A reflection on overthinking, insecurity, and the tendency to assume the worst in conversations.
You say, “I love your passion.”
I smile and say thank you, but sometimes I do not believe you.
By the time I get to the car, I have already started taking the conversation apart. I think about your face, your tone, the little pause before you answered. I wonder if I talked too long. I wonder if I got too excited. I wonder if you were only being polite. Before long, “I love your passion” has turned into something completely different in my head.
You are too much.
You are a little strange.
I do not understand why you care so much about this.
The strange part is, you may not have meant any of that.
I overthink.
I know I do.
I can take a perfectly ordinary conversation and keep working on it until I have created a problem that may not exist. A look becomes judgment. A pause becomes discomfort. Somebody checking their phone becomes proof that I bored them.
Then I feel embarrassed for being excited in the first place.
That bothers me, because there are things I really do care about. When I start talking about something that matters to me, I can get carried away. I talk faster. I explain too much. Sometimes I forget that the other person has not been thinking about this for six months like I have.
I need to know that about myself.
Scripture says:
“In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin: but he that refraineth his lips is wise.”
That verse keeps me honest.
Sometimes I really do need to say less.
Sometimes I need to stop explaining and listen.
Sometimes I need to let an idea sit for a while instead of trying to make somebody else see everything I see in ten minutes.
That is wisdom.
But there is another problem.
Sometimes I am not learning wisdom. I am becoming ashamed of myself.
Those are not the same thing.
I have caught myself thinking, Next time, do not get so excited. Keep it short. Act like it does not matter that much.
But it does matter to me.
Why should I pretend otherwise?
I think that is where overthinking gets dangerous. It does not just make me replay a conversation. If I listen to it long enough, it starts teaching me how to behave in the next one.
Be quieter.
Do not tell them too much.
Do not let them see how much you care.
Do not give anybody a reason to think you are strange.
That can make a person very guarded.
And very lonely.
Scripture says:
“For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”
A sound mind.
I need that.
Because my mind is not always sound when I am replaying a conversation for the twentieth time.
Sometimes I need to stop and ask myself a simple question.
Did they actually say that?
Most of the time, the answer is no.
They did not call me strange.
They did not say I was too much.
They did not tell me to calm down.
I supplied all of that.
I think that is one of the things God is showing me about myself. I can be so worried about what other people think that I start putting thoughts in their heads for them.
That is not fair.
Not to them.
Not to me.
Paul wrote:
“Charity...thinketh no evil.”
I do not want to assume the worst about people.
I especially do not want to take a kind word and turn it into an insult because I am insecure.
Maybe when somebody says, “I love your passion,” they really mean it.
Maybe they see something good.
Maybe they admire that I still care deeply about something.
Maybe I should just say thank you and believe them.
Of course, there will be people who do think I am weird.
That is life.
Some people will not understand the things I care about. Some people will think I talk too much. Some will not see what I see. That does not automatically make them wrong, and it does not automatically make me wrong either.
I need enough humility to hear correction when it is real.
I also need enough confidence in God to stop inventing correction when nobody gave me any.
Paul asked:
“For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men?”
That question gets to me because I know how badly I want to be understood.
I want people to see what I mean.
I want them to understand why something matters to me.
Sometimes I keep talking because I am trying to make that happen.
But not everybody is going to understand.
I am trying to learn that I do not have to force it.
If I am talking too much, God can teach me restraint.
If I am getting ahead of myself, He can slow me down.
If pride is mixed into my excitement, He can show me.
But I do not want to spend the rest of my life embarrassed every time I care about something.
And I do not want to keep punishing myself after normal conversations because I have decided everybody secretly thinks I am strange.
I overthink.
I probably always will to some degree.
But I do not have to believe every thought that shows up afterward.
So the next time somebody says, “I love your passion,” maybe I will try something different.
I will say thank you.
And then I will let their words mean what they actually said.