Overthinking therapy Copenhagen
Help to step out of the loop and back into your life
I help you hear what the thinking is covering, so your mind can rest
- Last updated October 18, 2026
What I want you to know about a mind that will not stop
In this short video, I explain why thinking harder rarely ends the loop, and what begins to change when you turn towards the feeling underneath it.
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At a glance
Overthinking therapy Copenhagen helps you when your mind keeps turning the same decisions, conversations and what-ifs over and over, long after thinking has stopped being useful. Sessions are individual, a 1-hour appointment with 50 minutes of therapy, held in English or Danish at my practice in central Copenhagen or online.
I help you see what the loop is doing for you, which feeling it keeps at a distance and where the habit of thinking instead of feeling began. Then we work on stepping out of it in real situations. Overthinking is one form of anxiety therapy, within my wider psychotherapy.
Try not to weigh this step for too long. Book a session, ask for a free discovery call, glance at my client policy or drop me a line, and let one of those be enough.
Is this the right page for you?
This is for you if…
Overthinking therapy Copenhagen is for adults whose mind keeps circling and will not let a question rest. You may be thoughtful, capable and good at your work, yet you spend hours analysing choices, replaying conversations and preparing for things that may never happen. You want a quieter mind and a way back into your own life.
- You replay a conversation from lunch for the rest of the day, trying out better answers you will never get to use.
- You lie in bed at night running through tomorrow in detail, and the plan never feels finished enough to let you sleep.
- You can spend a whole weekend deciding between 2 sofas, 2 flats or 2 jobs, and still feel unsure once you have chosen.
- You draft a short message several times, reread it after sending and then wonder for hours how it was received.
- You ask friends for their opinion on the same question again and again, and their answers settle you only briefly.
- You notice that you are rarely fully present, because part of you is always somewhere else, analysing what just happened.
- You have read about overthinking, tried journaling and to-do lists, and can explain your loops better than anyone else.
- You are tired of living mostly in your head and want to feel your life rather than keep commenting on it.
This is probably not for you if…
Some forms of thinking too much belong to a different problem, and then a more specific kind of help fits better. If one of these sounds more like you, the page linked will suit you better.
- Your worry is broad and physical, and the looping thoughts are only one part of it. → anxiety therapy
- Sudden surges of fear in your body, with a pounding heart and breathlessness, are your main problem. → panic attack therapy
- Your replaying is almost always about how you came across to other people. → social anxiety therapy
- The loop is driven by high standards and a fear of getting anything wrong. → perfectionism therapy
- Overthinking is a small part of a wider wish to understand yourself and your life. → psychotherapy
- You have a decision to make this week and need help quickly, not a course of sessions. → acute psychotherapy
- The thoughts that frighten you arrive uninvited and feel shocking or alien, rather than endless analysis. → intrusive thoughts therapy
- You are in immediate danger, or you are thinking about ending your life. Please call 112, or 1813 for urgent mental health help in the Capital Region.
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Client reviews
The reviews shown here are shared by clients who have worked with me in therapy and chosen to reflect on their experience. They are collected via Google and displayed through an independent verification service, offering an open and transparent picture of how my work is experienced.
Mark’s view
“In my clinical experience, people who overthink are rarely short of thoughts. They are short of permission to feel. The loop feels like problem-solving, but very often it is a way of standing guard over a feeling you would rather not have. Under the endless analysis I hear ‘What if I get this wrong and they lose interest in me?’ and, close beside it, ‘If I work it out alone, I will not have to ask anyone for anything.’ Sometimes it is ‘I want you to help me decide, but please do not tell me what to do.’ You cannot think your way out of a feeling. When you let yourself feel it, the thinking usually quietens by itself.”
Mark Colclough, MA, psychotherapist and EFT couples therapist
Meet Mark, psychotherapist and EFT couples therapist
I am Mark Colclough, MA, a psychotherapist and EFT couples therapist specialising in expats and international couples. I work in English and Danish, from my practice in central Copenhagen and online.
Practising since 2004, I bring a bicultural perspective to work with individuals and couples across languages and cultural contexts. My work integrates depth-oriented psychotherapy with approaches such as integral psychotherapy, Gestalt therapy, Jungian psychoanalysis, and object relations theory. I also have specialist training in attachment theory, narcissism, and borderline personality disorder.
