8 Ways to Stop Negative Thoughts and Overthinking - Rachel Devine

Overthinking everything and chronic negativity can make daily life feel overwhelming and bleak. It can exasperate depression. It also is a block to healing from any emotional wounds we may have in life. Learning techniques to dial down obsessive thoughts and shift inner dialogues to a more positive, balanced state provides relief. With consistent practice, you can stop detrimental and self-criticism and cultivate mindfulness, peace and optimism instead. Let’s look at some techniques on how to stop negative thoughts and overthinking. The more you shift to a positive state of mind, the more your life will go in a positive direction.

Catch and Challenge Distorted Thinking

Cognitive behavioral therapy helps reveal distorted thinking patterns like catastrophizing, all-or-nothing thinking, or jumping to conclusions that amplify anxiety. Catch these thoughts as they occur and analyze them objectively – are they overly dramatic or illogical? Are these negative thoughts conveying truth or anxiety? Challenging distortions with rational questioning is the first step.

Set Aside a Daily ‘Worry Timeout’

Rather than trying to suppress anxious thoughts throughout the day, set aside a short dedicated worry time daily, like 20 minutes. Jot down a list of concerns to examine objectively. The rest of the day when intrusive thoughts strike, remind yourself to save it for worry time. That should help clear your day of worry.

Live in the Present Through Mindfulness

Overthinking is exaggerated when focused on the past or future rather than the present. Practice mindfulness meditation and focus intently on your senses, bodily sensations, emotions and thoughts in the exact moment without judging them as good or bad. This cultivates presence. Staying in the moment brings serenity. You can also look at motivational quotes for inspiration.

Visualize Pushing Out Anxious Thoughts

Use positive visualization during meditation to practice pushing anxious thoughts out of your mind. Imagine each obsessive thought as a ball and visualize yourself gently batting the thought-balls away each time, clearing your mind’s space. Or visualize them as balloons and watch each negative thought float away.

Write Down Your Thoughts to Express Them

Journaling or stream-of-consciousness writing provides an outlet to express worries and limiting beliefs on paper so they don’t endlessly repeat internally. This process releases and processes obsessive thoughts. Just write out what you are worrying about and try to look at it objectively, which might bring your worry down to size. Also, write out ways to get your life in a state of living on purpose, which can be very positive.

Limit Stimuli and Distraction

Minimize stimuli like news feeds, overplanning, social media, and multitasking that feed into a frazzled, overwhelmed state, especially in the evening. Reduce clutter in your home to bring more calm.

Refocus on Solutions, Not Just Problems

When you catch yourself ruminating on problems, consciously shift to focusing on practical solutions and productive next action steps. Negativity thrives when problems seem insurmountable. Reframing issues as solvable weakens obsessive worry. Keep the focus on the solutions and become proactive at solving the challenge in a productive way, pushing away the temptation to worry about it. It’s important to shift your thoughts. Perhaps some happiness quotes will help.

Surround Yourself with Positivity & Gratitude

Hang around people who inspire optimism, self-confidence and solutions-focused thinking. Our thinking patterns are contagious. Choose to immerse yourself in positivity. Therapy is a great way to get to the root of the inner child dialogue of negativity. The inner child experiences are usually behind the negative thoughts and obsessive thinking. Having this awareness can help you. Gratitude is also the true equalizer when it comes to negative thinking. If you start your day off with listing 10 things you are grateful for, negativity will be hard to penetrate that mindset. Stay in a grateful state of being. Most people have so much to be grateful for, and yet they choose to look at what is missing, rather than what they have. Be thankful for the little things, as well as the big things in your life, and stay in that energy. With some effort, you can transform your life.

In conclusion, it’s important to bring yourself to a point to commit fully to transforming limiting inner messages, and shift from exhausting overthinking to mindful presence and you will see optimism will unfold. It will make your life happy again. Recognize negative thoughts but don't believe or react to them. Your power lies in choosing which thoughts to give energy to. You do have the power to change your thoughts to positive thoughts. It’s all a matter of recognizing the negative thought and then changing it to a positive thought. I suggest you get a rubber band and put it on your wrist. Whenever a negative thought enters your mind, gently snap the rubber band as a reminder to change to a positive thought. With some practice you will be on your way to a more peaceful life.

Rachel Devine is the author of, The Third Road, a book that gently guides one to the power within and your purpose in life & Lessons from the Needle in a Haystack, a spiritual book on dating and relationships.

Life coaching available.

Devine Intervention website.

Please leave your ideas in the comments. I will answer any questions you may have. Please also feel free to contact me.

Transform your Life with Purpose Rachel Devine

Research shows that living your life with purpose is linked to living longer. Researchers surveyed nearly 7,000 older adults on the correlation between mortality rate and finding your purpose. Participants who did not have a sense of meaning in their lives were more than twice as likely to die prematurely as those who were living out their purpose in life. Having a sense of purpose also reduced the incidence of cardiovascular incidents like heart attack and stroke. Having a purpose is also essential for fulfillment in life and brings happiness. People are genuinely happy when they are living life on purpose. Making an impact on your world, and the world around you, is one of the most rewarding things you can do in life. Contributing to society, even on a small level, is a way of leaving a legacy behind.

Sense of Direction

Everything in life has a purpose. There is a rhythm to earth that has a sense of direction. As far back as the fourth century BC, Aristotle was pondering life’s purpose and developing his theory of teleology, which is the idea that everything in life has purpose. In today’s fast-paced world, where we are being pulled in many directions simultaneously, finding your purpose in life seems more important now than ever before. And yet, because of our busy lifestyle our reason for being created eludes many of us. I will show you how to find your purpose and passion in life. Most of us are searching for meaning in life. Finding your path, having a personal mission in life, and having a sense of direction, is a positive way to go through this spiritual journey. Remember we are just passing through and we want are existence to have some meaning.

This is one of my favorite quotes:

“Our souls are hungry for meaning, for the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter, so that the world will be at least a little bit different for our having passed through it.” Harold Kushner

Finding your Calling

However, finding your calling may be easy for some and hard for others. Transforming your life to one of purpose might be elusive to some people. And the reason can simply be you have not put any focused effort on it, because of the fast-pace of your life. And it doesn’t matter how old you are, purpose can come early in life or later on. Louise Hay didn’t start her successful publishing company until she was in her late 50’s. And Betty White was living out her purpose of being an actress, well into her 90’s. The most important thing is that purpose is revealed to you and this is usually, in God’s time. Finding your calling, at any age, is beneficial in so many ways.

Transform your Life

To make it easier for you, I created an online course called, Transform your Life with Purpose. This is a step-by-step guide on how you can discover a purpose that is taylor-made just for you. This course is designed to help awaken your inner drive and help you transform your life. When you shift to living a purpose-driven life, your life will never be the same. You will be living from a place of intention and passion. It really doesn’t matter if your purpose is big or small, all that matters is that you recognize it and you start to incorporate this, passion purpose, into your life. You may want to take the, What’s my purpose in life quiz. This short quiz is designed to help bring focus and awareness on your life, in order to contemplate your calling.

Whatever avenue you take to discover why God created you, remember self-discovery and living intentionally, is more valuable than all the diamonds in the world. And living out a purpose-driven life has a benefit to your physical and emotional well-being.

Rachel Devine is the author of, The Third Road & Lessons from the Needle in a Haystack.

Please leave your comments below. I will respond to each one. And my question to you is, “What is your purpose in life?”