I am an extensive overthinker and I am sure many of you are too. I am not here to discuss how I battled overthinking, just sharing my experience which may help you somehow. From my experience, one usually overthinks about something, because he/she is worried about the outcome or he/she is scared to do something.
Storytime! So, recently I just took up swimming, and I would really like to highlight that I am a completely hydrophobic person. I can’t even enter a pool without having jitters. But nevertheless, this summer I was determined to learn to swim. Apart from the fear I had to face once I was in front of the pool, my nights were horrible. You would ask, why? Well, as I told you, I am an overthinker. At night, before I used to go to bed, I knew that the next day too I would have to enter that dreadful pool.
Just as it is illustrated in the photo, I used to just tangle all the perfectly aligned thoughts into a mess. Such were my thoughts- What if I drown? What if the water is too cold? What if I am not able to hold my breath? And so on…To all these questions, there is an answer, a very satisfactory answer. But still, these thoughts would just keep roaming in my head and I couldn’t sleep. I used to wake up even before the alarm went off and start worrying again.
But the interesting thing is that when I used to go there and actually learn and execute, I just forgot all that worry and actually enjoyed it. Not always, as some sessions were disappointing, but still… the worries which I had in mind, at least, used to vanish. And then again the cycle started, and I used to start worrying for the next day, even though I had had a nice session.
I know this doesn’t make sense… But I have a feeling that many of you may have also faced such a situation, at least once. The thing I have learned after overthinking for many of my sessions is that it is something completely unnecessary. For one, it makes your day horrible and it is even more horrible than the actual experience we are worrying about. And secondly, when we overthink we just anticipate that something is going to happen and then worry about it. But, we all know right? We can’t predict the future, so why worry about something that is not certain to happen? Makes sense now, right?
This is what I tell myself and it doesn’t make me feel any better (haha). But, when I think about it later, it actually soothes me. Like, right now. After writing about it, I feel better. I am just chilling, listening to my playlist, and writing this blog, and surprisingly… I am not so worried about tomorrow’s session…
So, note to self and to you, just chill. Live today, stop worrying about tomorrow.
-MsWebBean