For support with life between cultures, explore expat psychotherapy or expat couples therapy. My practice is supported by ongoing training and supervision. To read more about my background, training, and approach, visit About me.
The importance of supervision
Good therapy begins with good supervision
I regularly meet with experienced senior psychotherapists in Denmark and abroad to reflect on my work, challenge my thinking, and continue developing my skills. This ongoing process supports the quality of my individual and couples therapy, helping me offer thoughtful, ethical, and effective care.
My focus is simple: excellence, integrity, and impact.
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You are welcome to get in touch. We can clarify what’s the right therapy for you.
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A typical situation
Tomás is 41, an engineer who moved to Copenhagen for a job 5 years ago. He and his partner have been looking for a flat for 8 months. He has a spreadsheet with 40 columns. Every viewing ends with him awake until 2 in the morning, comparing heating costs and commuting times. He has turned down 3 good offers, and each time felt relief, then dread. His partner has started saying she will choose without him.
I would not start with the spreadsheet. I would ask Tomás what he imagines feeling the morning after he signs, and listen for the fear that lives there. In a first session like this, people often discover that the analysis is protecting them from something much older than the decision in front of them.
I have presented this clinical example as a compound of 22 years of clinical practice.
This is when you need overthinking therapy with me
You have tried to think your way to peace, and your mind has only grown louder.
There is no single right time or right reason to come to therapy for overthinking. If your mind is taking up more of your day than your life is, if you keep losing sleep to the same questions, or if the people close to you have started to feel shut out by your thinking, that is reason enough. You do not need a diagnosis, a tidy explanation or a crisis before you come to see me. In more than 22 years of practice, I have sat with many people whose minds would not stop, and I recognise when a thoughtful habit has become a loop that needs professional attention.
My professional view is that overthinking is rarely about the thing you are thinking about. I will help you identify what the loop is doing, what keeps it running and what needs to change for it to loosen. Read the 6 questions below once, without analysing your answers, and notice which ones land.
Do you spend more time going over your life than living it?
If you do, it is time to act. Overthinking quietly eats your days. You walk home from a dinner and spend the evening reviewing every sentence you said. You sit down to make a simple choice and an hour disappears. Your body stays tense because it is always half braced for the result of a calculation that never ends. People may tell you that you seem distracted, and they are right: part of you is always somewhere else.
I would look at when the loops are strongest, what kind of question sets them off and whether they ease when life is calm or keep going regardless. That tells us whether you are thinking hard under temporary pressure or living inside a pattern that will not ease by itself. If this sounds familiar, book a session with me and we will look at your loop together.
Do you want an answer and dread having one?
Many overthinkers do, and both wishes make sense. One part of you longs for a decision, a conclusion, an end to the loop. Another part fears what an answer would bring: a door closing, a loss, a responsibility you would have to carry. So you keep the question open. You gather more information, ask one more person, wait for one more sign. The not-deciding feels safer than either choice, even though it wears you out.
I do not treat the cautious part of you as the enemy. In psychosynthesis, we work with these parts of you as inner figures, each with something to say and something to protect. I help you hear what the part that wants to decide is reaching for and what the part that keeps the question open is guarding against. When both are heard, you can choose more deliberately and live with your choice afterwards.
Do you keep reading messages again to check what they really meant?
Many people who overthink do this, especially with people who matter to them. A short reply, a missing emoji, a pause on a phone call, and your mind sets off. You reread the thread, compare it with earlier messages and build theories about what has changed. You may draft a careful question to find out, then delete it because asking feels too exposed. Until you know where you stand, you cannot settle.
Your wish to feel sure of the people you love is legitimate, and I will not shame it. What I help you notice is the moment uncertainty turns into an alarm, often long before there is any real sign of trouble. Underneath the checking there is usually an old fear of being dropped or of not mattering enough. We work on calming that alarm and on asking directly for what you need, rather than trying to read it from the evidence.
Do you reach out for advice and then shut it out once you get it?
