All of us, at some point in our lives, have laid awake at night and unable to get to sleep because our brains just won’t shut down.
Unfortunately, this frequently happens to many people, especially those that are chronic overthinkers. But there are many techniques one can use to combat this.
One of the most popular ways to handle overthinking is by incorporating meditation into your daily practice. Meditation allows you to slow down and acknowledge your feelings and thoughts while moving through them.
The breathing techniques and other pillars of meditation also help calm your mind and your body.
If you’re a chronic overthinker, then you probably have considered meditation, and we are going to take a look at that in hopes we can help you decide whether this is the right fit for you and your needs.
How Can Meditation Help?
Meditation is a practice that people utilize to help with a lot of different things. In regards to overthinking, there are a lot of aspects of meditation that can help you hone in on the issues causing the overthinking and deal with them.
Below we’re gonna give you some of the ways that meditation can help with overthinking:
- Overthinking causes tons of unnecessary thoughts. This can stress people out and cause a whole wealth of other issues. But meditation gives you a different perspective and allows you to see the larger picture, which could negate some of those constant worries and fears.
- One of the biggest pitfalls of overthinking is that we tend to gravitate toward negative thoughts as opposed to positive ones. Mindfulness meditation, or any type of meditation, in general, allows you to be aware of your surroundings and thoughts, which can help you seek answers to those negative aspects that you keep dwelling on.
- Overthinking causes a lot of clutter in your mind. With meditation, the process of removing that clutter is key to ensuring success in the practice. You’ll be less likely to overthink with fewer negative and cluttered thoughts in your mind.
- A lot of the time, people overthink because they’re too attached to things. Whether it be ideas, words, or thoughts, you become obsessed with them, and it causes overthinking. This can also be about people and relationships. But meditation allows you to slow down and work on being Lester which helps with attachments. Letting go of some mind then helps with combating overthinking.
For How Long You’re Supposed to Do it?
When it comes to how long you’re supposed to do meditation, that’s a personal decision. However, if you were just starting, you may want to just simply start with a couple of minutes a day, maybe multiple times during the day, especially if you’re a very active overthinker.
Once you have built up the habit, you can extend it for as long as you want. For example, some people meditate for up to an hour every day to help with upfront issues, including overthinking.
What if You Can’t Stop Overthinking While Meditating?
For chronic overthinkers, it might be hard to even think about calming your mind enough to sit and meditate. But, even if you do, you may find yourself still drifting off into overthinking. So we have a couple of quick ideas that may help you stop overthinking while meditating.
The biggest thing to do is not to expect that there is going to be any type of overthinking while you’re meditating. The overthinking mechanisms in your mind begin to activate when you start thinking about it, and it’s inevitably going to happen.
Another great thing you can do to help prevent over thinking while meditating is to practice it outside of the meditation. Take time every day to try to release all your stress and anxiety so that when you are meditating, you don’t have those things weighing on your shoulders
You may want to dwell on feelings throughout the day. Unfortunately, by doing this, you’re building up a very counterproductive cycle that is inevitably going to continue even when you begin to slow down.
It’s especially worse when you slow down because your mind clears off all the excess stuff and allows you to dwell on that. So finding ways to acknowledge your feelings but not dwell on them could potentially help you stop overthinking while meditating.
How To Clear Your Mind from Overthinking?
Meditation is a great tool to help with your overthinking, but there are a ton of other ways you can clear your mind to allow you to have a more successful meditation practice. Here are some of those:
- Whenever you start to overthink, just take several deep breaths.
- Find something that can distract your mind so that you don’t dwell on things.
- Try to step back and look at the larger picture – oftentimes, this makes the things that you’re overthinking look inconsequential.
- Instead of fighting, allow yourself to feel the things that address them and move on. In other words, try to stay present in the moment.
Tips for Meditating for an Overthinker
So with all that said, we thought we’d also give you a few tips that might help you meditate while being an overthinker.
You can do many things to help reduce your chance of overthinking, but when you quiet your mind, it becomes harder and harder. So here are those tips that we think will help you out:
- Build a schedule that works, and you can consistently carry out
- Design your space to be as decluttered and calm as possible
- Try meditation with others
- Use a virtual space as an immersive way to create a meditation practice
- Utilize music or other mediational tools
- Try using yoga as an opening step to the process
Final Thoughts on Does Meditation Help with Overthinking
Being an overthinker can potentially do meditation which is the process where you slow down and really allow your thoughts to be heard and seen can be quite a challenging period, but it is not impossible as long as you are consistent and dedicated.
You should be able to create a practice that works for you and helps you overcome some of those natural inclinations of overthinking.