Healthytalk8 Mental Chatter
Contents
Mental chatter means where your thoughts continue running all the time, and where you are unable to control them.
It is also known as running thoughts, monkey mind, and internal monologue, where the mind is unable stop to thinking.
Especially, when it is negative, and it is also allied with anxiety and depression, but these ideas can be cheerful, negative, and neutral.
Around 50% of people experience mental chatter, and it is normal until negative thoughts dominate your thoughts (1).
Is Mental Chatter Harmful or Helpful?
If it is positive thoughts then it’s not harmful, but if negative thoughts dominate your thoughts, then it can affect your daily life.
Positive thoughts can boost your self-confidence, and improve your problem-solving skills.
On the other hand, negative thoughts are allied with mental illnesses like anxiety, depression, etc, and over time it leads to chronic illness.
Overall, it can affect an individual’s life, especially if it is negative thoughts, which leads to anxiety, depression and other mental-illness.
Why Did It Happen?
It happens due to many reasons, find your reason with a specialist, and then they will suggest what is good for you.
Here is why mental chatter is happening:
Multitasking
Doing multitasking is shown amazing but it gradually affects your mental health negatively and causes forgetfulness.
Multitasking at the same time affects our brain’s remembering area, which overloads brain capacity (2)
To reduce forgetting things make sure to do one thing with focus at a time, which allows you to grab more information (3)
Stress
It is one of the common reasons for running thoughts, and it affects everyone, whether it is old, mature, poor, rich, male or female.
Stress and anxiety both make it harder to focus and stress increases the chance of mental issues like forgetfulness, etc.
Dopamine Need
Our brain craves dopamine (a feel-good hormone), and mental chattering is run by anxiety and desire, where dopamine is released.
Day by day it’s increased and becomes a habit where dopamine release triggers your desires and thoughts.
NOTE: keep this happiness, or satisfaction in control, Otherwise, getting dopamine for any work will become a bad habit.
Unnecessary Movement
This unnecessary movement means not staying in one work, mentally and physically.
Gradually it is unable your mind to focus on one things which trigger anxiety and mental chattering.
Bad Habit
It includes late night sleep, consuming excessive processed food, smoking, alcohol, bad sleeping environment, etc.
Bad habits affect your mental health, where keep things in mind, not doing exercise, and not consuming healthy food.
Research indicates that the gut microbiome also influences your mood and mental health, which play a vital role in controlling internal noise.
Mental chatter is not always bad, it can trigger your creativity, raise new skills, and make you a problem-solving expert.
Symptoms of Mind Chattering
There are several symptoms of running thoughts:
- Lack of awareness
- Inability to focus
- lack of attention
- forgetfulness
- inability to deal with stress
If you have experienced or seen someone who experienced it, then it is good to talk to your doctor, where proper treatment helps in it.
The Downside of Mental Chatter
As we already know, mental chattering is normal until it does not dominate your thoughts, especially when negative thoughts are seen.
Mental chatter has several downsides the most common downside is negative thoughts which lead to several mental issues such as:
- anxiety and depression both are common mental illnesses, so managing them before they become harder to manage
- decreased self-confidence is very vital and helpful for facing life’s different experiences.
- harder to focus on work which makes you irritable, and raises your anxiety level
- disturbs your sleep, excessive anxiety, and overthinking, make it harder to focus on sleep, and cause a lack of sleep.
- Interact with relationship, where continuous running thoughts can’t interact with relationship, indirectly.
- for example, lack of sleep triggers your anger and stress level, which can come in your relationship.
Overthinking B/W Mental Chatter
| Mental chatter | Overthinking |
| It overall continuous running thoughts include positive, negative, and normal | It occurs when you keep thinking about the same thought or problem, especially when it is negative |
| Its overall continuous running thoughts include positive, negative, and normal | It generally comes from stress, anxiety, and other issues. |
| Mental chatter can also increase your skills, and creativity level. | Overthinking leads to mental issues like anxiety, and stress. |
How To Deal With It?
Continuous running thoughts make it harder to focus, and sleep, which triggers individual anger, and irritation, and affects mental health.
So here are several ways to deal with continuous running thoughts its include:
Deep Breathing
If you are not able to focus on work, or it interacts with your sleep, then you can try this method.
I use it before sleeping, where my overthinking or continuously running thoughts through my mind, without any reason.
Deep breathing increases oxygen levels in the brain, which suppresses cortisol levels and increases melatonin levels (a sleep hormone).
It is one of the leading relaxation techniques to reduce stress, which brings calmness, and relaxation, and decreases mental woes.
Count 1 to 100 with deep breathing, I even can’t reach to 50 counts, before 100 I sleep.
Spend Time in Nature
Nature will heal it, it takes time, but continuous exposure to nature decides your mind to other things like mountains, green, etc.
You can go to the park for walking, which is beneficial for both mental and physical health.
So reaching in nature is very practical in diverting your mind, which does not allow your brain to create unimagine (4)
Apps
You can use also a smartphone where brain training apps are available which tell how the brain works in mental chatter.
Give your real-time date, which allows you to find the reason and provide you with the solution too (5)
There are paid apps too like CBT apps, etc which will suggest exercises, books, and videos (easy to understand)
But make sure not totally depend on apps, books, and any videos, first consult your doctor about your issues.
Exercises
Do exercise at least 30 to 1 hour daily including yoga also (one of the best ways to promote mental and physical health at the same time)
Make sure to focus on mental exercises like:
- Puzzle-solving
- learning new things or promoting your skills
- reading books
- meditation
- yoga
- writing blog or articles post
- take enough sleep
- met with others and shared your thoughts
The brain is more powerful than we think, it can make us or destroy us, so keep your mind healthy through exercises.
Let Them Free
Controlling or fighting with your thoughts can worsen the situation, it’s better to do meditation, or yoga before it gets worse.
Be kind to what you thinking, and understand why it occurs, and first, it’s normal so do not take it too seriously.
Just follow simple tiny steps, and actions like stop it before it goes deep, and try the breathing method during sleep.
Tiny action brings patience, and calmness, and teach many new things like building your self-esteem, confidence, etc.
Meditation
It is one of the best-considered methods to manage your overthinking, mental chatter and any other type of mental issues.
Because in it you have to focus on your breathing or a single thing, no more thoughts.
If you are finding difficulty focusing, then start by saying “OM” which suppresses the disturbing sound and thoughts and focus on “OM“
In Additional
Get enough sleep, which allows your brain to take rest, which brain can handle mental chatter very well.
Play your favourite games, do love can attract your mind and bring peace.
Overall, you are not alone in mental chatter, there are millions of people, but you have to manage before it reach at higher level.
Down Line
Mental chatter is a normal mental concern, that affects millions of people, you can simply manage it through simple methods.
Meditation, yoga, deep breathing, CBT, take specialist help are some of the ways that can easily suppress these running thoughts.
If you experience or seen someone who faces any mental issues, when talking to a mental doctor is the best way.
