Confessions of an over-thinker

Okay, let me set the scene for you: one moment I’m a bright-eyed, bushy tailed 19-year-old, jumping off the train at London Victoria, ready to throw myself head first into the whole ‘being an adult’ thing. The next moment (apparently it’s been 10 years?!), I’m hurtling towards the age of 30 with alarming rapidity, my life feels as slippery and out of control as a bar of soap in the shower, and the prospect of being the most adulty-adult in the room at any given moment truly petrifies me.

Now don’t get me wrong, over-thinking is nothing new to me; my brain has always run at 100 miles per hour and I’ve always been the type of girl to scope out the emergency exits within minutes of entering somewhere new, but these past few years have been something else altogether. I don’t know if the big milestone birthday lurking in the distance has had anything to do with it, or whether it’s the sheer fact that I can’t glance at my social media feeds without seeing an engagement or baby announcement, but my brain constantly seems on the verge of a complete meltdown. I’ll be sat watching The Apprentice on a Thursday evening with a glass of wine in my hand, when I’ll suddenly feel the overwhelming need to start drafting up a business plan and filling my wardrobe with mid-length dresses, ready for the boardroom. I’ll be sat in a coffee shop, leisurely sipping my flat white and reading my book, when I’ll somehow convince myself that I’m the only single person left in London and start aggressively swiping through dating apps, in the hope that the love of my life will miraculously appear right before my eyes.

The thing is, on the whole, I’m actually very fond of my life. My days are packed full of fun and laughter, and I’m extremely lucky to have a job that not only gives me a reasonable amount of money; but enough free time to actually be able to spend it - practically unheard of these days, right? The problem is that I’m currently a bit too comfortable, and although comfort can be a lovely, warm hug of a feeling; I know that nothing particularly wonderful will ever come from staying inside my snug little cocoon of a comfort zone. I really feel like there’s something bigger, better, and more exciting out there for me to be doing; I’m just a little bit too nervous to go and find out what exactly that might be.

I think I’m just so worried about failing and letting everyone down, that I’m choosing to stay put and am essentially sticking my fingers in my ears and singing ‘lalalalala’ at the top of my voice. I’m not someone who embraces change all that successfully, but I’m trying my best to be brave and do the things that scare me, and sometimes I just need to remind myself that in the grand scheme of things: one small failure will only really be a single page of my eventual success story.

That being said, I seem to be spending the vast majority of my days in a never ending cycle of worrying about not doing enough with my life, and then stressing myself out by doing too much - yep, it’s a right party inside this brain of mine. I have a tendency to squeeze the utter life out of my days like a tube of toothpaste because if I dare give myself a day of doing nothing, I’ll spiral into a pit of guilt and self loathing. I feel like it’s just the norm to be burning yourself out and spreading yourself as thin as tissue paper when really, there are some parts of life that should absolutely be spread as thick as possible. We should allow ourselves to indulge in those cosy afternoons spent reading a book and people watching in a coffee shop, we should enjoy the days where we inhale a full Netflix season in one sitting, and savour the moments spent on a train, just staring out the window like the main character in a rom-com (the audacity of me writing this whilst sat on a train, not letting myself just sit back and relax - but I guess that just proves the point, doesn’t it?).

I guess that all I can do for now is continue to put one foot in front of the other, and keep surrounding myself with people who make my life seem a little bit steadier and whole lot more sparkly. As long as I have things to look forward to, lovely people by my side, and am making slightly better decisions with each day that comes, hopefully I’ll be okay.

Katie x