Six Journal Prompts for Intellectualizers
You may be asking yourself, what is “intellectualizing”? Intellectualizing is the act of attempting to use logic to sooth or understand our distressing emotional states. Now, you may be asking yourself, “How is using logic a bad thing? Isn’t being clear headed and logical about difficult situations the goal?” Well, in certain situations, logic is certainly the goal. For example, when you are dealing with a really important deal at work and need to make an informed decision, or if you are trying to identify how many pounds of potatoes you are going to need to feed your extended family for Thanksgiving.
Intellectualizing is not helpful is when you are dealing with the emotional response to a difficult situation that has caused big emotions within us. For example, when you get a breakup text from a person you’ve been seeing for 5 months and you immediately jump to Why they may have made this decision, rather than Feeling the very human emotional pain that is inevitably there. Or for example, when a tragic event happens in our world, and we look for reasons why, such as, “the perpetrator must have been mentally ill” or “How old were they? They must not have been taking care of themselves if they had a heart attack at 55. I go to all of my doctors appointments and eat well, so I will be safe.”
Intellectualizing is a defense mechanism, a mental shield of sorts, that all of us utilize to protect ourselves from the pain of accepting that sometimes uncomfortable or downright tragic things just happen with no fault or reason to be had.
The reason this is an issue is because it separate us from what is really going on within. It keeps us away from how these things are actually causing us to feel, and therefore, we aren’t feeling. We are trying to logic ourselves out of uncomfortable emotions causing longterm stress, anxiety, overthinking, and resentment.
We think, “If I can just understand why this occurred, then I can prevent myself from feeling this way in the future”.
Wouldn’t that be great if it actually worked?
The reality of life is that suffering is inevitable, so why fight it? If we didn’t have suffering, we would never fully be present and grateful for the joyous moments life has to offer. What if we accepted that it was going to come and go, just like any other emotion, and ride the wave?
This is something we ALL do from time to time, but to help us accept the uncomfortable emotions, rather than push them away, I’ve come up with 6 journal prompts to get us back into our bodies.
What are my physical responses to stress and anxiety? What is going on in my body during these times?
What emotion(s) am I avoiding by overanalyzing this issue or situation? What about them feel uncomfortable?
How do I view vulnerability in my relationships? How is this helping or hindering me?
How has overthinking been of help for me in my past? How has it served as a protective factor?
In what ways is “little me” looking for validation right now? How can I comfort this version of myself through words and actions?
Describe and/or draw what my overthinking and anxiety look like to me. Explore what it would feel like to allow those feelings to sit with you, without feeding into the pressure to fix or do anything about it. What curious thoughts would you ask it if you weren’t trying to make it go away? What comfort would you give it?
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