How do I get my thoughts to shut up

I overthink. All. the. time. And it's exhausting. Do anyone have any advice? I constantly overanalyze everything and always assume the worst. I can't keep doing it.. I need help.

Mindfulness training.

Therapy may help you control anxiety and thus ruminating and catastrophizing.

Read up on it: Quit catastrophizing

I constantly overanalyze everything and always assume the worst.

if you are having thoughts that demand attention, have them, think. i think the problem is your thoughts aren't helpful, so you might want to talk to someone to learn to reshape them.

you can also write them down on here. assuming you overthink many, many subjects and not just one, you can do so daily, and question and organize them with the input from others.

i can only speak for myself, but my thoughts refused to be silenced, they needed to be worked with, and still do. each thought separately. it's a lot of work if you're that caliber of an overthinker, but worth it.

I know where you are coming from. My analysis paralysis has plagued me many times.

These are traits engineers have and considered strong ones for their occupation, but for everyday life overthinking can consume you.

The foundation to learn is that so many things are out of your control. Reframe your thinking of asking what is the BEST or most likely outcome instead of assuming a bad outcome.

Other than that, Google is your friend for solutions on overthinking and many books on it as well.

Agree....

The foundation to learn is that so many things are out of your control. Reframe your thinking of asking what is the BEST or most likely outcome instead of assuming a bad outcome.

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I overthink. All. the. time. And it's exhausting. Do anyone have any advice? I constantly overanalyze everything and always assume the worst. I can't keep doing it.. I need help.

I've had this issue all my life, but it was particularly bad during my last breakup. I was cycling through thoughts and emotions from the instant I woke up to when I finally went to sleep. It was both emotionally and physically exhausting. I also noticed there were certain times of day when it would 'peak' - for me, 3pm was unbearable. I could never avoid crying at this time, like clockwork.

One thing that helped was assigning some time - I would give myself 10 minutes per hour to think/feel/hurt/cycle, then try like hell to not do it for the remaining 50 mins of each hour.

Apart from that, I found medication under the care of a psychiatrist to be necessary and a major improvement in my life. I still have a lot of anxiety (always have and most likely always will) but it is not in control of my every waking hour.

Good luck!

I overthink. All. the. time. And it's exhausting. Do anyone have any advice? I constantly overanalyze everything and always assume the worst. I can't keep doing it.. I need help.

The problem isn't the thinking, the problem is the habit of drilling it into a downward spiral until you reach the worst possible outcome. That's not only exhausting, it's self defeating, because it lands you with no good outcomes to shoot for--which would otherwise motivate you, instead.

When you're in hell, that's not the place to stop. Given that you get to choose the direction of your mind spins, consider adopting the practice of writing stuff down. Divide a page in half or use an old fashioned steno notebook. Then shoot for balance by 'noting' worst possible outcomes, coming up with a list of steps to avoid those, then 'note' the best possible outcomes on the other half of the page and list some steps you can take to support those.

This may sound like more work than the mind drills, but it's not. The key to jotting lists is to LET GO of your mind's need to hold stuff and spin. When you save your concerns to a page, you'll feel better, sleep better, and you can go back to any of your lists of issues at any time and add new ideas for concrete steps you can take to get the outcomes you want.

Over time, you'll train your mind to focus on your positive outcomes and shoot straight for those. That's how to build goals, and working toward those will keep you busy enough to avoid ruminating about lousy stuff and making yourself miserable.

Then shoot for balance by 'noting' worst possible outcomes, coming up with a list of steps to avoid those, then 'note' the best possible outcomes on the other half of the page and list some steps you can take to support those. .... The key to jotting lists is to LET GO of your mind's need to hold stuff and spin. When you save your concerns to a page, you'll feel better, sleep better, and you can go back to any of your lists of issues at any time and add new ideas for concrete steps you can take to get the outcomes you want.

Solid advice. ^^

The simple (and often forgotten) form of writing things down really works to slow or stop the everlasting loop of thoughts in your head.

When I was going through a life changing experience, I typed a journal which help me process the situation and balance my emotions. Worked wonders.

Nowadays, I keep a pad and paper next to my bed at all times. Really comes in handy to quiet my thoughts when I go into thinking about something, it also helps me remember things that need to be done tomorrow, and even great ideas I get at 3am.

Solid advice. ^^

 

The simple (and often forgotten) form of writing things down really works to slow or stop the everlasting loop of thoughts in your head.

If it doesn't stop them, then at least it gives you something productive to DO with them. You can create a project out of almost any issue that concerns you when you write it down and break both prevention and production 'actions' down into a list of constructive steps.

From there, you get to decide how important it is to you to work those steps. If you find yourself putting that off, then you'll recognize that the concern was not as important as you believed at the moment. This is a form of self soothing, and it will help you to deal with anxiety. You'll either use the opportunity to make changes, or you won't. If not, then you'll teach yourself how to calm down about that deliberate decision.

