Overthinking is a common issue. How often have you caught yourself going round and round on an issue, or back and forth on a decision? How often have you disappeared down a wishing well of pros and cons, analysing and evaluating? And how frustrated have you been, to be stuck waiting on someone else to work through their overthinking!

When we get caught in these thought loops, the go-to strategy is: more thought!

We try to think our way out of the problem. We convince ourselves that the answer to poor thinking is more thinking. But I think we already know this is a strategy that isn’t going to work for us! (It hasn’t ever, yet!)

So, let’s translate over-thinking into its corollary: under-acting.

This simple reframe will give you new thoughts to work with and new pathways to pursue. Have a rule in mind that whenever you catch yourself overthinking, know that you’re underacting. And that your next solution step is a new action, not a repetitive thought.

This might be easier said than done. I guestimate something like 95% of all thought is repetitive. We love it and are well-practised at it. And thinking is an entirely safe pursuit: no fear of failure, possibility of embarrassment or worries about judgement, there. But an action? That’s different!

So, which drama do you want? The depression of being stuck in a perpetual loop of overthinking? Or the exhilaration of trying something new, learning something new, achieving something new?

You’re not overthinking. You’re underacting. And now you know, you know your antidote.

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