Women Who Think Too Much: How to break free of overthinking and reclaim your life

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You have an innate urge to push the boundaries of conformity, to question or to challenge traditions, particularly those that seem meaningless or unfair. Paired with a strong sense of justice, you are often frustrated with corruption and inequality in the world. Michl LC, McLaughlin KA, Shepherd K, Nolen-Hoeksema S. Rumination as a mechanism linking stressful life events to symptoms of depression and anxiety: longitudinal evidence in early adolescents and adults. J Abnorm Psychol. 2013;122(2):339-52. doi:10.1037/a0031994 Chapter eleven mentions that optimists appear to fight illness more successfully than pessimists. Consider the ways in which this mind-body connection has affected your own health and that of your family.

But too often, many of us are flooded with worries, thoughts, and emotions that swirl out of control. We are suffering from an epidemic of overthinking-getting caught in torrents of negative thoughts and emotions that overwhelm us and interfere with our functioning and well-being. Our concerns are about fundamental issues: Who am I? What am I doing with my life? Answers do not come easily to such questions and so we search and ponder and worry even more. Do not let the thoughts win. Separate your observer-self from your thoughts. Mindfulness and meditation courses can teach you how to do this, and the key is to keep practicing it on a daily basis. Nolen-Hoeksema's life work and research was honored in February 2014 by a special section in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology, volume 123, issue 1. [11] You tend to experience zealous enthusiasm about certain topics and endeavors. When you get excited about an idea, your mind runs faster than your words can keep up, or you find yourself talking rapidly, perhaps even interrupting others. Over-thinking can start off as innocuously as hearing a colleague say that she will be wearing thongs to a corporate event. You then start to question ‘why did she say it in ear shot’? Is she doing it to show you up? Then you remember the time she did humiliate you. Your thoughts go through any number of possibilities until you reach the conclusion that you will probably lose your job as she is setting you up to fail. But it doesn’t end there. You can keep going further; worrying about how you will survive without income, worrying about who will employ you and worrying that you will be evicted. One comment about casual footwear sets you spiralling in to a journey of negativity.You have a rich inner world that is imbued with words, images, metaphors, visualizations, vivid fantasies, and dreams. Developmental studies of explanatory style, and learned helplessness in children (depression) (1986) Regardless of the altering effects it may have had on me, it took me FOREVER to finish. I understand the layout of the book and why it was done the way it was, but because of this I literally fell asleep reading this a few times.

You might have felt frustrated that those around you were not prepared to discuss and consider these weighty concerns. Nolen-Hoeksema, Susan (1993). Sex Differences in Depression. Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-0804721806. Widiger, Thomas; Cannon, Tyrone D. (March 2013), "In Memoriam: Susan Nolen-Hoeksema", Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 9 (1), doi: 10.1146/annurev-cp-9-031513-100001

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The book talks about overthinking and depression almost synonymously, as if anyone who overthinks is certainly depressed, and it goes on to talk about research comparing depressed and non-depressed people in an attempt to show how overthinking will destroy your life. With the negativity laid out, I am a severe over thinker. I go crazy prattling on in my mind about something simple and insignificant. This overthinking could have started with a conversation I had that I felt went negatively and explode to why I have no friends. This is dramatic of course, but has unfortunately happened. It was nice to hear this was normal and more common in women. I know if I tell my boyfriend or father about something I am worried about they think I'm crazy and weird for worrying about something so trivial. Susan Kay Nolen-Hoeksema (May 22, 1959 – January 2, 2013) [1] [2] was an American professor of psychology at Yale University. Her research explored how mood regulation strategies could correlate to a person's vulnerability to depression, with special focus on a construct she called rumination as well as gender differences. [3] [4] [5] Biography [ edit ] Education and employment [ edit ]

Susan Nolen-Hoeksema, psychologist and writer, helped explain why women are twice as prone to depression as men and why such low moods can be so hard to shake. Dr. Nolen-Hoeksema, a professor at Yale University, began studying depression in the 1980s. Atkinson and Hilgard's Introduction to Psychology 15th Ed.. Wadsworth Cengage Learning: EMEA, 2009. From an early age, you have a grave concern for others and the wider world. When others are abused or mistreated, you feel as if it is happening to you. From 1986 to 1995, she was a faculty member at Stanford University receiving tenure in 1993. From 1995 to 2004 she was a tenured professor at the University of Michigan in the Personality Area. From 2004 to 2013, Nolen-Hoeksema was a professor and researcher at Yale, as well as the head of the Yale Depression and Cognition Program. [6]

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However, your abilities do not necessarily make life easy. You are bothered by hypocrisies and unfairness and struggle with inauthentic people and situations. You cannot help but be the one who points out the "elephant in the room," but your perceptiveness may seem intimidating to those who felt "seen through."

How can readers avoid the conundrum of overthinking the problem of thinking too much? Discuss some of the ways in which you can implement Dr. Nolen-Hoeksema's advice through action rather than through rumination. You may resonate with traits of being an " empath," due to your innate ability to feel and be affected by other people's energies. In social situations, you can intuitively identify with others' emotions, and you may feel that you "absorb" their physical and mental ailment, to the point where you get overwhelmed. Intellectually, you are inquisitive and reflective. You have a strong need to seek to understand, to expand your horizons, to gain knowledge, and to analyze your mental content. When you observe yourself spiralling, literally imagine a Stop sign, say to yourself ‘stop this’, then get up and get moving. It pulls factual evidence on women's pay, women's rights etc. and states it as the cause for depression or overthinking. I could do that with anything, oh women eat porridge for breakfast, the porridge must be causing the overthinking.

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Nolen-Hoeksema, Susan; Ganji, Hamzeh; Jahangiri, Hamideh (2020). Psychotherapy of depression in elderly Volume 2. Scholar's Press. ISBN 978-613-8-94232-0. Nolen-Hoeksema, Susan; Ganji, Hamzeh; Jahangiri, Hamideh (2020). Psychotherapy of depression in elderly Volume 1. Scholar's Press. ISBN 978-613-8-94228-3.