The Overthinking Epidemic: Why Brilliant Women Healers 50+ Can’t Turn Off Their Minds (and How to Stop It)

Ever replay a conversation from 1997 at 2:00 AM or rewrite an email seventeen times while your brain runs a full clinical case conference in your head?

This show helps brilliant women healers over 50 who are exhausted by their own mental hamster wheel. Overthinking isn’t a personal flaw—it’s a symptom of the "professional vigilance" you've honed for decades. You have trained your brain to anticipate risk and absorb responsibility, but when that vigilance collides with midlife hormonal shifts and burnout, it becomes a cage.

In this episode, Dr. Julie Merriman—burnout researcher and counselor of 30 years—reveals the neurological and spiritual roots of your analysis paralysis and how to finally find the "off" switch.

Listen to discover:

• The Vigilance Trap: Why healthcare professionals are wired for worst-case scenarios, and how chronic stress and perimenopause rewire your nervous system to mistake worry for safety.
• The Energetic Root: How blockages in the Third Eye, Throat, and Crown chakras drive "intuition fatigue" and keep you stuck in problem-solving mode long after the work day ends.
• 3 Research-Backed Resets: Spiritually grounded, somatic tools to calm your system in under a minute, helping you shift from frantic rumination to embodied presence.

If you are ready to stop the 2:00 AM mental loops and learn to trust your inner knowing again, start by listening to this episode now!

Next Steps:

• If this episode resonated, please share it with another woman healer who needs to hear it.
• [Freebies]: Tap the links below to grab the Compassion Fatigue Cure Starter Guide and the From Burnout to Radiance Reset.
• [Take the Quiz]: Discover your burnout style with the What's your Burnout/Compassion Fatigue Archetype? quiz.

We rise together.

This podcast supports women healers over 50 navigating burnout, compassion fatigue, and midlife transitions with strategies for nervous system regulation, trauma-informed boundaries, and chakra alignment to heal resentment and self-neglect while cultivating soul joy, radiance, and a purposeful next chapter of freedom and inner peace.

THE DIAGNOSIS: Are you the Martyr who can't say no? Or the Warrior who fights until she collapses? You cannot heal what you cannot name.

👇 Take the 60-Second Quiz to find your Burnout Archetype: [CLICK HERE TO REVEAL YOUR ARCHETYPE]

Join the Rebellion: If this episode woke something up in you, share it with a colleague who needs permission to stop. We rise together.

Reach out to Dr. Julie

Episodes drop every Tuesday at 5am and every Friday at noon.

Special guest episodes drop the 4th Thursday of every month at 7am.

Transcript

0:03

Welcome to Soul Joy. Fun day, Friday or Friday. Fun day. I'm so glad that you're taking 10 minutes just for you today. Let me ask you something really important. Have you ever laid in bed at 2:00 AM replaying a conversation? Oh, Mylanta replaying a conversation from, I don't know, 1997. Am I the only one? You're wondering if you should have said something completely different or mentally rehearsing an email. Um, oh Lord, I do this. You're rehearsing that email like 17 times before sending it only to lie awake that night. Thinking of three better ways you could have wor worded that email. I do that. I absolutely do that. And. I want to welcome you to the Overthinking Club. We meet in our heads constantly at all hours, and today we're diving into the spiritual guide to overthinking everything, everything. I'm telling you, everything. And here's what you're going to learn first. You are gonna discover which chakras are actually behind your mental hamster wheel. And spoiler alert, it's not just one guilty party up there and it's not I if only right, if only. And second, you'll get three research backed, spiritually grounded. Tools to quiet your mind that actually work, unlike that advice, to just stop thinking about it, that people love to give. Thanks, Karen. Super helpful. So grab your coffee, you tea, or let's be honest, your wine. It's Friday afternoon and let's figure out why your brain won't shut

Cedric: 2:09

the you know what up!

