Past events only affect us when we continue thinking about them. It is overthinking that gives them power. By constantly replaying the events, worrying about them and trying to figure them out, we remove ourselves from living in the now and instead choose to relive the past. There is no good that comes from reliving something over and over again. Learn the lesson and move back into the present.
At the same time, pondering too much about the future also keeps you from the present moment. Sometimes, the most important lessons we can learn are that both the past, and the future, are not happening. In fact, they’re never truly happening. Enjoy the gift of the current moment, this is why it’s called the present…
Here are 51 quotes to help you to stop overthinking.
“The more you overthink the less you will understand.” – Habeeb Akande
“We are dying from overthinking. We are slowly killing ourselves by thinking about everything. Think, think, think. You can never trust the human mind anyway. It’s a death trap.” – Anthony Hopkins
“Your perspective on life comes from the cage you were held captive in.” – Shannon L. Alder
“I’m tired of being inside my head. I want to live out here, with you.” – Colleen McCarty
“Overthinking ruins moods and kills good vibes.” – SupaNova Slom
“Don’t overthink things. Sometimes you can convince your head not to listen to your heart. Those are the decisions you regret for the rest of your life.” Faith Barnett From Texas Tangle” – Leah Braemel
“Thinking will not overcome fear but action will.” – Clement Stone
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” – Albert Einstein
“There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” – William Shakespeare
“Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason why so few engage in it.” – Henry Ford
“The head thinks. The heart knows.” – Rasheed Ogunlaru
“If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you’ll never get it done.” – Bruce Lee
“Half our mistakes in life arise from feeling where we ought to think, and thinking where we ought to feel.” – John Churton Collins
“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.” – Alice Walker
“Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t–you’re right.” – Henry Ford
“The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it.” – Terry Pratchett
“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” – Albert Einstein
“I think and think and think, I‘ve thought myself out of happiness one million times, but never once into it.” – Jonathan Safran Foer
“The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled.” – Plutarch
“Stop thinking, and end your problems.” – Lao Tzu
“Think for yourself and let others enjoy the privilege of doing so too.” – Voltaire
“If you believe that your thoughts originate inside your brain, do you also believe that television shows are made inside your television set?” – Warren Ellis
“The spirit of the individual is determined by his dominating thought habits.” – Bruce Lee
“Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action comes, stop thinking and go in.” – Napoléon Bonaparte
“Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason so few engage in it.” – Henry Ford
“The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks.” – Christopher Hitchens
“We are set in our ways, bound by our perspectives and stuck in our thinking.” – Joel Osteen
“Thinking is a bit uncomfortable, but you’ll get used to it. A matter of time and practice.” – Lloyd Alexander
“The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation, but your thoughts about it. Be aware of the thoughts you are thinking.” – Eckhart Tolle
“You’ve never lived what you are thinking, and that isn’t good. Only the ideas we actually live are of any value.” – Hermann Hesse
“Too often we… enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.” – John F. Kennedy
“The trouble with most people is that they think with their hopes or fears or wishes rather than with their minds.” – Will Durant
“Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinion at all.” – G.C. Lichtenberg
“Thoughts are like an open ocean, they can either move you forward within its waves, or sink you under deep into its abyss.” – Anthony Liccione
“It’s crazy how you can get yourself in a mess sometimes and not even be able to think about it with any sense and yet not be able to think about anything else.” – Stanley Kubrick
“[Thinking is] what a great many people think they are doing when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.” – William James
“You cannot plough a field by turning it over in your mind.” – Author Unknown
“No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, can be trusted without proof.” – Henry David Thoreau
“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” – Aristotle
“Clear thinking requires courage rather than intelligence.” — Thomas Szasz
“It is well for people who think, to change their minds occasionally in order to keep them clean.” — Luther Burbank
“Thought is the blossom; language the bud; action the fruit behind it.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
“A real decision is measured by the fact that you’ve taken a new action. If there’s no action, you haven’t truly decided.” — Tony Robbins
“Better to be without logic than without feeling.” – Charlotte Bronte
“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things.” — Ray Bradbury
“Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it.” — Niels Bohr
“I began to realize that thinking itself is nothing but the process of asking and answering questions.” — Tony Robbins
“I once tried thinking for an entire day, but I found it less valuable than one moment of study.” — Xun Zi
“If you keep thinking about what you want to do or what you hope will happen, you don’t do it, and it won’t happen.” — Desiderius Erasmus
“I really wish I was less of a thinking man and more of a fool not afraid of rejection.” — Billy Joel
“What we think, we become.” — Buddha