Yes, many overthinkers swing like this, and it can puzzle the people around you. You call a friend in a spin and ask what they would do. The moment they answer, you feel pressured, find reasons it would not work, or go quiet and end the call. You want someone to share the weight, and you also fear being steered, judged or proved wrong. Afterwards you feel more alone with the question than before.
I help you slow this sequence down in the room, so we can see exactly where wanting help turns into pushing it away. Often it is the moment another person seems to take the decision from you, or to see your uncertainty too clearly. I have real compassion for that protection. I will also ask you to notice what it costs your friendships, and help you find ways to ask for company in your thinking without handing over or defending the whole question.
Do you disappear into your head when people want more of you?
For many people, thinking is a place to hide. When a partner wants to talk about feelings, when a colleague is upset or when a family gathering gets emotional, you retreat into analysis. You become calm, reasonable and slightly far away. You explain, you summarise, you work out what is going on, and somehow you are no longer really in the room. It feels like control. To the other person it can feel like being shut out.
My view is that this distance usually protects something important, and I will not shame your need for space or quiet. I help you understand what it shields you from, so you can stay present a little longer without feeling flooded. You learn to say “I need to think about this and come back to you” and then actually come back. Thinking is not the problem. Thinking in place of being there usually is.
Have you lost touch with what you actually want under all the thinking?
This is common after years of overthinking. If every choice has to pass through a long internal committee meeting, the quiet voice of what you want gets drowned out. You may know what is sensible, what others expect and what would be easiest to defend, and still have no idea what you would choose if nobody were watching. That can feel empty and a little frightening. It does not mean you have no self. It means your self has been outvoted for a long time.
I help you find that quieter voice again. That often means looking at where you learned that your own wishes needed to be justified, checked or kept hidden, sometimes in your family and sometimes in the generations before it. I will challenge you when you argue yourself out of what you feel, and I will not hand you an answer. The aim is to know more clearly what matters to you and what kind of life fits you.
If you recognise your own loops in these questions, request a free call to talk it through, or book a session if you are ready to start.
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What overthinking therapy with me will help you do
Understanding why you overthink is a start, but the work has to change how you decide, rest and meet people.
Overthinking therapy with me will help you understand what your mind is doing when it loops, see the pattern that keeps it going and make changes you notice in your evenings, your choices and your relationships. Many overthinkers arrive with a great deal of insight already. That is part of the problem. More analysis of the analysis rarely helps.
In more than 22 years of practice, I have learned that the work moves when I take an active role. I will not simply listen while you think out loud. I will interrupt the loop, tell you what I notice and bring you back to what you feel. These 6 questions describe what we work towards.
How will I help you find what the overthinking is really about?
I help you separate the loop from what it is circling. The flat, the email, the comment at the meeting are rarely the real subject. Underneath them, you will usually find a feeling the thinking is designed to manage: fear of regret, a dread of disappointing someone, shame about getting things wrong, or grief about a choice that cannot be undone. Once that feeling has a name, the thinking loses much of its urgency.
I bring structure to this. I tell you what I think the loop protects, which questions deserve real attention and which explanations keep you stuck, such as “I just like to be thorough”. I work with the body as well as the mind, because a racing head usually sits on top of a tense body. When you are ready, book a session with me and we will start tracing it.
How can you catch the loop before it carries you off?
You can learn to notice the moment a thought turns into a loop, and that is where change starts. There is usually a recognisable first step: a sense of unease, a question that starts with “what if”, a pull to check your phone or open a new browser tab. Then the familiar spiral follows. When you can feel that first step, you gain a small pause in which you can choose something else.
In sessions, I help you slow the sequence down until you can see each link: the trigger, the feeling it stirs, the first thought and the urge to solve it at once. Recognition alone is not enough. We practise a different response, such as naming the feeling, putting the question down for a set time or acting on a good-enough answer, until it works for you at your desk on an ordinary afternoon.
How can you settle your mind when it starts racing?
Settling your mind does not mean emptying it or forcing thoughts away. It means staying present enough to notice what is happening and choose how to respond. A racing mind is usually a body on alert. If you only argue with the thoughts, the alert stays on. My article on how to stop overthinking describes some of this in more detail.
