My mom used to tell me that I overthink everything.

"Analyze, paralyze," she would say to describe my antics.

I never understood what she meant, because — well — it was just the way my mind worked. I assumed that everyone thought the way I did.

As I've grown up, I've realized that I was right to a certain extent.

First, if you Google "overthinking," millions of articles, blog posts, and psychology sites pop up with different analyses, remedies, ideas, and discoveries. This made me feel normal — the fact that there are literally millions of accounts of overthinking behavior.

Additionally, a good portion of memes we see show some discrepancy between reality and expectation, between what we think is happening and what actually happens, between what we think and what we say — the list goes on.

And then, of course, it's easy to find a friend or someone nearby who has likely been overthinking something themselves — a relationship, a test, an interview.

The last time I interviewed for something, I was asked about my strengths and weaknesses. I said I "overthink" everything as a weakness, which it is.

It stops me from being quick on my feet, and from saying what I'm thinking in the moment. It just slows me down — a clear disadvantage in a world that moves ridiculously fast. I never know what the right thing to do is, or rather, I do, but I'm too distracted by all of my other thoughts to act on it.

However, as a strength, I said I was very analytical.

This was not the first time that I had pieced the two together, but it was certainly a definitive clash.

One of the reasons I enjoy writing is because I view it as a puzzle. It's kind of like the intro, body, conclusion format we learned in elementary school, but more complex. I like piecing together newspaper articles and essays. I find it fun. Of course, it takes me forever, because I'm always thinking of different ways everything could fit, but nonetheless, I enjoy doing it. It makes me feel creative.

I suppose writing is an opportunity for me to apply my analytical thinking skills.

Then I got to thinking about math and science — two areas I don't often associate with. For a few years in high school, though, I was actually very good at math. It was the teachers, to be honest. I had good teachers. I can't take all of the credit myself.

Granted, I was never in that high of a level, I enjoyed math at that time.

When I got to thinking about my math experiences, I started to think about my work ethic. It made sense that I would approach a math problem differently than I would approach an essay. And, naturally, I enjoy writing more.

However, I thought back to my high school math days — those I enjoyed. And I realized that maybe the reason I liked them was because I was approaching math problems the same way I approached essays — like a puzzle. I would analyze each step as much as I possibly could so as to understand a problem in its entirety and be able to apply what I had learned to other problems.

Again, I was putting pieces together.

In this way, I'd like to think of my habitual capacity to overthink and over-analyze as a double-edged sword. It slows me down at times but it has helped me on occasion.

Perhaps "overthinking" is just an alternate way of thinking that can best be associated with "overanalyzing" in an academic context. It's about understanding the ins and outs of complex material.

It is, I have found, a mixed blessing.