When I was going through a life changing experience, I typed a journal which help me process the situation and balance my emotions. Worked wonders.

Nowadays, I keep a pad and paper next to my bed at all times. Really comes in handy to quiet my thoughts when I go into thinking about something, it also helps me remember things that need to be done tomorrow, and even great ideas I get at 3am.

Yep! Once you get it down on a page, you can let it go--you've 'captured it'. Another suggestion for better sleep is to suggest to your mind before you lie down that it's allowed to do it's job of sorting stuff out, but it needs to go into 'background processing' so that the front of your mind can rest.

The idea is to teach your overactive brain to recognize the difference between a wakeful, productive state versus a sleeping, restful state--and to cooperate with your wishes. Making the direct suggestion before retiring is a habit that will aid this process.

Your brain is stuck in the limbic regions. Check out "You Are A Winner Trauma Recovery" (awesome little read very inspiring) and do the Brain Gym exercises when high anxiety. Complete Lazy 8s for a few minutes THEN add your thoughts outloud AS you do the lazy 8s. It's very important that your eyes following your thumb as you trace one circle to your right then another full circle to your left, it's the eyes moving with the exercise (I think) that somehow causes the prefrontal cortex (the part of your brain that can do emotion regulation and body regulation) to come online. Move (exercise,) sauna, get a massage (massage schools offer them for cheap or community acupuncture $15) anything to GET IN YOUR BODY. The mind uses the brain to create, they say start with a BODY SCAN if you want to begin mindfulness execises

me too! lol

ive practiced meditation a bit to try and quieten my mind but have not been as regular as i could have.

i've discovered a guy called Eckhart Tolle, and his ideas have really had an impact on me, significantly.

he comes from a position of letting go of all the falseness that is going round and round in our heads, thoughts about the past, the future, the what if's, the shoulds, the beating ourselves up, the expectations we have etc.

If we over analyse it because we are thinking about how something 'should have been' and how it didnt meet those expectations... we ask why this and why that, and maybe because this or that... all we do is clitter our heads up with endless possibilities and leave no room for just 'being'... in the now, as he puts it.

all of this causes us stress and anxiety and possibly depression. we become disappointed that things didnt turn out as we had hoped... but actually, what we hoped was only in our head, our mind created an expectation that we are now unhappy about! more often than not our mind is our worst enemy!

so the idea is, stop... stop going over the past that doesnt exist anymore, stop thinking about what the future is 'supposed' to look like, because neither the oast or the future exist, apart from inside our own imaginations.

once you stop doing this you will be much more free to respond to things as they happen, and live in the present moment, rathen than living in the past and the future and all the other imagined possibilities and scenarios that your mind is forcing you to think about.

im 44, and have over analysed my entire life, ive suffered from anxiety, depression, self harm... this guys words have really changed how i feel, more than anything ive ever tried before. loads of his videos are on you tube and he has audio books too, i highly recommend his stuff.

i still have moments when i catch myself or something happens that i begin over reacting to and over analysing, but now it lasts just a few hours or perhaps a day and i am able to bring myself back to the now and let it go... previously it would have taken over my life.

good luck x

I am consistently full of negative thoughts and they always get the better of me. I can't seem to control them and I can't seem to stop reacting to them. It makes getting through every day a struggle, so you're not alone. The only honest piece of advice I can give you is to go talk to someone. I have been told many, many times that I need counseling, and I'm sure that would be helpful to you as well.

I overthink. All. the. time. And it's exhausting. Do anyone have any advice? I constantly overanalyze everything and always assume the worst. I can't keep doing it.. I need help.

There has been some really good input on this thread! Really fascinating. How are you getting on now?

I too can empathise and relate to you on this one. One thing to remember is that how to marshal your own thoughts is a skill many people acquire as they go along in life. It's not something someone will necessarily just know how to do. The cool thing is you've noticed it and want to improve the way you deal with it.

Keeping a journal is a really effective technique which I have done many times, and will really help organise your thoughts and 'capture' them, as has been said already. That's such a great way of putting it actually. Knowing that you're 'done' with thinking about something because it's written down. I use this a lot in my job too, because in my job I have a habit of over thinking unless I organise my thoughts and sift through manually.

However always assuming the worst is not something that has to happen, even if you have a busy mind that likes to think. As already pointed out, that's catastrophizing - and you can change the way you think. Thoughts can start out innocent and curious enough, but then snowball out of control. The trick is being aware of what is happening - to be able to watch your train of thoughts almost as a separate entity and think "Woah - this isn't cool.". Recognising what's going on is the first step to doing something about it.

I have many thoughts, some of them useful, some not. You can let the non-useful ones just go. You don't have to give credibility or value to a thought. A thought that says something terrible is going to happen is just a thought.

Personally I like to exercise regularly as it really changes the way I think in a positive way, and tends to quiet my mind.