I help you recognise the physical signs of the loop earlier and understand what your nervous system is bracing for. We find simple ways of bringing you back into your body and the present moment that fit your life. I will also be clear that this needs daily practice between sessions. A few minutes each day will do more than any single insight in the room.
How can you say what you think without rehearsing it first?
Speaking more freely starts with knowing what you actually feel and need, rather than what you have prepared to say. Overthinkers often rehearse important conversations for days, then either deliver a polished speech that leaves out the real point or never have the conversation at all. Fear of being misunderstood, of sounding foolish or of upsetting someone keeps the words inside your head.
I help you find words that are honest, specific and in proportion to the situation. I will challenge you when you over-prepare to avoid the risk of being seen, and also when you expect other people to guess what you meant from what you left out. We often practise real conversations in the room, so that you can speak in the moment and trust yourself to repair it if it goes wrong.
How can you make a decision and stop reopening it?
Decisions become possible when you separate what you know and value from fear, habit, obligation and the hope of a perfect option. Overthinking treats every choice as if it could be made risk-free with enough information. It never can. So the question stays open, and leaving it open becomes a decision of its own.
I help you look at your realistic options, what each one would ask of you and what you can live with. I will give you my professional view, and I will point it out when you are using analysis to avoid choosing. I will not choose for you. If your standards are what keep the question open, perfectionism therapy looks at that pattern more closely.
What does life look like when your mind no longer runs the show?
Lasting change has to be felt outside the therapy room. The test is whether you can leave a party without reviewing it all night, send an email and move on, or choose a holiday without a week of research. You may need new habits around your phone and your evenings, clearer limits on how long a decision may take, and relationships where you can think out loud without being judged.
Together we separate the careful thinking worth keeping from the circling that only wears you out. Your ability to think carefully is a real gift, and the goal is not to take it from you. The goal is that you use your mind rather than being used by it, and that your choices follow what matters to you, not the loudest worry of the day.
You can also send me an email
What happens when you begin overthinking therapy with me
You do not need to have worked out your thinking before you come. I begin with what is looping now and what you want to change.
When you begin, I listen carefully, help you name the loop that costs you most and give the work a clear direction from the first session. Many overthinkers prepare for their first session in great detail. You do not need to. I do not expect a diagnosis, a theory of your mind or your full history in order.
Overthinking therapy is a focused form of psychotherapy, structured individual work in which we look at your inner life and your relationships together. If your thinking mostly circles your relationship and your partner is willing to take part, couples therapy offers long-term relational development and healing. If you can see this will be a longer piece of work, my therapy discounts and bundles lower the cost and settle the plan once, so there is one fewer thing to keep reconsidering.
What happens in our first session about overthinking?
In our first session, I ask what brought you now, which loops take up most of your time, what you have already tried and what you hope will be different. I ask you for one recent example, in detail, because a single real loop tells us more than a general description. Your full history can come later, once we have seen one loop clearly.
By the end, I give you my first understanding of what the thinking is protecting and propose a direction. You decide whether my way of working feels useful. If you would rather ask your questions before committing to a session, book a free 30-minute discovery call.
When is individual psychotherapy the right choice for overthinking?
Individual work is right when the loop lives mainly in you: in how you decide, how you rest, how you handle uncertainty and how you protect yourself from feeling. That is true for most overthinking, even when it is often about other people. We can explore your relationships closely without anyone else needing to come.
Working with you alone, I keep hold of the thread between sessions, steer us back when we drift into analysis and tell you honestly when a clever argument is just another loop. If you want to look at your life more broadly, with overthinking as one theme among several, Psychotherapy Copenhagen describes my structured individual work as a whole.
When is couples therapy a better choice than working on overthinking alone?
Couples therapy is worth choosing instead when your thinking has settled on the relationship and the relationship is what most needs the work. If your overthinking mostly circles your partner, if the 2 of you keep having the same argument about decisions, or if one of you analyses while the other withdraws, the pattern lives between you as well as inside you. Then working on it together often helps more.
In couples work, I help you both see the cycle you are caught in, take responsibility for your own part and build steadier ways of being together. That is more than settling one disagreement. Couples therapy Copenhagen is long-term relational development and healing, and some people work on their overthinking alone first and turn to couples work later.
