Strength TogetHER 7- Session 3

7 January 2021

Overthinking, also, best known as creating  problems that are never there." - David Sikhosana

Lokopakar is a youth based organization which is currently running 4 programs among which "Strength TogetHER" is also one. This is a program where a group of girls from diverse backgrounds meet virtually to share their experiences, stories, insecurities, ideas in order to come to a common conclusion. Through this homely platform, girls have been helping and inspiring each other to grow.

On 7th Jan,2021, we conducted the third session of cohort seven on the topic ''Overthinking". The session was one hour and twenty mins long. 


10 amazing girls showed up, shared their stories and extracted a lot of knowledge from our amazing moderator.

Our moderator for the session was Ms. Rosy Karna who is currently pursuing her doctorate degree in Clinical Psychology at The PGSP Stanford Psy.D. Consortium Program and doing her practicum at the Community based mental health clinic, Community Health Awareness Clinic (CHAC). Her goal is to utilize her clinical knowledge and establish a better mental health care system in Nepal.

After a short introduction, participants became more comfortable with each other and started coming forward to share their stories:

  • Our first speaker shared that she has always been obsessed regarding her academics and because of the habit of overthinking, she is not able to score to her satisfaction.
  • Our second speaker shared that she thinks too much before she even starts. She mentioned that she mainly over-thinks when she has to perform in front of mass. She  is worried that it is affecting her growth.
  • Our third speaker shared her incident where she was very nervous and was overthinking the whole time while organizing a program. After the completion of the program, she was appreciated by the panelist. Then she realized that it was not actually a very difficult task. It was just her overthinking habit that made it seem so. This experience taught her to handle things calmly.
  • Our fourth speaker shared about her coping mechanisms against overthinking. She stated how she just goes to sleep when she finds herself overthinking and when she wakes up, she completely  gets over what she had been overthinking about. But in response to her mechanism, once she was suggested to stop suppressing within and to let her emotions out. She also asked the moderator how she can healthily let her emotions out. 

After hearing each of the stories, our moderator had really constructive and helpful feedbacks:
  • Don't overthink about the past event, there's nothing wrong or right. Be proud that you utilized your resources at that point. Being rigid on yourself limits you, making you narrow minded.
  •  If you are nervous while performing anything, remember that the nervousness is only for the first few seconds, it gradually falls down and confidence rises up. This way, observing behavior changes helps to improve ourselves.
  • Sharing our feelings with whom we feel comfortable is a healthy way of letting our emotions out. This reduces stress and overthinking.
  • We should respond to over thinkers by validating them first and then giving them a logical perspective.
 Our moderator gave us very warm vibes and assured us that overthinking occurs to everyone but we should not make it a threat to ourselves. Observing our body reactions can help us mitigate the immediate effect of overthinking. Taking long breaths, doing ice bucket challenges etc. keeps the situation in control. The other best way is to write our thoughts on a piece of paper until we get  bored, then it  no longer becomes a threat. She reminded us to not forget to make efforts. Then we virtually bid goodbye to each other with excitement to share and listen to more stories in the upcoming sessions.

This blog is written by Aahana Dhakal, a keen learner who is sharing, gaining experiences and growing in the Strength TogetHER family as the cohort coordinator of the seventh cohort.

Written by: Aahana Dhakal (Cohort Coordinator)
Edited by: Aastha Shrestha ( LOKOPAKAR)

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