Living Above the Neck: What’s Really Happening When You Can’t Start?
If this has ever happened to you, or if it happens to you regularly, you know the exact feeling.
You finally get the time. All the tasks on your list are done, the house is still, and you settle into your spot with a notebook, a canvas, or a project that’s been on your mind all day. Everything is set up.
And then, instead of starting, you just sit there.
Your head takes over. You mentally run through five different ways to begin. You reach for your phone to check a technique, cross-reference an idea, or look at how someone else did it. Ten minutes pass. The initial spark feels heavy or distant, and you put everything away, telling yourself you just need to think about it a little bit more first.
It is so easy to walk away from that table and default to the usual excuses: “I’m just blocked,” “I don’t have enough talent,” “I’m going to waste materials,” or “I’ve got too much else on my mind.”
If you put aside all those excuses for a moment and choose to really meet yourself in that moment, curious about what’s actually happening, you might be surprised by what you find.
Overthinking as a Shield
When you finally create open space for yourself, your mind often predicts that openness as a threat.
Out in the day-to-day world, you have schedules, expectations, and clear steps telling you what to do. But sitting down at a blank page or a quiet table has no external instructions.
In that moment, staying up in your head feels a whole lot safer than making a choice.
If you can just analyse, plan, and critique the process in advance, you don’t have to meet the scary vulnerability of getting it wrong or struggling with what comes next. Overthinking becomes a shield. It rushes in to construct a story that you’re unprepared, when in reality, your body might simply be holding everyday stress or fatigue.
It’s much easier to jump straight into "What does this mean?" or "Why can't I just do this?" instead of noticing that something is shifting inside, or that your body needs a moment to settle before you can begin.
One of my teachers used to tell me: “If you’re not in your body, you’re leaving space for something else to be.”
That something else might be an imposter, an inner critic, or a protected part of yourself that steps in, takes over, and runs the show. But where is the expanded version of you at that moment? This is really what we are trying to work with—making sure you can actually show up fully. And if you can't, take a breath and ask: what is happening here, and how can I explore it with curiosity?
Tapping into the Five Senses
When you catch yourself in that mental loop at the table, you don't need to force a big creative breakthrough or solve a deep mystery. You just need to interrupt the loop.
One of the simplest ways to pull your energy out of your head and back into the room is through a quick 5-senses check-in:
Touch: Put your hands flat on the surface of the table below you, feel the texture of your clothes, or sense the air on your skin.
Sight: Pick one object in front of you—a brush, the grain of the wood, or a shadow—and notice three details about it. Slowly.
Sound: Listen for the subtle background noise in the room that you’ve been tuning out.
Scent and Taste: Notice the air moving through your nose, or the residual taste of your tea or water in your mouth.
Tuning into a physical sense creates a momentary pause in those looping thoughts. There is nothing to fix here. Whatever you choose to do next is what you choose, but catching the loop for even three seconds is the whole win.
Reflection to go deeper
If you want to meet yourself in that moment with genuine curiosity instead of judgment, try taking out a pen and exploring these three questions:
What is my mind trying to protect me from right now? (e.g. making a mess, feeling foolish, making a wrong choice, or simply feeling tired?)
Where am I holding this moment in my body? (e.g. tight shoulders, shallow breathing, or a restless urge to pick up my phone?)
What if my overthinking is actually just a strength that became my default tool for every situation? What would happen if I asked my mind kindly to step back for a moment?
If there are no answers that’s fine too, but usually you might find a whole lot of things present you hadn’t realised.
Meeting Yourself in the Space
There is nothing wrong with overthinking if it keeps serving you. But what if its overprotection is keeping you out of your own life? What if it’s keeping you from actually feeling alive and present in the spaces you worked so hard to create?
Catching yourself in the loop is the beginning of building a new relationship with yourself.
If you keep finding yourself stuck in this loop, this is the exact work we explore together in 1:1 online transpersonal art therapy sessions.
