This One is For the Overthinkers

 Our current culture has such an emphasis on self awareness. Do you know your horoscope, your enneagram, your Myers Briggs personality type? Have you spent time considering why you are the way you are? Certainly not everyone is the same and we are prone to act in ways that are unique to ourselves and consistent with our personality. One of our core needs is a sense of belonging and connectedness and we can only achieve that by being seen and known by others.  This is helped greatly by knowing ourselves. While it is a gift to understand and know yourself, it also can be a self fulfilling prophecy. Once you've internally labeled yourself a certain way, now you've given yourself a stereotype.  

"I am an empath. I am a high achiever. I am indecisive. I am emotional. I am a nurturer. I am indifferent."

Maybe you are those things.  Maybe you are those things some of the time. Maybe you are those things in certain circumstances. Shoot, now it's not so straight forward is it?  

One thing is for sure, we are so desperate for certainty that we love these labels.  We want to believe that we are consistent all the time, that we respond and react in a consistent way to all that life throws at us.  If we deem that we are practical, we buy into the notion that regardless of the circumstance and the sequence of events we can be counted on to react in a practical way. What really throws us for a loop is when it doesn't go that way at all. Then, we are back to the drawing board - "Why was I so emotional?! I am practical! That is who I am!" 

The reality is that we are nuanced and evolving people who do not react the same way all the time. Each individual situation is shaped by our history, our personality, our choices and even whether or not we are hungry at that moment (hangry anyone?).  While this is true, it leaves us feeling out of control.  If we don't even know what to expect from ourselves, what can we expect from others and the world?

Thus begins the cycle of "overthinking" which in and of itself has gotten a bad rap.  Planning and being introspective can have positive impacts on your life. But overthinking generally means spending too much mental energy on controlling outcomes that simply can't be controlled.  For the thinker, this gives them a sense of comfort.  If they can plan for all the outcomes, they won't be caught off guard and they will be better prepared for the emotional backlash of negative events. Usually this manifests by jumping to worst case scenario outcomes for many situations. 

For an easy example, something happens at work and the planning begins for losing your job.  Questions are asked: How would I go about looking for a new one? What are my skill sets, how would I market myself, and where would I look for work? How many months could we live without my income? Which bills would I cut first? If I worked in a different industry how would my schedule change? Would I need a different vehicle or source of childcare? 

It's not that these questions wouldn't need to be answered. It's that you can cross that bridge when you get to it. Deciding on a new daycare for your baby can only be done when you know your new schedule, which would only happen when you know your new job, which only occurs after you find it, which only happens when you lose the job you have.  Getting so far down the road with so little information doesn't leave you with a good plan, just a lot of unanswered questions. Of course, the alternative is the feeling that you are just hurtling toward an unknown future with no plan at all! 

Not to mention the additional emotional response of "but what will everyone think that I lost my job?" So much of our emotional fatigue comes from the fear that our close relationships will be impacted. Either that we will lose that coveted source of belonging and connectedness or we will disappoint those closest to us.

This uncertain feeling of the unknown is so uncomfortable for so many of us that the alternative mental gymnastics give us the soothing feeling of being better prepared. So what do we do? The only solution is to strengthen our internal self confidence in two ways: 

1. Keep promises to ourselves. Building inner trust is so important, and knowing that we can rely on ourselves to respond appropriately, be authentic, follow through on what we say are small steps toward fortifying our trust in ourself. 

2. Prove our resiliency to the outside world. Externally, finding and documenting times you successfully managed the stress of the outside world offers proof that you are capable of handling whatever may come your way without spelling out all of those possibilities and your responses. 

We all know we can only control ourselves, but it sure is hard to stop there and not try to figure out the rest of the world as well. The solution though, is actually to double down on self, since all your efforts on the outside are fruitless anyway!