How To Stop Overthinking #550

Struggling with the quicksand of overthinking? You're not alone. I'm Lachlan Stuart, your high-performance coach, and this episode is packed with my hard-earned wisdom from coaching over 800 men to success. Together, we'll cut through the noise of your mind and lay out a blueprint to conquer those paralyzing thought patterns. With a laser focus on actionable strategies, we'll tackle awareness, solution-based thinking, and the challenging task of dismantling limiting beliefs. The outcome? A life where progress and meaningful experiences are the benchmarks of success, not just fleeting moments of self-improvement.

If you've ever felt the icy grip of fear and self-doubt when chasing your entrepreneurial dreams, I'm here to breathe fire into your ambitions. Forget about fearing failure; it's time to cultivate a bias for action. Using practical methods like a simple task list and transforming comparison into inspiration, I'll guide you towards nurturing a sterling self-relationship. As we celebrate the podcast's seven-year legacy, you'll see just how patience and persistence carve the path to triumph. So, subscribe and consider joining our Strongman of Value Academy, where the journey to a richer life continues well after the episode ends.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:51

Are you constantly overthinking? Do you find yourself getting lost in that never ending loop of thoughts that only leads to stress and only leads to anxiety? It's time to take control of your mind and conquer overthinking once and for all. Understanding that I could do this and learning the process that I'm about to share in this episode, I'll really freed up my mind and has allowed me to create huge levels of success in all the areas of my life and, most importantly, it's given me peace of mind when I was stuck in the trap right the rut of constantly overthinking, paralysis by analysis I was stuck and, as a man, one of the most important things that I have recognized that's important to me is I want to be making progress. I want to feel like I'm making progress. Overthinking does not allow that, and when you feel like you're not making progress, it's a crap place to be living in. So my name is Lachlan Stewart and I have been a men's high performance coach for the last seven years. I've worked with over 800 men, I've done over 550 podcast episodes interviewing some of the greatest athletes, businessmen and men that I know, and I am just continuing to want to teach things that have helped me live a better life. One thing that I believe is really important I'll be doing a separate episode on this shortly is the understanding that your life shouldn't just be self development. It shouldn't just be consuming content like this. I'm grateful that you're here, but I also want to inspire you to actually start living your life, and that's where today's episode around how to stop overthinking has come in.

Speaker 1: 2:34

I am someone who aspires to live a great life, and to me, that means being around great people who challenge me. I can laugh with them, I can create great experiences with them, I can feel loved and valued. It also means maximizing my health and the experiences that are available to me, as well as creating adventures. You know I want to really look back at my life for resume, and Jesse Itzler talks about this a lot. If you were to look at your life now and the things that you've done, would you be proud of that resume? Would you hire you as someone to hang out with? And I've really been focused on that. So, while I am very passionate about the work that I do, I'm very mindful that I want to be living my life in other areas as well. So when I look back on my awesome the Man-Mit-Can project impacted a lot of men's life. It was something that I was so proud and grateful to wake up and work on every day. But I also, you know, wrote 30 marathons in 30 days. I traveled the world with my wife. We lived in Nashville. I've lived in France. I've, you know, had all these incredible experiences.

Speaker 1: 3:36

So I encourage you to do that and overthinking and implementing what we would discuss now. It's going to allow you to really move through that life resume at a much faster pace. So, three things we're going to cover Awareness, so the signs that you're overthinking. Secondly, challenge Become solution focused. Once you do this, you can then move into the work.

Speaker 1: 4:02

You would have heard people talk about the work. I have spoken about it on earlier episodes, but the work is where you overcome the things that are holding you back. So the negative beliefs sorry, the negative emotions the limiting beliefs, the reason why you aren't getting the outcomes that you want from your life. Most people aren't living their dream life, especially men aren't living their dream life not because they don't have it within them to do so, but because the stories that they're telling themselves is what's really holding them back. So this is going to be more game changing to you than you maybe even realize when you clipped to play.

Speaker 1: 4:41

The first thing is becoming aware of the problems. You've probably met people in your life where they keep having the same problems and you're sitting there scratching your head. They'll come to and say, oh man, this is still happening, enjoy life. When we talking about this months ago, have you done anything different? You probably their responses no, I've just. You know this is. It just keeps happening. It's not me, it's them. And what you've become aware of is that they're Overthinking or worrying about a situation, but they're not doing anything to change it. They haven't become solution focused. I guarantee you, if you notice that in other people, there are moments in your own life where you're doing that I always am putting my hand up. It's why I'm very grateful to hang around with high-performing men and people in the Academy because they can call me out on this Quite often when we're.

