Overthinking
This morning my husband told me he’d barely slept.
“I’ve been thinking too much,” he said. “All the thinking is exhausting me.”
My husband lives with Long Covid. For us, energy is never a small thing.
And I thought: this is exactly what I work with every day.
So over breakfast, we talked — not about how to stop the thinking, but about what it was actually doing to him.
Many leaders mistake overthinking for diligence.
There is a point, though, where thinking stops improving performance and starts quietly eroding it. Decision-making slows. Perspective narrows. Recovery disappears. And underneath it all, the body behaves as though danger is near.
Healthy thinking gathers information, weighs options, assesses risk — and then allows movement. There is flexibility. Curiosity. Enough tolerance for uncertainty to make a reasonable decision and act on it.
Overthinking is different.
What overthinking is:
The brain keeps preparing because somewhere underneath lies a belief: that preparation itself is what keeps you safe.
- Fear of missing something
- Fear of failure
- Fear of being exposed as inadequate
So, the brain and nervous system keep working hard. Scanning. Predicting. Rehearsing. Trying to eliminate uncertainty before action can safely happen.
Strategic thinking prepares for uncertainty. Overthinking tries to eliminate it altogether.
One is grounded in curiosity and capability. The other is driven by protection.
And this matters:
Overthinking is not a flaw. It is biological.
When we feel insecure, overwhelmed, or under pressure, the brain shifts into search mode — scanning for patterns, anticipating threats, rehearsing scenarios. Not because we are weak. Because the nervous system is trying to protect us.
The real issue is not the quantity of thoughts. It is the function they serve.
When the nervous system is activated, the mind compensates by analyzing, predicting, and rehearsing. It creates the illusion of control — but rarely creates relief.
For someone like my husband, whose system already runs on limited reserves, that loop is genuinely costly.
Here is what many people miss: you can understand that you are overthinking and still not be able to stop.
Because insight alone is not enough.
Overthinking is not the source. It is a signal.
The body is bracing. The brain predicts based on old codes. The mind follows.
Those late-night loops — replaying conversations, rehearsing what-ifs, searching for the mistake that explains the unease — are the brain’s attempt to reduce uncertainty before something goes wrong. Exhausting, yes. And completely logical from a survival perspective.
Until the underlying state of the nervous system shifts, the thoughts keep returning. The system never fully settles.
So what did we actually do over breakfast?
We did talked about the issue itself:
Not so much the story , Not to solve the issue — but to move it from something felt but unaddressed into something named and given direction.
The moment he’d identified the overthinking and a possible next step, something visibly relaxed. The brain received what it needed: a signal that the situation was being handled.
No breathing exercise required — he politely declined that one; fair enough, as he practices breathing exercises already. 😄
This is what regulation often looks like in real life.
Not Silence , Not distraction, Not forced positivity, Not willpower.
Sometimes it looks like grounding. Sometimes emotional acknowledgment. Sometimes a values-based decision.
And sometimes — as it did this morning — it looks like a real conversation that brings something out of the shadows and into the light.
The goal is not to stop thinking.
The goal is to help the biological system feel safe enough to stop bracing.
When the body settles, thoughts no longer need to run ahead. Clarity returns. Creativity returns. The capacity to choose returns.
Overthinking becomes less of a problem to eliminate and more of a signal to understand.
Two questions worth sitting with:
What is my system trying to protect me from right now? What would help it feel safer?
Asked with curiosity rather than frustration, those questions do far more than any productivity tip ever will.
These are the conversations I have with leaders and in supervision and coaching sessions every day — not just over breakfast. 😄
If this resonates: what does overthinking look like for you?
