The Romantic uses overthinking to manipulate events and people to fit their fantasy.

Like the person who starts picking out the names of their unborn children with someone on the first date, The Romantic, whether in their personal or professional life, has a clear vision of what they want, but isn’t in touch with the reality of what is actually in front of them. Instead, their mind is preoccupied with possibilities and how to get those possibilities to come to be.

The Romantic focuses on the destination, not on the ground they stand on. They’re not above putting lipstick on a pig while they ruminate on a more elegant and lasting solution for an outcome that feels better to them. The Romantic can make excuses for days for other peoples’ bad actions. Or come up with a thousand ideas for bettering the workplace culture while they put up with things like inequity, disrespect or outright gaslighting or bullying.

The Romantic’s unique skill is being able to camouflage themself like a chameleon in order to appear to be down with the status quo, all the while trying to figure out how to create change.

The Romantic’s go-to thought is “if they or it could just.” The Romantic deeply believes in the capacity of people and organizations to grow and change, and they hang their hat (and their overthinking) on how to facilitate that external change to solve for their own happiness. They believe if they can coach, nurture or even manipulate another person’s future perspective, beliefs, feelings or actions, they will attain the fantasy scenario they have in mind in which they get to be happy.

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NOW WHAT?

Is your mind already chewing on what all of this means?

Or maybe you’re second guessing your results…are you really another archetype??

And are you wondering how to apply the insights about your overthinking archetype to stop overthinking and start trusting yourself?

Don’t worry. I got you.

Here’s how you can begin to integrate this information:

1. Start to become more aware of your body.

Because your body is your greatest tell when it comes to overthinking, and it’s also your greatest ally. Using a bottom up approach (sending info from your body to your brain) is a powerful way to regulate your nervous system and to get you in touch with the inner resources that will help you stop the hamster wheel in your head.

When you find yourself overthinking, you can do something as simple as give your face and neck a quick massage, shake your arms and legs, give yourself a hug, go for a walk…or even sometimes it’s enough to sit or stand up taller to shift your thinking.

It won’t stop you overthinking forever, but it will push the reset button on your sweet, overworked brain.

2. Use your mantra.

When you find your body giving you all the overthinking tells, or you catch yourself ruminating on your core question, or you realize that your core fear is lurking under the surface…let that be your sign that it’s time to use your mantra.

Your archetype’s mantra is medicine that’s unique to your core fear. Saying it to yourself is a way of soothing the part of you who may feel scared and is trying to fix feeling scared by overthinking. (Which, by the way, isn’t helpful.

I get it that it might feel awkward or fake to say your mantra to yourself at first. That’s ok. But see if you can look for the part of yourself who might be open to letting the words in, or even potentially believing your new mantra. That’s the part of you who will befriend you in moments when your overthinking is taking over.

3. Take action.

As the Romantic, it’s easy for you to focus on the fantasy version of the world and what other people need to say or do to fit that. It’s time to focus on reality—YOUR reality.

This week, I encourage you to pick one need that you have, and advocate for it. It can be small, like asking your partner to do bedtime duty with your kids so you can meet your need for more rest.

Or it can be big, like talking to your boss about a raise or taking on more responsibility to meet your needs for security or for mattering.

I understand that this might feel flimsy in the face of your mighty overthinking. It isn’t–it will have a positive impact!

But it IS only one part of the equation when it comes to shifting your experience.

Just as overthinking is just ONE form of self-sabotage that you’re probably doing.

Overthinking usually runs in the same crowd as things like not trusting your gut, not setting boundaries, and not believing that your insides get to matter. Sound familiar?

And when all of those troublemakers are hanging out with you, it’s hard to feel at home in your own skin. It’s hard to have a good experience of yourself, especially around other people.

Addressing the whole system of self-sabotaging behaviors takes an integrated and holistic approach that includes your body, brain, heart and nervous system.

For over two decades, I’ve been on a mission to give smart, sensitive, self-sabotaging people (like you) the practical tools they need to live in a way where their insides match their outsides and they are trustworthy to themselves.

Because like the “training” you got to NOT do that, changing your capacity to not just know better but do better is a matter of training.

So if you’re ready to have access to the entirety of the training you’d need to stop overthinking (and all the other behaviors on the self-sabotaging menu), I’ve made a signature program that encapsulates everything I’ve learned over the last 20+ years and that has helped hundreds of people like you stop sabotaging themselves and start trusting themselves.

It’s called Yours Truly.™ Click the video below to learn more!

(Pssst…if you don’t think you have the capacity to do the full program right now but you do want a quick and effective mini course (for only $36!) that will help you get at the root of your overthinking check out Yours Truly: The Initiation!)

Too much to think about right now?

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