Speaker 1: 5:32

You know picture like this if you see yourself naked every day, you don't notice changes, whether you're getting fatter or whether you're getting thinner. But if you were to take progress photos and use that as a way to hold yourself accountable and just go, man, I'm putting on a few pounds or geez, I'm getting fit. You know that what you're doing is improving on that. But if in your life you don't have people there who are going to make you aware of challenges, or you don't have ways to hold yourself accountable, to become aware of challenges, or you're not taking responsibility, you're probably going to go in one or the other way. And for most people, they find themselves extremely wealthy but they're extremely fat. Or they've found themselves extremely wealthy but they're on their fourth wife and their kids don't talk to them. Or they find themselves extremely healthy but they don't have any money to take any trips or to support their family. So there's always trade-off right and being aware allows you to really build that life.

Speaker 1: 6:28

And, once again, the benefit and the reason why I created the strongmen of value Academy but was because I wanted access to men who were really crushing it in areas of their life. Because what I could speak to a gentleman who's killing it in business you know he's growing his business 500% since he's been in the Academy I'm like man, I want to prioritize my business. But one of the cool things about him as well, he's got a family and prioritizes that and his health. So I'm like, okay, well, you can achieve success in all areas. It's just about developing skills, creating leverage and Actually doing the thing, and not being paralyzed by analysis.

Speaker 1: 7:04

So the awareness this is the stage where many are stuck and you're not making progress. Don't undervalue how important it is for you to be making progress. It impacts your confidence, the way that you view yourself and what you think is possible. And I truly believe you're listening to this podcast because you dream big, you want an incredible life and you've got this feeling like I have my stomach, that you're here to do something great. You may not know what that is yet, but you've got that feeling. And if you have that feeling, I am here to tell you and I am living proof that if you start with this awareness piece, you can create anything for your life. I'm not saying there's any quick fixes there's definitely not but you can do the thing that is required in order to continue growing right, moving into that solution focused area. So when you become Aware, just be mindful of this.

Speaker 1: 8:00

If you're feeling stuck, if you're feeling like you're not making progress, there's a high probability that you are over thinking things. Now, every decision that you make or Decisions that need to be made carry different weight. For example, deciding who you're gonna marry is probably a bit bigger decision than deciding what you're having for lunch. But if you're continually deciding to have the wrong lunch day in, day out, chances are you probably not gonna feel good, you're probably not gonna be healthy, so you need the feedback from that. If I'm, you know, overweight, I need to be aware around what I'm consuming, or how much I'm exercising or how much, maybe, alcohol you're drinking. So you need to think about that and, rather than going I don't know or I'm probably not, start tracking stuff. We've got to become solution focused. And this moves us into point two, and I'll tie this in at the end with an example of how the awareness piece, how becoming solution focused and then how doing the work, all ties together so that you can stop overthinking.

Speaker 1: 9:04

Most people don't get what they want, and not through the lack of being able to, but it's just mentally. They're holding themselves back, and this is those limiting thoughts that I spoke about. We need to move into the solution focus area. So it's like what do I need to do here to make progress? So, now that I'm overthinking, we need to ask ourselves why am I overthinking. What am I overthinking about? This is where we will start bringing up the things that you need to work on right.

Speaker 1: 9:30

It could be the fear of failure. Some people in business might go I want to start a side hustle, I want to start a business, but I could never do a business. I haven't done a business degree, or I have no experience, or I don't know what the first step is. And because of that limiting belief in those negative thoughts that follow, you never do the thing. You have this feeling, once again, that I've spoken about that you can do more, that you want to start that business, but you listen to the thoughts and you don't do it. And then you continue to live your life wondering what, if, what, if, what, if? The trick here, gentlemen, is to go okay, maybe I haven't started a business, maybe I don't have any experience, maybe I don't know that first step, okay, and then we now need to move to problem.

Speaker 1: 10:16

For our solution focus, it's like, okay, anyone who has ever started a business was at some point in their life in the same position where they hadn't started a business. The only way you can get to a point where you have experience of starting a business is by starting a business. So now that we can start going, okay, I don't need to overthink. I need to be aware of what I'm overthinking about. I need to bring up the reasons why I feel I'm overthinking, whether it's fear, it's fear of judgment, fear of success, not knowing what to do, because now you're creating the next questions for yourself.

Speaker 1: 10:51

What is the worst case if I fail? For most of us it's not much. I knew if I failed in business, I still have a roof over my head, I'd still be able to work as a builder, okay. But it was more so the fear of judgment. And I realized it wasn't the failure itself, it was the judgment. What would people think if I failed in business?

