These 9 Things Happen To You If You Have A Habit Of Overthinking

Aug 13, 2018 by apost team

If you find yourself making big pro and con lists when it comes to all kinds of decisions or lying awake at night working through endless possibilities, you might be an overthinker. You may see yourself as conscientious and thoughtful, but overthinking can also limit you if you aren't careful. Below are nine things most overthinkers have in common.

You can tell yourself you are carefully thinking through all the possibilities, and that's a good idea for a major decision such as saying yes to a new job. However, you may find yourself doing this for even small things, and it can leave you mired in indecisiveness.

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Overthinkers may find themselves dealing with multiple emotions at the same time. You may also find yourself following various trains of thoughts down rabbit holes and struggling to settle on feeling or thinking just one way about a situation.

Having an imagination is great, but it can get the better of you if you start to picture something terrible happening to loved ones every time they are running late or if you become obsessed with trying to figure out what someone "really" means with a seemingly harmless remark. Overthinking often means you let yourself get overwhelmed by the possibility of worst case scenarios.

Whether you're using email, texts or social media, if you're an overthinker, you probably struggle to write messages and spend far more time thinking about their composition than the recipient does. Most likely, you start and erase the message quite a few times because you are concerned the message will be misinterpreted. This may happen in both professional and personal relationships.

If someone blocks or unfriends you on social media, you probably can't stop thinking about why that might be the case and mentally reviewing the last conversation you had with that person. It might not even occur to you that the person may have merely deactivated the account or might be culling the friends list for reasons that have nothing to do with you personally.

Even though you might spend a long time reaching a conclusion about something, there's a good chance you still can't let it go. Every plan still seems like it needs a contingency plan, and you probably spend a lot of time imagining "what if" situations and how you will handle them.

You probably tend to be very loyal to friends and loved ones. You appreciate those who talk you through your bouts of overthinking and help you reach a conclusion, and you don't judge those who make you feel good.

All that overthinking means you expect the world to be as complex as the inside of your head. In fact, some things really are that simple, and you are the one adding the unnecessary complications to the situation. You may find yourself trying to "fix" situations that are not broken in the first place because they seem too simple and easy.

Because you tend to think about things so deeply, you have little interest in the superficial conversations happening around you that deal with what you're planning to eat or what the temperature might be. You prefer to go deep as soon as possible with people and find out as much detail about them and situations as you can.

Overthinking can be both a blessing and a curse. You put a lot of effort into your decisions and relationships, but you have to be careful that you don't become paralyzed by indecision.

Let us know about some ways you have found yourself overthinking and how you stop it from getting out of hand in the comments. Show this article to an overthinker you know!