2:10

Welcome to Soul Joy, the podcast for empowering brilliant women in healthcare over 50, transform burnout into purpose, reignited your spark to create a life that energizes you every single day. I'm your host, Dr. Julie Merriman. Let's get to it. Okay. So there is an overthinking epidemic. I think that's true. And here's the thing about those of us in healthcare, we're professional problem solvers, right? I mean, we're getting paid to do this stuff. We spent decades anticipating what could go wrong, planning for the worst case scenarios, and being hypervigilant because. Well, lives literally depend on it, right? Lives depend on it. But then we bring that same energy home suddenly and surely it's not just me. Suddenly we're running a full case conference in our head about whether we offended someone at the book club or if we should have bought that organic. Blueberry thing instead of just the regular ones. You know, see, the research backs this up. A study from Harvard showed that when we spend 40% percent of our waking hours, not when that we spend 47% of our waking hours thinking. About something other than what we're actually doing. Y'all, 47%, that's basically half of your life spent living in your head instead of in your life. And for women over 50. For those of us seasoned gals, there's additional research from uc, Berkeley. That shows our overthinking, often intensifies during this stage of life. The stage that we're in and y'all, there's reasons for that. We're simultaneously dealing with hormonal changes, life transitions, and what we call the wisdom years, which is quite a paradox we know better. Which makes us overthink even more because we think we should have all the answers by now. And here's the plot twist. Nobody, nobody has all the answers. Not even you, not even me. Despite our decades of experience and impressive credentials, we don't have all the answers. It's okay. So let's talk. Just a hot minute about the chakra culprits, shall we? Um, so the chakra culprits, oh, they are true. And they are there. They throw us into this overthinking party in our head. We've got our third eye chakra. The overachieving, ringleader, and your third eye chakra. It's, it's that indigo beauty right between your eyes and it governs your intuition, your wisdom and insight. And when it's balanced, you have clarity and trust your inner knowing when it's active, overactive, congratulations. That you've got analysis paralysis, and it's a festival happening up in your nogging. You are over analyzing every decision, second, guessing your intuition, and creating a very elaborate mental scenario or scenarios about things you haven't. Experience things that haven't even happened and y'all, they probably never will. It's like your third eye is working overtime at a job that doesn't offer overtime pay, and that is exhausting. Then you have your throat chakra, the, did I say that right? Perpetrator? Oh my goodness, yes. That perpetrator your throat chakra, excuse me, governs communication and self-expression. And when it's blocked, you replay conversations obsessively because you didn't say what you really meant, or you're afraid you said too much or not enough or the wrong thing entirely. That 2:00 AM conversation that replays in your head from 1997. Yeah. Been there. Had those, that's your throat chakra, holding a party up in your noggin and also maybe holding a bit of a grudge from 1997. Then we have a crown chakra. That spiritual perfectionist, your crown chakra, connects you to higher consciousness and the divine. When it's imbalanced, you overthink your spiritual practice itself. And my meta meditating, right? Am I meditating enough? Am I grateful enough? Blah, blah, blah. Maybe. I need a different mantra. You know, it just, it's all up in your head or, oh, I've done this. You're trying to meditate and you're thinking, oh, I think I need a better meditation cushion. You're just not being present. Even your enlightenment has become something to overthink. Oh, yes. The irony is not lost on anyone, especially not the universe. So the real reason we overthink ladies, the real reason we overthink. Um, of course I like to, you know, dig into a little research and here, here's my hypothesis, and neuroscience kind of backs us up. Here's what the neuroscience tells us. Overthinking is often our brains misguided, repetitive, negative, negative thinking. It is the brain's way of trying to solve something that can't be solved. By thinking alone. It's like trying to fix your plumbing with a stethoscope wrong tool, my friend. It's the wrong tool, and for us healthcare professionals dealing with burnout, you've got to understand this. You've spent your career. Controlling outcomes, managing crisis, and being the person everyone depends on when you can't control your own exhaustion, your fading passion, or this nagging feeling that there's got to be more to life than this. Your brain goes into overdrive trying to