Sometimes our minds spend so much time in the past or future that we barely experience the life happening now.

Thinking about the past can help us learn. Thinking about the future can help us plan. The problem begins when we stop using thought as a tool and start living inside it.

Overthinking can become a way of avoiding the present.

Sometimes this pattern develops early in life, especially when our environment feels unpredictable, critical, or emotionally unsafe. We may learn to analyse situations, anticipate other people's reactions, or imagine a future where everything is finally safe and everything works out.

But overthinking can also develop later. A difficult relationship, loss, prolonged stress, uncertainty, or another overwhelming period can teach us, consciously or not: "If I think about this enough, maybe I can prevent something bad from happening."

The pattern can then continue long after the original situation has passed.

When the Mind Becomes a Place to Hide

I've noticed that sometimes we don't just imagine the future — we create an ideal version of it and emotionally live there.

We imagine the relationship, career, home, lifestyle, or version of ourselves we want. It can feel comforting because nothing has gone wrong there yet.

But fantasy is not reality.

The longer we live in an imagined future, the harder it can become to return to the present and take the small, imperfect steps needed to create something real. And the more precisely we imagine how something should unfold, the more anxious we can become when reality doesn't match the picture:

• "What if it doesn't happen this way?"
• "What if I change my mind?"
• "What if something goes wrong?"

We can become so focused on predicting the outcome that we stop participating in the process.

Sometimes we need to grieve the fantasy. Reality will rarely unfold exactly as we imagined. Letting go of a projection can bring disappointment, sadness, anger, or even shame. But it also gives us something fantasy cannot: real information about our life.

Thinking Is Not the Same as Overthinking

For me, the difference is quite simple.

Thinking helps us understand something, make a decision, or prepare to take a step. Overthinking keeps returning to the same question, trying to eliminate uncertainty before anything has actually happened.

• We analyse every possible outcome
• We try to predict what someone meant instead of asking them
• We mentally prepare for situations that may never happen
• We try to work out exactly how a relationship, decision, project, or future situation will unfold — even though other people are involved and they have their own choices, feelings, perspectives, and the right to change their minds

We can influence some things. We can't and shouldn't control everything. And sometimes another person's decision has very little to do with us at all.

The more we try to mentally control an outcome we cannot actually control, the more anxiety we can create around it. At some point, more thinking stops creating clarity and starts creating noise.

Sometimes the answer isn't another thought. It's an experience. Go and see. Ask. Try. Take the smaller step. Then observe what actually happens. We can always change direction.

Learning Through Living

This is something I've learned through my own experience. Some things cannot be understood fully through thinking alone.

When we stay in our heads, we work mostly with our own interpretations, memories, projections, and imagined scenarios. When we participate in life, something different becomes possible: we get real experience and evidence.

We allow the external world to affect us. We meet someone and they show us something we may never have questioned while staying alone with our thoughts. We have a conversation that changes our perspective. We take a decision or action and see what happens. We experience something, learn from it, and gain a deeper understanding that thinking alone could not have given us.

Sometimes life answers questions we didn't even know how to ask. Sometimes we discover that what we feared didn't happen. Sometimes we discover that our intuition was right. And sometimes we realise we don't actually want what we thought we wanted. That's okay too. We can change our minds. We can change direction.

The goal isn't to predict life perfectly before we live it. It's to participate in it enough to learn from what actually happens — and to trust ourselves to navigate from there. Life itself becomes a teacher when we stop trying to figure everything out before we experience it.

The Role of Projection

Overthinking becomes particularly painful when we start interpreting other people and situations through our own fears, wounds, and past experiences:

• "What did they mean?"
• "What if they're losing interest?"
• "What if something is wrong?"

We can build an entire story in our heads without checking whether it is actually true.

Our emotional history inevitably influences how we interpret things. Sometimes we project old experiences onto new people and situations, reacting not only to what is happening now, but also to what it reminds us of.

Instead of repeatedly asking "What if?", we can come back to the facts:

• "What do I actually know?"
• "What can I verify?"
• "What is happening right now?"

Sometimes it helps to simply verbalise the facts to ourselves — or ask the other person directly instead of trying to work out their intentions from a distance.

The more we separate what is happening from what we are imagining about it, the less power projection has over our choices. We can then respond to reality rather than to a story our mind has created.

When Perfectionism Keeps Us Thinking

Sometimes overthinking is an attempt to get a perfect outcome. We want to make the right decision, choose the right person, take the right path, or make sure everything works before we begin.

But real life is rarely perfect. Things get messy. Plans change. People surprise us. We learn as we go.

Sometimes done is better than perfect. At some point, we have to choose between staying in the safety of our imagined version of life and stepping into reality where we can actually experience it.

The question becomes: Do I want to keep thinking about life — or participate in it?

Coming Back Into the Body

For me, reducing overthinking is not only mental work.

When I notice myself becoming too absorbed in my thoughts, I try to return to something physical and real: walking, going outside, exercising, dancing, cleaning, cooking, doing something with my hands, spending time in nature, or being around other people.

These things bring my attention away from endless internal processing and back into the body and the environment around me.

Sometimes, when we become more present, emotions that were underneath all the thinking can surface — sadness, grief, disappointment, anger, or even the realisation of how long we've been living in our heads.

That can be uncomfortable. But it can also be part of coming back to ourselves.

How Reiki Fits Into My Work

This is one of the reasons Reiki became an important part of my work.

From my experience, when the mind is constantly active, there can be a lot happening beneath the thoughts as well — anxiety, fear, emotional tension, or experiences that haven't been fully processed.

I see Reiki as creating space to slow down, reconnect with the body, and become more aware of what is underneath the mental noise.

As those emotions become more accessible and begin to be processed, there can be more space for clarity, presence, and conscious choice.

The aim isn't to stop thinking. It's to stop being trapped inside our heads.

Coming Back to the Present

We don't need to know exactly how our whole life will unfold. We need to know what is happening now, what matters now, and what the next step might be.

Think. Choose. Act. Observe. Adjust.

• We can change our minds
• We can change direction
• We can ask for help
• We can learn as we go

The more we practise this, the less we need to control every possible outcome. We begin to understand that we don't need certainty to move forward. We need enough trust in ourselves to know that whatever comes, we can meet it, learn from it, and choose again.

Because life isn't happening in the scenario we are imagining. It's happening now.