How often should you come for overthinking therapy?
The right pace depends on how much the loops cost you, how much room you have in your life and how much continuity the work needs. Overthinking tends to fill any gap with more analysis, so long breaks between sessions often let the old habit take over again. Shorter gaps keep the work alive.
My recommendation is to begin weekly, or every second week if weekly is not possible. I will tell you honestly if sessions are too far apart for anything to build, and when the work is ready to become less frequent. If you prefer to work on one decision in a concentrated way, back-to-back psychotherapy over a few days is also possible.
When does a bundle make sense for overthinking therapy?
A bundle makes sense when you know the work will take several sessions and you want continuity instead of deciding after each appointment whether to continue. For an overthinker, that decision alone can become another loop. A planned course takes it off the table and leaves your attention for the work itself.
You also pay less per session with a bundle. Rather than researching it for days, ask me, and I will give you my honest view of whether a bundle fits the loops you want to work on. There are only a few options, set out on therapy discounts and bundles and in the cards a little further down.
How will we know when overthinking therapy has done its job?
Therapy has done its job when the loops have lost their grip enough that you can carry on without the same support. You will still think carefully. The difference is that you can stop, decide, sleep and be present with people, and you can tell when your mind is helping and when it is circling.
We take stock openly at agreed points, and I have no interest in keeping you in therapy longer than it helps. Once your mind is working for you again, we can meet less often, pause or bring the sessions to an end. Returning one day with a fresh question would not cancel out what you gained, so there is no need to analyse that in advance either.
How it works with me
- Choose a free 30-minute call or go straight to booking your first session, whichever takes less deliberation. You only need to write a line or 2 about what your mind keeps circling.
- In the first session we spend a 1-hour appointment with 50 minutes of therapy together, one to one, in English or Danish, at Møntergade 4 in central Copenhagen or over video. Free times appear on every day of the week, between 08:00 and 21:00 Copenhagen time, subject to availability.
- We usually meet weekly at first. Between sessions, you try one small agreed change, such as making a decision within a set time, and bring back what happened.
- Every few sessions, we look honestly at whether the loops are loosening. Then you and I settle whether to continue as we are, meet less often or stop, and we make that call once, not every week.
- If you expect several sessions, a therapy bundle saves you 10 per cent and gives you a clear plan from the start, with no new decision after each session. You can see the bundles just below.
Save with a prepaid session bundle
How the bundle works
- Current bundle savings are shown on the Pricing page.
- Your bundle is valid for 180 days from the date of purchase.
- The bundle can only be used for the type of session stated on your invoice.
- If you request a refund, sessions already used are recalculated at the standard single-session price.
- The administration fee applied to a bundle refund is shown on the Pricing page.
- VAT follows the type of therapy included in the bundle: VAT-exempt sessions remain VAT exempt, while VAT-liable sessions include applicable VAT.
Compare with nearby options
Not sure overthinking therapy is the right starting point? Here is how it compares with the options people with a busy mind most often consider.
| Option | Choose it when | Pace |
|---|---|---|
| Overthinking therapy (this page) | Your mind loops on decisions, conversations and what-ifs, and will not let go. | Weekly 1-hour sessions at first |
| Anxiety therapy | Worry and tension run through your body and your days, not only your thoughts. | Weekly 1-hour sessions at first |
| Intrusive thoughts therapy | Unwanted, disturbing thoughts arrive suddenly and frighten you. | Regular 1-hour sessions |
| Perfectionism therapy | Your loops come from high standards and a fear of getting things wrong. | A focused course of 1-hour sessions |
Frequently asked questions
What is overthinking therapy with you?
Overthinking therapy with me is individual psychotherapy for adults whose minds keep circling decisions, conversations and worries long after thinking has stopped helping. Rather than only teaching you techniques to stop thoughts, it helps you understand what the loop protects you from and where the habit began. It takes place in English or Danish, face to face in central Copenhagen or online.
I work in depth, with the whole person: your feelings, your body, your relationships and what you learned in your family about mistakes and uncertainty. Overthinking therapy is a specific branch of anxiety therapy, which in turn is part of my psychotherapy.
