Personal Development

How To Calm Your Mind When You Can’t Stop Thinking

how to calm your mind

We all over-think at some point in our lives and wish our mind would just calm down. We worry about the future, decisions, regrets, and just about every other thing.

However, this kind of thinking can be detrimental to our lives. It robs us the peace of mind we ought to enjoy. So how do you achieve this peace of mind?

Why people over-think

You might think about a single even over and over again. During this thinking, you are essentially over-analyzing an event, regretting your past action, or simply worrying about the future.

But on the other hand, decisions can be over-thought in the same way. In fact, in this case, you may over-analyze to the point where you can’t make any step forward.

So basically, over-thinking is the act of thinking about one thing and nothing else, thus affecting your life in a negative way. So you should strive to escape the loop and move forward.

Ways to achieve peace of mind

Take action

Sometimes you will over-think something that you’re actually capable of doing. When you want to learn how to calm your mind, just make a step forward so you can save your mind away from over-analyzing. It doesn’t mean you run off immediately, it only means you take a small step forward.

For instance, if you’re thinking of relocating to a new city for some reason, you can’t move out immediately, so you’ll think first.

This process will take you into circles in your brain. But realize that you can do something even though moving out immediately is impossible.

Begin by doing something; i.e. start writing down your to-do list, your budget, what you’ll need etc. It doesn’t matter what you do, we just need to ensure we’re making a leap forward.

Distract your attention

If you cannot do anything about a particular thought, just distract your mind. Pick a task or activity that engages your mind, and it will quickly wander off that thought which has been bothering you.

Learn More About As You Think You Become

In fact, exercise or fun activity will shut off your brain for a specific period, thus allowing you to relax.

Identify why you’re over-thinking and learn how to calm your mind

Recreating an event over and over again can land you into a never-ending cycle of thoughts. You will start to analyze something from every perspective you can imagine. But at the end of the day, you will realize that you haven’t done anything about it.

But according to Psychology Today, we can do something a little bit constructive — despite the fact that the brain is wired to over-think.

There are 4 elements that Psychology Today puts emphasis on. They simply query the brain to uncover the validity of those thoughts.

The 4 elements include re-labeling the idea you’re thinking about, i.e. anxiety, self-doubt, etc, re-framing your experience to identify thinking errors, re-focusing attention on the part that matters, as well as re-valuing your brain with the new info.

At the end of it all, you will realize that your mind doesn’t even have an idea what it’s doing. This way, you will know why you’re over-thinking, so you can close the loop and move on.

The idea is to minimize thoughts so we can have a peace of mind. Instead, we can make those thoughts productive so they can’t get on the way or interfere with our lives. So if you want serenity of mind, just practice the tips above.

Photo credit: Sarah