The Aperture Coaching Blog: How to Stop Overthinking and Start Living Well

Helen Barnes
Sep 5
3 min read

Updated: Oct 17

Helen Barnes sitting on sofa with coffee cup — A space for you

Welcome to the Aperture Coaching blog.

This space is for you - the high-performing professional who carries a lot, cares deeply, and wants to thrive without sacrificing your health and happiness along the way.

Here, I’ll be sharing insights, reflections, and practical strategies on how to stop overthinking, avoid burnout, build resilience, create more balance and embed sustainable success. My aim is simple: to help you create the clarity, calm, and control you need to feel good about your work and your life.

Why Talk About Burnout?

If you're feeling exhausted, overwhelmed, and struggling to switch off - chances are you might be somewhere on the road to Burnout.

Burnout isn’t just about feeling tired or needing a holiday. It’s a state of deep exhaustion - emotional, mental, and physical - that builds up over time when the pressure outweighs the recovery.

It often shows up subtly at first: constant fatigue, sharper edges of irritability, or a creeping sense of disconnection from the work you once cared about. Overthinking can set in, leading to overwhelm and exhaustion. Decisions become harder to make and it can start to impact our home life and how we feel about ourselves. Left unchecked, it can lead to serious consequences for our health, relationships, and performance.

But I'm not Burnt out - I'm Just Tired (and Need to Stop Overthinking)!

Here's the thing. I call myself a Burnout Coach - but none of my clients are actually burnt out.

It's true! Because if they were, they wouldn't be unable to function and they would need medical or at least therapeutic support. I'm the before and after.

I'm not here to diagnose or label. All I know, is that full Burnout is not a happy place to be, and not an easy place to come back from. If we can avoid it, we should. We need to be looking out for the signs and putting some guardrails in place so that Burnout never has a chance to materialise.

Studies show that up to 90% of us have experienced extreme or prolonged stress in the past year, and that a high percentage are also showing signs of burnout. This is not a blip, this is an emergency. Burnout is a ticking timebomb sat under most desks in most offices in the land. So whether or not you resonate with the term 'burnout' barely matters - the point is that more and more professionals are feeling under pressure at work.

Why Wellbeing Matters

Prevention is always better than cure. When we make wellbeing a non-negotiable - not as an afterthought, but as the foundation of success - everything else shifts. We make better decisions. We recover faster from setbacks. We show up with more energy, clarity, and purpose.

And the good news? Sustainable wellbeing isn’t about radical overhauls. It’s about small, consistent choices - setting boundaries, finding moments to reset, noticing early warning signs, and giving yourself permission to prioritise your own needs.