Speaker 1: 11:11

I then shifted that to go. Well, what will I think if I don't actually try? So by shifting that once again, we've now become solution-focused and I was then able to go okay, I'm going to start. What do I need to do? The first thing is probably read a book on what are the first things to start around business, or Google it. Give yourself a bit of a roadmap. You're going to recognize that when you start business, there is so many things to do, so many systems, so many processes and so many ways of going about it, and you can speak to 100 business owners and every bit of advice they give you could be different around how to start, but if you can just give yourself things to do, you've now started a task list, and when you give yourself things to do and actually start doing them, you'll notice that you're not overthinking. You're now using real life data, real life feedback around. Okay, this is what now has to happen.

Speaker 1: 11:59

Next, you don't have time to overthink when you're doing, and so that's why I recognize really quickly the power of. If I overthink which I do I need to ask myself what is the one thing that I am overthinking about and why, and what can I do to start creating a solution for this? And there's always an action item. There's always something to do. That's why we see people who are highly successful. They're always doing something, they're always making progress and we go. How are they doing that? Because they're choosing not to overthink by acting. They're using the feedback by the actions, and I'm not saying they always make the perfect decision. They definitely don't, and I definitely don't. But every decision I make is giving myself a real life feedback for the next decision. So that is why it's very beneficial to get to that.

Speaker 1: 12:47

You know, challenge those the reasons why you're overthinking and become solution focused. What do you need to do to get you to that next step? And I always believe in the foundations, and comparison, once again, can be perceived as a bad thing. You might feel inadequate or you could use it as I aspire to be like, and when you're in the framework or the looking through the lens of I aspire to be like, you can then go. Okay, well, they're here, and that's where I really, once again, want to get to. But what do I need to do? First, you had to crawl before you could walk. You had to walk before you could run. You had to, I guess, learn to run slowly before you could sprint, and there are always steps and only by doing will you be able to work out what's missing for you. Okay, finally, this brings us to the point of doing the work Now.

Speaker 1: 13:37

Obviously, you can't out, act or outmaneuver bad thoughts. I believe it helps definitely with building your confidence and helping you to become more courageous, but for some of us, our initial thought is negative I'm not worthy, I don't deserve this. What if they think that I'm not a good person. But those first thoughts, what we can control is that second thought. So when we identify negative thoughts that we're having right amount on a piece of paper these are all the ones that I've had in the last seven days or the last couple of hours and on the flip side, it's like what's the complete opposite of that. So nobody likes me, everybody likes me. I can't be wealthy. I have an abundance of money Okay, you understand that.

Speaker 1: 14:24

And then what we need to do to condition ourselves, to flex a muscle, is to focus on the thoughts that we want to have, that are going to deliver the way of thinking that we need in order to continue building our confidence and helping us Be more, create, courageous sorry, to act and do the thing that we know we need to do. So there's, you know, there's a couple of books around doing the work and it never stops. It's all internal, but my biggest thing is the better relationship you can build with yourself, and that, to me, is ultimately doing the work. But if you look at limiting beliefs, negative emotions, fears, trauma, all that sort of stuff, you don't have to do that all before you can start doing anything. Great, that's a lifelong journey and throughout life, you're going to overcome fears, traumas and bad experiences, and you're probably going to accumulate more, which means it doesn't stop. It's why the work just continues going, and sometimes, actually, it's freezing outside. It's winter here in the States, but seasons of life You're not always in summer. Don't expect yourself to be so.

Speaker 1: 15:21

Make sure that when you're aware of things, you become solution focus and you continue doing the work. You're going to be coming, so you're going to continue becoming that version of yourself that you need to be in order to deliver the results and the outcomes that you want from your life. If you don't do that, then you can continue over thinking, but you already know how that feels and it's not productive. You don't feel good about yourself. You feel like you're stuck in a rut. So, finally, to finish up, if that's how you're feeling, if that's where you're living right now, my go to is one be aware of that thought, so write it down on paper. Now I am overthinking about X Cool. The proof to this is why what I need to do to create a solution is when can I do it? Giving yourself a timeframe. Then you do the thing and you'll notice how you start breaking it down brick by brick and if you're really lacking confidence, start with small goals, start with small actions.

Speaker 1: 16:23

Once again, chip away, chip away, chip away doing the things that I do now in business or with podcasts, or hosting the guests that I have. Seven years ago, when I started the podcast, I wasn't, I guess, the version of lucky I am now that would have been able to facilitate those conversations, would have been able to get those people in the podcast because of the value that I wasn't offering. But rather than going, I'm going to be there tomorrow. I've just slowly chipped away at it, slowly chipped away at it. So, thank you, guys, for listening. If you've listened to the end, even better, make sure you subscribe so you don't miss another episode and you can connect with me on Instagram, obviously, wherever you're listening right now. But I would highly encourage, if you've listened the whole way through and you're getting value, check out our strongman of value Academy. You will get so much more value on top of these podcast episodes and it will complete the help you transform your life. My name is looking, stuart. As always, do something today to be better for tomorrow.