You can’t think your way out of a feeling problem.

Overthinking is underfeeling. Trying to think your way into feeling emotions is like trying to drink your way sober. Trying to think your way out of overthinking is like trying to sniff your way out of a cocaine addiction.

“Overthinking invents more problems than it solves.” — Gurwinder Bhogal

Your brain ruminates because it hates uncertainty so much that it would rather fantasise a catastrophe than deal with not knowing what the future holds. Unpopular opinion: your brain ruminates because you are getting something out of the rumination. Finding out how it secretly serves you is the first step toward overcoming it.

You never get paralysed by overthinking positive outcomes, you only overthink about terrible outcomes. Fear does not keep you safe, it keeps you trapped. Whatever you fear establishes the boundaries of your freedom. If you’re afraid of heights you stay low, if you’re afraid of people you stay alone. Most people don’t think about things enough. You are probably not one of them.

In my experience, the more you think about yourself, the harder it is to access happiness. In this way reflection and personal development is a double-edged sword - you need to self-assess to know what to work on, but intense self-assessment is super restrictive to your quality of life.

The amount you overthink is directly inverse to how much you live life. Do not trade the thing you want for the thing that is supposed to facilitate it.

Chris Williamson | @chriswillx