up. I shouldn’t have yelled.”
Value underneath:
- Being a caring parent
- Emotional safety
- Repairing relationships
Present-moment action:
- Go give a hug.
- Say, “I’m sorry I got loud.”
- Sit on the floor and play for 2 minutes.
- Practice patience and compassion by also treating yourself with compassion.
- Schedule in some time for self-care so that you can respond differently next time.
You don’t erase the past — you embody the value of connection now.
You’ve got to redirect your attention from the past, to the now, and then do one dang thing!
Now I get it, rumination and overthinking can be really deep ruts to get out of. Sometimes we just can’t make ourselves do it, we need some support.
There are some good medical treatments for depression that seem to help create new neural pathways. SSRIs (antidepressants) were previously thought to help depression by fixing a chemical imbalance, but now the theory is that they help with neuroplasticity—-making the brain more adaptable so it can make new connections. Ketamine therapy seems to help increase BDNF: Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor. It helps neurons grow new branches, form new connections, and repair damaged circuits. And all of this can help your brain be more flexible at building new thinking patterns. So can TMS, transcranial magnetic stimulation. This is a treatment that can be done in the office and has relatively few side effects, but can help people really improve their ability to build new thinking patterns. One of the psychiatrists I’ve collaborated with said that these treatments are like when you get fresh snow on a ski hill. It’s easier to get out of the icy ruts and create new pathways, new thinking patterns.
But these medical options are really best when paired with cognitive therapy, working with a therapist to change how you think, to ski new mental trails.
5 Skills for Overthinking
OK so there are 4 ways you get stuck in overthinking or intrusive thoughts and 4 skills to get unstuck from them. I do want to mention a fifth skill:
Mindfulness is a daily practice to notice your thoughts and redirect your attention to the present moment. A daily mindfulness practice is strength training for being able to do these other skills. It’s like building up the mental muscle memory to be able to notice your thoughts and redirect. I am personally using Insight Timer for some free courses on it. (Not a sponsor.)
If you’d like to learn more skills to work with difficult thoughts or painful emotions, check out my online course How to Process Your Emotions. It’s part of my membership that has 10 courses.
