What does it look like to be intentional? When it comes to relationships, intentionality appears as:

Initiating conversations, planning times to hang out, purposeful interactions, and intentionally getting to know that person. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been friends for 10 years or you met last Tuesday—intentionality shows you are purposeful with that person and their emotions.

Overthinking is often a wolf in sheep’s clothing, disguised as intentionality—when in reality, overthinking is overthinking.

People unfortunately often forget that when it comes to relationships, emotions are involved. Witnessing my coworkers and peers friendship or dating lives, I wonder: do they realize the other person has emotions and is impacted by this?

I’ve seen overthinking damage relationships, not only for the one who is overthinking but for the other person. Breakups happen because of overthinking. Friends split apart because of overthinking. Families struggle because of overthinking.

When we lead ourselves to believe that we are purposeful by constantly thinking about a specific thing, we are slowly learning to confuse intentionality with overthinking and obsession.

It becomes dangerous when the wolf (overthinking) in sheep’s clothing starts to actually believe that he is the sheep (intentionality).

There was a time when I believed that obsessing over all my friends’ actions was being intentional.

I once (accidentally) led my friends to believe that I hate being touched. Physical touch is my last love language—every time I’ve taken the test, it’s been less than 10%, if not 0% of my love language.

When I laughed it off and said I could easily survive without being touched by people, my friends assumed I hate being touched. That’s not true—I love hugs and having someone’s arm around my shoulder or a small pat on the back to communicate someone sees me. But it’s not what I need to feel truly loved and appreciated.

As my friends heard this, some even said they overthought when they hugged me or put their head on my shoulder.

Like I said in my post You’re Reading Too Much Into It, Scripture tells us that we shouldn’t just jump to conclusions.

‘Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait until the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of the heart. At that time each will receive their praise from God.’
1 Corinthians 4:5 NIV

It’s important to look at our relationships specifically and ask ourselves: am I overthinking this or am I being intentional?

Because there is a difference.

Overthinking worries: if I do something wrong, it will screw up this relationship.

Intentionality states: I want to make sure that both parties are clear and aware of the relationship dynamics.

Overthinking panics: I asked if they wanted to hang out, I’m annoying.

Intentionality reminds: I asked if they wanted to hang out, I’m showing that I care.

While overthinking is a huge part of being human, that doesn’t mean we need to feed that mindset—instead we can silence those thoughts and turn them into productive intentionality.

Overthinking is not the same as intentionality—overthinking is overthinking.

For a lot of us, the school year is about to start back up in a couple of weeks. And this means seeing a lot of people more often, as well as some new faces and some new experiences.

If you are like me and are someone who’s constantly overthinking the actions of myself or others, maybe you can join me in my simple, no-commitment challenge for August:

Consider giving up the habits of overthinking to the Lord.

Just letting Him do what He will with the things that happen—I want to be mindful of my relationships, and overthinking will not help them. But intentionality is something I want to grow in this month. Care to join me?

As always, thank you for reading.
~Willow