When should I come to you about overthinking?
Come when your thinking is costing you sleep, presence, decisions or closeness, or when people you love have started to feel shut out by it. There is no need to hold out until the thinking has worn you down completely. Your own sense that your mind has taken over is reason enough.
In more than 22 years of practice, I have learned to look at how long the loops have been there, how many areas of life they now reach and what you have stopped doing because of them. If you have tried hard for months and the loop keeps winning, it deserves proper attention. My article on how to stop overthinking is a good place to begin reading.
Can you really help me stop overthinking?
Yes, often I can help you overthink much less, though not by switching your mind off. I cannot promise how fast it will change, and I do not offer quick fixes. What changes is your relationship to the loop: you notice it sooner, understand what it is doing and step out of it more often.
In my clinical experience, the people who change most are those who become curious about the feeling under the thinking rather than the content of the thoughts. That is where I would focus with you.
Is overthinking just my personality?
Partly, perhaps, but not in the way you fear. A careful, reflective mind may well be part of who you are. The loop that will not let you rest is usually something you learned, often because thinking ahead once kept you safe, and what has been learned can change.
I help you tell the difference between the thoughtfulness you want to keep and the habit that wears you out. We look at where the habit began, what it protected then and whether it still needs to protect you now. You keep your mind. You lose some of its tyranny.
Why do I overthink most about the people closest to me?
Because they matter most. When someone is important to you, any sign of distance can feel like a threat. Some people respond by checking, asking and needing to know where they stand. Others pull back and analyse privately, so they never have to ask. Many do both, depending on the day.
I help you recognise which way you tend to move, what it is trying to achieve and what it costs you and the other person. Then we work on steadier options: asking directly, tolerating not knowing for a while and settling yourself without needing to solve the relationship tonight.
What will we do in the first session?
We start with one real loop from the past week. I ask what set it off, what you thought, what you felt in your body and what you did. I also ask a little about your history, because overthinking usually has a past. Before the session ends, I tell you what I think the loop is protecting and where I suggest we begin.
You do not need to prepare, even if part of you wants to. We can start with whatever you bring. Pick one and stop there: book your first session, or start with a free discovery call.
How many sessions will I need for overthinking?
My recommendation is to plan for a course of sessions over a few months, usually weekly at first, rather than one or 2 conversations. That is often enough to understand your loop and start changing it in daily life. When the circling goes back to childhood, or is bound up with painful earlier experiences, it usually takes more time.
Based on more than 22 years of practice, I would rather you commit to a clear first stretch and review it honestly than keep reconsidering after every session. At that review we look at which loops have loosened, and you and I agree whether to go on, slow the pace or finish.
Should I come in person or online?
Come in person if you can. For many overthinkers, being in the room with another person makes it harder to drift into the head and easier to stay with what is felt. Online sessions work well too, especially if you travel, live outside Copenhagen or have little time, and they last just as long.
The work itself is the same psychotherapy either way, offered in English or Danish. If you are unsure, we can decide on a free call. Please do not spend a week thinking about it.
What does overthinking therapy with you cost?
Overthinking therapy follows the same format as all my individual work, a 1-hour appointment with 50 minutes of therapy. What a session costs today is listed on my prices page. Payment is by invoice and bank transfer.
A bundle takes 10 per cent off and spares you the decision about whether to come back after each session. There are only a few bundle sizes to choose between, all on therapy discounts and bundles. Pay on the same day by transfer from a Danish bank account, and a further 3 per cent comes off.
How do I start overthinking therapy with you?
Go ahead and book your first session, or choose a free 30-minute discovery call if you would like to ask a few questions out loud first. A short note about what your mind keeps circling is enough.
If you cannot find a time that suits you, contact me directly. Then book the session, and let the first decision be a simple one.
You can also send me an email
My approach and values
My mission
My mission is to help individuals, couples and families rediscover connection, communicate with understanding, and build a stronger, more loving relationship that can thrive through any challenge.
My vision
My vision is to create a world where every person in my therapy room feels supported, connected, and empowered to grow, and to step one step closer to your Self.
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Individual psychotherapy
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