What Is Worrying (and When Does It Become a Problem?)

Worrying is a mental process where our thoughts are constantly churning and analysing possible outcomes. Humans are unique in this ability and it can be beneficial when it helps you to perceive threats, predict opportunities and respond to both accordingly. Unfortunately, like anything, it can turn into an overused tool which veers more frequently towards a negative outcome. When this happens, worry can contribute to low mood and/or anxiety. Clients tell me that they believe their worry has served a purpose because nothing bad has happened, which can reinforce the belief that worry is performing an important function. It can be hard to break out of mental busy-ness and allow for more in the moment presence and connection to what’s really going on around you.

Many people experience excessive worry or chronic overthinking without realising that it has become an anxiety-maintaining habit rather than a helpful problem-solving tool.

Why Do We Worry So Much?

Put simply, our minds are constantly busy, monitoring the environment and wanting to reduce the discomfort of uncertainty. Uncertainty can feel like a problem to solve, and an overly helpful mind will churn over endless possibilities to try and regain a sense of control and avoid negative outcomes.

It’s easy to see how this becomes a habitual thought pattern and people get stuck in a self-reinforcing loop. When the constant stream of thoughts, worry and rumination stop then the mind can seem eerily quiet and unfamiliar. That quiet can feel so unfamiliar that the mind quickly looks for something to analyse — often worrying about whether that lack of noise is “normal” or find a distraction such as social media or the news which instantly sets the wheels in motion again.

Worry is productive if when you recognise an issue that needs addressing, you course correct and a positive outcome has occurred based on your awareness of potential issues. But there are times when worry-type thoughts begin to operate almost like a magical spell, if I fixate on this issue, that will contribute to its resolution. A simple thought-experiment usually debunks that idea: paint a vivid picture of winning the lottery, buy the ticket, imagine what you’d do with the money, all your numbers coming up think about it thoroughly for a week, really convince yourself its happening. When the draw comes around and you haven’t won – do you recognise that the lottery system isn’t influenced by positive thoughts and you can see that thinking about something is limited in its efficacy, or perhaps you do double down and think maybe I didn’t visualise hard enough? Maybe next week things would be different. Thinking about winning won’t influence the results any more than thinking about negative outcomes prevents them. It can be hard to accept that, although there are many meaningful things we can influence, we can’t control the future. There will always be uncertainty and we have to learn to become comfortable with an element of risk.

Sometimes we stay stuck in a worrying habit because when the things we don’t want to happen don’t, we attribute this to the fact that we spent our time worrying about it. This can make not worrying feel dangerous, if you don’t worry how will you protect yourself. This logic is flawed though because it takes away from your peace today and can quietly shape how cautious or restricted your life becomes – worrying and tuning into the negative may hold you back and result in playing things safe in life to ensure nothing bad ever happens.

Worry might feel preferable than action. Maybe, outside of your awareness, you’d prefer to stay stuck because it means you don’t have to change your behaviour. If we are unsure of the consequences of change, we might opt to continue thinking about an issue to see if we can come up with an easier or less challenging solution. To overcome avoidance, give yourself credit for small constructive changes to begin the process of reducing worry and increasing agency.

When worry becomes habitual, it doesn’t stay confined to our thoughts. The mind’s predictions trigger physical responses in the body — a racing heart, tension, shallow breathing, heightened alertness — which are then interpreted as further evidence that something must be wrong. This creates a self-reinforcing anxiety cycle: worrying produces physical sensations, the sensations confirm the worry, and the loop continues. Many people also believe that worrying in advance will somehow soften the blow if a feared outcome does occur, yet in reality it rarely reduces emotional pain — it simply means you suffer twice, once in anticipation and once in reality. Over time, this constant mental and physical activation drains energy, narrows perspective, and pulls attention away from the present moment, making it harder to feel grounded, connected, or clear.

When Worry Is Actually Helpful

·       Consider likely outcomes: The ability to worry about the future and unknown events has given humans an evolutionary advantage – the ability to predict and pre-empt danger and threat is what kept us safe when we were living in more hostile conditions, exposed to nature and wild animals. This becomes effective worry when you change your behaviour or response to something based on your predicted outcome, so if you imagine living in a cold outdoor environment, a worry about the weather turning cold in the winter months is effective if you then make a plan to gather and store so you will have a ready supply of fuel/fire to last the winter.   

·       Action and plans: Worrying is useful when it helps us to consider issues that might occur and then plan how we will respond or change a course of action based on our predictions. It is in the formation of a new plan that worry serves a purpose. 

Ask yourself – is this worrying process purposeful? 

If worry is productive and proactive then it can be positive because it can help to solve problems and reduce rumination about future threats and challenges. This means worry that involves identifying issues followed by solutions and potentially a new course of action - which you either enact or schedule. Without a new actionable plan then worry can lead to anxiety and rumination.

If it isn’t something purposeful or you’re having difficulty stopped, then most likely it is draining you of your inner resources, increasing your sense of stress and overwhelm.

Why Excessive Worry Keeps You Stuck

Our brains are hard wired to have a negativity bias so it is a natural inclination to identify potential negative consequences. Over the course of a day our attention is pulled in so many different directions that are leaving us overstimulated with information. For example, it is often cited that the human brain can comfortably hold 100 acquaintances – so think in the past if you knew 100 people, some closely and others more peripherally how often you would hear about traumatic events that have affected them or the death of someone you knew. While still upsetting this would be more localised and limited in the occurrence. But now with social media and the modern news cycle, potential threats and catastrophic consequences are reported frequently. This stimulates our worrying mind, with its negative leaning to mentally consider the threat of these things happening to us. 

People who are prone to worry often believe that it is uncontrollable, and they can’t stop but the reality is you can change your relationship with worry but it will take time and effort to unlearn an habitual thought pattern like worrying. Learning techniques to help us break the cycle of rumination and unhooking our thoughts can be helpful to put into practice to begin giving your mind some space to slow down and stop the constant flow of thoughts allowing you to engage in the present.

How to Reduce Worry and Overthinking

Although worry can feel automatic and uncontrollable, it is not a fixed part of who you are. With time, support, and repeated practice, it is possible to change how you relate to worrying thoughts — even if they don’t disappear entirely. Rather than trying to eliminate worry, the aim is often to reduce its dominance, soften its intensity, and increase your ability to stay grounded in the present. This creates more mental space for clarity, connection, and choice, instead of living in constant anticipation of what might go wrong.

How to Reduce Worry and Overthinking

1. Learn what fuels your worry Rather than fighting worry, start by observing it. Notice what triggers it and how your mind responds. Developing a compassionate, curious stance can reduce the intensity of worst-case thinking.

2. Use a worry tree Often used in CBT, a worry tree helps you decide whether a worry is hypothetical or actionable — guiding you either to let it go or to plan a concrete response.  I have created a that you can download for free: printable worry chart.

3. Schedule “worry time” Worry becomes more powerful when it’s suppressed. Setting aside a dedicated time to engage with worries helps contain them, reducing their impact throughout the day.

4. Write worries down Externalising worry creates distance. Seeing thoughts on paper can shift perspective and make patterns clearer, especially when the same worries keep resurfacing. Here is a printable Thought Record: worry thought record.

5. Ground yourself in the present Shifting attention from “what if” to “what is” helps interrupt rumination. Noticing bodily sensations and allowing discomfort — rather than escaping it — can reduce the pull of worry over time.

Worry chart.pdf

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Worry thought record.pdf

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If you are interested in having counselling, and would like to know more about how I work, arrange a free introductory call by emailing contact@carolynleith.co.uk