Stop Overthinking: 23 Techniques to Relieve Stress, Stop Negative Spirals, Declutter Your Mind, and Focus on the Present (The Path to Calm Book 1)

by Nick Trenton

Racing heart, headache, nausea, muscle tension, fatigue, dry mouth, dizzy feelings, increase in breathing rate, aching muscles, trembling and twitching, sweating, disturbed digestion, immune system suppression, and memory issues. Your body was designed to endure brief moments of acute stress, but chronic stress (stress that is ongoing) can start to cause chronic health conditions like cardiovascular disease, insomnia, hormonal dysregulation, and so on. If the ordinary physical experience of stress is prolonged, the physical effects can have consequences in the rest of your life. Mental and psychological effects include: Exhaustion and fatigue, feeling on edge, nervousness, irritability, inability to concentrate, lack of motivation, changes to libido and appetite, nightmares, depression, feeling out of control, apathy, and so on. Stress can reinforce negative thinking patterns and harmful self-talk, lower our confidence, and kill our motivation. More alarming than this, overthinking can completely warp your perception of events in time, shaping your personality in ways that mean you are more risk averse, more negatively focused, and less resilient. When you’re constantly tuned into Stress FM, you are not actually consciously aware and available in the present moment to experience life as it is. You miss out on countless potential feelings of joy, gratitude, connection, and creativity because of your relentless focus on what could go wrong or what has gone wrong. This means ...