First off, let it be clear, there’s strictly nothing wrong with thinking per se! In fact, thinking is the greatest thing since instinct. Many things are greatest since sliced bread, but thinking is the greatest thing since before we could think. Opinions differ as to when we changed from non-thinking to thinking, or whether we have in fact ever made the transition, but even the staunchest supporters of non-evolution theory agree, it must have been before sliced bread.
If thinking as the greatest thing has been around for such a long time, what can we possibly do wrong with it?
Well, I know some people – some of them I know personally very well :-) – who relied on thinking to improve their lives. They tried for a long time, even years, without much to show for it. They tried thinking this and that, learning new ways of thinking and spending good money in the process. All to little or no avail. The need to think about improving their lives had gathered momentum through a series of events loosely referred to as life accidents – divorce, illness, accident, financial ruin, addiction, etc. - but by and large it happened in the manner of a warning light on a car dashboard.
When a warning light appears on a car dashboard initially, typically at an inopportune time, most of us choose to … ignore it. As if the purpose of a warning light were to think about it. Subsequently, each time the car is started the light shows up again, only to be pushed back to where it belongs again – to the back of the mind. Hoping for the best, never quite knowing what will happen and when, until when happens and hope is not enough anymore. At long last the car’s owner manual is consulted, in the hope to fix the problem without the help (and cost) of a mechanic.
However, ignoring a warning light on the dashboard is in most cases but a symptom of the underlying problem of overthinking. For most people who are consistently unsuccessful at changing their lives for the better, the real issue is they are thinking too much, at the expense of not acting enough. It may sound counter-intuitive. How can you do anything too hard? Conventional wisdom teaches the harder the better. Well, conventional wisdom can be wrong, too. Thinking by itself only ends up in overthinking, and overthinking actually prevents change. The primary purpose of warning lights is not thinking, but to act!
7 Steps To Stop Overthinking And Start Doing
1. Replace Ready-Aim-Fire by Ready-Fire-Aim. Do not overthink the possible consequences of your actions before you take them. Life is not the Olympics Game where the opportunity to excel and show off comes around every four years only – and only if you’re perfectly healthy, fit and in the prime of your life. Life happens now. There are many “now” in a day. Just do it – fire, then use feedback from the shot just fired to aim the next shot. Then do it again. Taking aim is okay, but correct your aim only after you go along, not before you even start.
2. Act. It doesn’t matter whether you end your (over)thinking with a big or small action, provided you act. Start with anything. Don’t think of size, think only of action. Allow yourself to act on even the smallest part of the idea you’re thinking about. Act, act, act. Taking massive action is your miracle cure for overthinking.
3. If you’re still only thinking, you have not really decided. You need bigger motivation or greater discipline, possibly both. Start with bigger motivation. Is the idea you’re dreaming and thinking about truly important, to you? Would you live a thousand years on water and bread, rather than leave the dream unfinished? If not, find yourself a bigger dream. Don’t just think about finding yourself a bigger dream, take action. Remember, to find is a verb.
4. Good is good enough. An okay plan consistently acted upon and executed works miles better than a perfect plan executed whenever the time is right. The time to act is always right if the dream you’re dreaming is right.
5. Every morning take the time to visualize your dream, as well as your current situation relative to the dream. Visualization involves intense feelings and emotions. The every morning routine is not about thinking your dream, it’s about living it, visualized in your mind. Picture your dream as you would picture yourself at the beginning of a long trip across the country. Know your destination and your starting point, then choose the best route for you to get from here to there. Locate yourself on the mental map of your dream, relative to where you are and to where you intend to go.
6. Share your dream with your best friends. Are they touched, moved and inspired by it? If not, improve your dream … until they are, until YOU are, truly touched, moved and inspired by your new, improved dream.
7. Choose your environment. Make sure the people you spend most of your time with are as action-oriented as you, or more so. Rather than choose your friends, choose the environment(s) within which you move. Your friends will come from within the environments you make yours.
Good luck in your new life of thinking AND massive action every day!
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