These 3 Reasons Prove Why Overthinking Is A Waste Of Time
And what you can do to get rid of it
Overthinking is the easiest way to destroy your life.
For years, overthinking was not something talked about a lot as our ancestors were usually more focused on taking action. And we can see how their lives turned out, most of them had a good professional as well as personal life.
But now, overthinking is much more common and talks about it have gone mainstream. Gen Z is the most mentally unstable generation ever.
There are several things that contribute to this fact, things like excessive social media consumption, isolation, and the upbringing of the person. Overthinking has become a part of everyone’s life.
The truth is overthinking is the biggest waste of your time. Here’s why:
No Actual Progress
One of the major drawbacks of overthinking is that you don’t make any progress. If anything, you lost all the progress you’ve made.
Between October 2019 — January 2022, I did nothing. I was sitting idly all day overthinking about my life and career.
Sometimes I would indulge in worthless activities like playing video games or consuming content mindlessly. Other times, I would overthink to the point that I used to get mental breakdowns often.
I would make a decision and after some time drop it due to overthinking about it.
- I’m not good enough
- I’m a loser
- I’m a failure
- I can’t do this
This cycle repeated until one day I came to the realization that more than 2 years have passed and I haven’t done anything. I am in the same place as before.
At that point, I started taking action. I didn’t do something drastically different but was taking small actions that could actually help me make progress. Fast forward 11 months and I got my first-ever job with a decent enough salary.
After that point, I promised myself that no matter how much I think, I won’t stop taking action.
When all you do is think, you make up your mind about things without any proof.
- How can you say that you’re bad at everything if you haven’t tried everything?
- How can you say that a certain path is not for you if you haven’t tried it?
- How can you say that you can’t gain muscle if you haven’t tried for long enough?
Overthinking limits our beliefs and makes us feel bad about ourselves. This is why overthinking is the biggest killer of dreams because it has nothing to do with reality and still influences every decision you make.
The more you think, the more you convince yourself not to take any action and just give up. Earlier, other people were our enemies. Nowadays, our mind is our own enemy.
Break free, my friend. Focus more on taking action, and less on thinking.
Poor Mental Health
With each passing day, we are watching more and more people have mental health issues. Although there are multiple elements that contribute to poor mental health, overthinking is the biggest one.
Overthinking puts your mind at constant high-stress levels which leads to breakdowns and other issues. The more stressed out you are, the more severely bad your health gets. Not only mental health, but it also results in poor physical health as it messes up your sleep and body composition.
If most of the day, you feel anxiety and depression, then that will affect your life i.e. your work, school, family, etc. More importantly, you will experience low happiness levels and poor quality of life.
Your mind can be used to do great things but if not used well, it can absolutely destroy you.
The solution is to practice mindfulness and intentional living. Perform activities like meditation, reading books, and working out or walking. This will help you focus on the present and avoid thinking too much.
Not staying alone all the time is another thing that can lead to much better mental health. Stay occupied, do work that brings fulfillment, and spend time with your loved ones. This minimizes the chances you have to overthink.
Once you do the above things every day for a few days, you’ll make them a habit. This way overthinking will slowly disappear from your life and you’ll be much better off.
It’s not as easy as it sounds. But remember it’s all about practice. It’s all about taking action.
Suffering In Mind More Than In Reality
More often than not whatever it is you think about, whatever your mind predicts, doesn’t happen in real life. Tell me, how many times your mind’s predictions have come true? 5%, 10%, or 20% of the time? I bet it won’t be more than that.
An overthinking mind always focuses on the worst-case scenario instead of the realistic or best-case one. This makes you afraid of taking any action and keeps you trapped. Your mind has trapped you in a cell and you can’t get out of it.
You listen to everything it says and believe it more than reality. Your mind is not made for things like that, it’s not something that decides the results even before reality.
You don’t need to trust your mind every time, you need to and should trust the outcome of your actions and make adjustments accordingly. Even if the worst-case scenario comes true, you’ll still be better off taking action as now you know where to make improvements.
There are zero benefits to thinking more and zero downsides to taking action. There’s less suffering in real life and taking action as compared to the mind. The more you think, the more you’ll suffer.
The more you take action, the more you’ll make progress with occasional suffering (which is far less than suffering in mind).
There’s no better way to take control of your life than by taking action. Start doing it today and you’ll get rid of overthinking in no time.
The sooner you eliminate overthinking, the sooner you’ll see improvements in your life.
This is one of the newsletters I share at Right way to live life.
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