By Lindsay Hanson | August 11th, 2026
Overthinking can be exhausting. Our minds get caught in repetitive thoughts about things we regret, conversations we’ve had, why someone responded the way they did, or how we can change a situation. Those thoughts can keep us up at night, leave us feeling anxious, and create a sense of paralysis that makes it hard to move forward.
Rather than seeing overthinking as the problem, I tend to see it as a coping strategy. Often, our minds become so preoccupied with thinking because it’s protecting us from something deeper—anxiety, hurt, fear, or emotions that feel difficult to experience. The overthinking becomes so loud that we don’t even realize what it’s helping us avoid.
The work, then, isn’t simply trying to stop the thoughts. It’s slowing down enough to create space between the trigger and the overthinking. As we make more room in both the body and the mind, we begin to build a greater tolerance for sitting with anxiety, fear, and other difficult emotions instead of immediately trying to think our way out of them.
From there, we can begin connecting the dots. We can explore where those deeper hurts or traumas came from and start processing what hasn’t yet been fully felt. As those underlying experiences are understood and healed, the need to overthink often begins to soften on its own.