Overthinking.What is overthinking.
Who thinks too much? We are not categorising anything as more or less. The brain is always working at its maximum capacity. When everyone’s brain is working at its maximum, how can we say that some people are overthinking? Many people have some misconceptions about the brain. There are misconceptions that the brain uses only six per cent or 10% of its capacity. That’s not true. The brain works at 100% even during sleep.
We call it overthinking when thoughts that repeatedly frighten us keep coming. We call thoughts that push us into negative emotions as overthinking. We don’t call positive thoughts, no matter how many there are, as overthinking. We only call it overthinking when we have thoughts that we don’t like.
Actually, there is no such thing as overthinking. The thoughts that exist are mostly related to the past, such as love failures, the death of loved ones, and other thoughts related to depression. And then there are thoughts related to the future, anxiety, like “What if something happens to me? What if my parents or children fall ill? What if something happens in the future?” All these thoughts keep coming.
Why do we get these thoughts? Let’s say we have a laptop. We saved a file named “world” on it. We don’t remember where we saved it.When you type ‘W’, it shows all the files that start with ‘W’. If there is only one, it shows only one. What if there is no file named ‘world’ in it? Then what does it show? It shows “No results found.”
Similarly, we have a problem, and we are telling our brain to find a solution to that problem. We searched for “What is 7*7?” It gives the answer 49. We asked, “What is 17*17?” It searched but didn’t find it. But our brain doesn’t say “Not found”. Our computer has a limitation, but our mind does not have a limitation. The mind is beyond the brain. The mind is not limited to the brain alone. Therefore, there is no “Not found”. It keeps searching. The bigger the problem, the higher the priority. Let’s say passing the exam is a matter of life and death for that girl. If she doesn’t pass the exam, it’s a negative outcome. That girl is searching for confirmation that she will pass and won’t fail. Even if she searches from night till morning, she won’t find that confirmation. She is unlikely to sleep that night. Even if she does sleep, she will wake up startled in the middle of the night. Why? Because the same thoughts keep coming in her dreams.
There is another girl who is afraid that a tiger might come. That girl needs confirmation that a tiger won’t come. She keeps being afraid, wondering if it might come this way or that way. Even if she searches her entire life, she won’t get confirmation that it won’t come. There is something called research methodology. This is covered in masters and other postgraduate programmes in psychology. According to that methodology, a negative statement can never be proven. No matter how much you search, you cannot confirm a negative statement. For example, a girl is afraid of lizards, and for her to enter her room, she needs confirmation that there is no lizard. The lizard could be behind the refrigerator, under the table, or hiding behind the air conditioner. It could be anywhere.What is overthinking? It means we are searching for a solution that is not logically possible. It doesn’t stand up to logic, nor is it practically feasible.
Why are we getting stuck here? Because there is an extreme fear regarding a certain matter. This might be a fear for our life, a social fear, or a fear of losing our reputation. Why did this fear arise? Because there is a strong belief that the opposite of it is something great.
That boy thinks that getting a government job is great. He says that if he doesn’t get it, his life will be wasted. There is a sweeper’s post. Will the person who goes for the interview for that post sit there trembling? No, because it is not glorified as something great.
People who go for interviews for IAS, government jobs, and corporate jobs are trembling. Why? Because it is considered great. If they don’t achieve it, their life is meaningless. Whenever we strongly believe that something is positive, we become extremely negative towards its opposite. We don’t want that negativity.
