Here’s a pithy quote from that all round good Greek egg Pythagoras:

A thought is an idea in transit

Wickedly simple and dripping with truth.

(Pythagoras usually has the right angle on things, after all)

Yet for most people, thoughts can look a lot more stationary than “in transit”.

Especially when it comes to more serious thoughts about events from the past which are plague our minds today, or present-day worries to do with work, our health or relationships, or future focussed doubts and concerns about family or decisions or money.

Heavy thoughts like these can be almost impossible to shake. 

And I know how crippling all this can be.

There were times when I sleepwalked through chunks of my life because I was so stuck in my head.

It didn’t matter where I was or what I was doing because I didn’t even notice.  I was living my life in my thoughts.

Over the last couple of years – and the last 12 months in particular – I’ve seen just how possible it is to change all this. 

One thing which helped?

Realising why I was taking my thoughts so seriously.

See, thoughts are not – by their nature – serious. 

No thought is.

Thoughts are light, flighty and frivolous.  They’re like feathers dancing through the air.

A thought only becomes serious when we add our own meaning, weight or significance to it.  When we grab a stun gun and try to freeze the dancing feather mid-flight so we can spend time analysing it.

Why wouldn’t we?  This seems like a sensible thing to do for a weighty, significant thought.

But adding the weight comes first.  This is what turns thoughts from "in transit" to stationary.

When I saw that I was adding weight to the thought myself and then dwelling on the weight which I'd made up, the whole routine of overthinking started to look more and more suspect.

And at some point I realised that the best way to not zero in on my weighty thoughts was simply to stop adding the weight in the first place.

Something to think about perhaps (but not too hard).

While we’re on the topic of overthinking…

If you’d like to hear more of me pondering about overthinking and how to overthink less, you might like to check out my Busymind Buster audio. 

It’s full of realisations I’ve had over the last 18 months which have helped me calm the chatter in my mind, get out of my head and get into the real world.

But beware:

The production values for this bonus are…how shall I say this?.....

Almost non-existent.

I recorded the audio by the canal.  The wind is howling in the background and there’s even one point where you can hear a boat tootling past.

As you might gather, the audio is completely pared back and off-the-cuff.

So don’t expect any bells & whistles.  If you’re the sort of person who’d rather own a turd coated in glitter than a diamond wrapped in a crumpled copy of last week’s Daily Mirror, this isn’t the bonus for you.

For everyone else:

What you can expect is a short little audio (it clocks in at just under 19 mins) where I spill the beans on a few things that have really helped me (and might help you) when it comes to overthinking less.

Plus I give a couple of extremely practical tips which anyone can use right here, right now to get out of their head and into the world.

The only way to get a copy of the Busymind Buster bonus is by joining Time Conqueror before the deadline at 2pm PT / 5pm ET / 10pm UK time on Friday 24^th November.  That's 12 hours from the time I hit send on this email.

Here’s the link:

https://timeconqueror.followingfulfilment.com

If you've already joined a previous version of Time Conqueror, this bonus is available to you too.  Just reply to this email with the word “gimme!” and I’ll send it right over. 

And if you’d like to re-join Time Conqueror as an alumni for a second time (or, for the keen beans, a third time) just reply to this email with “sign me up!” and I’ll add you to the challenge.

The same deadline (2pm PT / 5pm ET / 10pm UK time on Friday 24^th November) applies for both.