Have you ever ended a conversation with someone, and that nagging feeling that you said too much won’t leave you alone?
You replay the conversation a million times, wondering why you said this or mentioned that, or even bothered going too deep. You overthink every word you said and start hating yourself for being so bare, or looking desperate before them.
At the end, you promise yourself not to overshare next time. But right after your next conversation, you again wonder why you can’t stop oversharing.
If this is you, you’re in the right place because this post will help you uncover the root reason you overshare and how to stop oversharing.
Most people think oversharing is just a bad habit of talking too much. But it is beyond that. Oversharing is often tied to deeper issues like identity, boundaries, and the need for external validation.
However, learning how to stop oversharing isn’t about becoming cold, secretive, or closed off. It’s about becoming more grounded and in control of the access you give people to your life and story.
So, in this post, we’ll walk through the reasons why you overshare, and for each reason, I’ll show you how to stop oversharing in your conversations.
Let’s dive in!
You’re Struggling with Identity Issues
Sometimes, the need to tell people more about yourself comes from a place of identity crisis or a broken sense of self.
When you are not grounded in who you are and your worth as a whole individual, you’ll always want to prove your worth to people. Eventually, you’ll overshare and say more than you should.
When you are not rooted, you may unconsciously start to seek validation or worth from your conversations. You end up telling them a little more about yourself or your story, so they can finally see or hear you.
How to Fix It
Fixing your identity issues to stop oversharing isn’t something you do right before or during your conversation. It is something you do for literally all your life.
To stay grounded in your identity, you must understand who you are and the innate value you bring to the world. You must also be conversant with your core values, your life’s purpose, and your unique story.
Finally, you must cultivate self-awareness and stay connected to your source to stay rooted in your identity.
When you are rooted in your identity, you’ll never have the need to share more than is appropriate simply to make the other person see you or see the value you bring to the world.
You Don’t Know Where to Place People in Your Life
Another reason you likely overshare is that you do not know where to place people in your life. So, you end up sharing everything about yourself with everyone.
To be honest, I’ve had people who shared very intimate details of their lives with me on our very first meeting. Very embarrassing. And I am pretty sure they did that because they had a hard time rightly placing me where I belong in their lives, even though I’d never use what they shared against them.
How to Fix It
The truth is that not everyone you know or interact with should have emotional access to you or know everything about you.
To correctly place people in your life so you can stop oversharing, you need to start to define every relationship you have.
Always confirm who people are to you, and how much they have proven their commitment to you before considering them as a ‘safe space’ for sharing those intricate details of your life.
When you’ve ascertained where each person belongs, place the right boundaries in those relationships. You know why?
The only thing you owe everyone is love and honor. When it comes to access to your life, emotions, or story, you must carefully select those with whom you share that. Otherwise, you may never be able to stop oversharing.
You Believe Silence is a Bad Thing
The belief that silence during conversations is bad is one striking reason you can’t stop oversharing.
If you start to take note, you’ll find that the times you overshare are mostly times when it looks like there is nothing else to say during a conversation. So, you say what you shouldn’t say to keep the conversation going.
How to Fix It
Stop trying to fight the silence. There is nothing wrong with your conversations taking a nosedive.
In fact, the duration of silence you encounter during a conversation with someone is an indication of the depth of vulnerability you share in your relationship with them.
So, don’t be afraid of silence. Don’t try to force the conversation to keep going when the crickets kick in.
Instead, be confident enough to politely end the conversation when it becomes clear that you’ve achieved the initial goal of that conversation.
You Do Not Know How to Manage Time
Let’s be honest: one of the reasons you share more information with others than you intend to is that you have too much time on your hands.
Absolutely!
When your day isn’t properly scheduled and filled up with activities that matter, you’ll have those extra minutes (or hours) to have conversations that are without specific goals or direction too often.
And the moment a conversation begins without a clear goal, you’ll likely discuss anything (even private matters) to keep it going.
Also, not managing your time properly can leave you emotionally messy or overwhelmed.
As a result, the moment you get into a conversation with someone, you’ll likely use it to declutter or organize your thoughts and emotions. When you do this, the likelihood that you overshare is usually very high.
How to Fix It
To stop oversharing due to poor time management, simply start to do better with your time. Ensure you do not leave too many idle times within your daily or weekly schedules, so you do not accommodate too many baseless conversations.
And before each conversation, try to create and hold on to a mental overview of what you want to achieve from the discussion. This way, you’ll know exactly when you start to drift into unnecessary details in the course of that conversation.
Use this Time Management Quiz to audit how you currently use your time. Then download our Printable Weekly Planner here to ensure that you start every week organized and clear on your goals.
You Don’t Have Trusted Confidants
The truth is that we cannot deny or neglect our emotional makeup as humans. And we were never wired to carry emotional burdens alone – that’s why we have relationships.
So, it is normal to want to vent or share deep emotional information about ourselves with others.
But when you do not have trusted people to pour your heart to, you’ll likely start to treat every single conversation you have with literally anyone as a means to unburden yourself.
How to Fix It
To stop oversharing with everyone, you need to have people who can hold space for your messy middle so you don’t dump it on strangers or people who do not deserve such access.
Hey, you don’t have to do too much to have confidants. Simply look within your current relationships and see where you can deepen connections to make such access natural and deserved.
Maybe you need to work on your marriage so that your spouse can become your confidant, or reach out often to your parents, friends, or siblings so that your emotional connection with them can be natural enough not to look like oversharing.
Conclusion
Your privacy is power, and you can’t keep handing that power to just anyone.
Now that you know the reason you overshare and how to stop oversharing, what will you start to do differently?
And hey, even when you start to implement any of these, the urge to overshare may not automatically go away. Just don’t beat yourself up if you find that you keep oversharing in your conversations.
Keep implementing these strategies, and with time, everything will settle in, and you’ll start to stick to your healthy boundaries.