think your way and feeling better. Spoiler alert, you can't think your way out of a problem like that. You can't think your way out of a problem that requires you to feel. So here's three tools that I want you to think about that can help quiet this mental chaos. Three pretty simple tools. So that's enough with the problem identification. Let's get some solutions. Tool one, the third eye pressure release. I want you to close your eyes. Place your middle finger gently on your third eye. Point between your eyebrows. Take a deep, deep breath and imagine that a pressure valve is at that point. As you exhale, visualize releasing all that excess mental energy, like a steam is, like steam is escaping and I want you to say silently, I release what I cannot control. I trust what I know, and you need to do this three times. Research from the HeartMath Institute shows that intentional breathing combined with focus, helps to reduce cortisol and activates the parasympathetic nervous system in under a minute. In under a minute. Pretty badass. Tool number two, the throat chakra truth bomb. Here's the deal. Most of our overthinking about conversations happens because we didn't speak our truth in the moment. So I want you to take five minutes today and write down what I really wanted to say was, and let it flow uncensored. You don't have to send it, you don't have to do anything with it. Just let your throat chakra express what it's been holding a study in the Journal of Experimental Psychology found that expressive writing. Reduces intrusive thoughts. That's why every therapist on earth tells you to go journal. Um, it reduces these thoughts by 40%. That's like cutting. You're overthinking almost in half just by getting honest on paper. And here's the third tool. It's the crown chakra Surrender. Every evening you place one hand on your heart and one on the top of your head, and you say out loud, I did my best today. That is enough. I am enough. This simple practice reconnects your crown chakra to your divine wisdom. Instead of it being ego-driven perfectionism, Dr. Kirsten Neff, she's here in Texas too. Her research on self-compassion at UT Austin shows that self-compassion, this practice reduces rumination. More effectively than distraction techniques or positive affirmation alone. You're not trying to be perfect. You're trying to be present and my friend, big difference. Okay, so here's the plot twist. You ready? Here's the plot twist. It's a beautiful irony. You're overthinking isn't your enemy actually. It's proof of your incredible mind, your deep caring, and your commitment to doing things right. The problem isn't that you think deeply. The world needs more people who think deeply. You go over here. The problem is that you've forgotten how to turn off the thinking and turn on the being. Your chakras are not broken, not by any means. They're just overworked like you. They need the same thing. You need permission to rest, trust, and let go. Okay. All right, so that's gonna do it for today. And what did we learn? Let's review what we learned right quick. First, we discovered that overthinking isn't just all in your head, right? It's not just all peer, it's in your chakras. Specifically, you're over achieving third eye, your unexpressed throat chakra, and your perfectionistic crown chakra. They're all having a party at your expense and you do not have to consent. You can tell them to cut that crap out. Second, we learned that overthinking is your brain's misguided attempt to control and you cannot think your way out of a problem. That requires you to feel the research is clear, the research is clear, intentional. Breathing, expressive truth telling and self-compassion practices work far better than trying to logic your way into peace. And here's the bonus takeaway. Here's the bonus for your weekend. That brilliant overthinking, that brilliant mind of yours is not your enemy. She is not. It is just tired and need you to be as compassionate with yourself as you are with everyone else that you care for. So this weekend, here's what you need to do. I want you to catch yourself overthinking, pause, and ask, is this thought serving me or am I serving this thought? You get to choose and choosing to let go. That's not giving up at all. That is not giving up at all. That's giving you the gift of peace. Thank you for spending time with me today. I appreciate it so much. You deserve this time for yourself and you deserve to enjoy your life without your brain. Narrating every flipping moment like it's preparing for a final exam. I will see you next Friday for more soul joy, fun day. And until then, I want you to overthink less, live more. And remember, you're already enough. You are so already enough. So last word I'll say, please hop on over to my website and sign up for my Soul Joy challenge. Or just sign up to be on my list and I will get this podcast out to you every, oh, I send it out twice a week. Have a beautiful day.