How do you go about an important decision—where to go to church, what job to take, where to move, who to marry? When I was interviewing for pastoral positions toward the end of seminary, every step after every interview was always, “Take some time to pray about it.”

I love a good ponder. Whether it’s eyes up to the midnight sky, gulping down drafts of galaxy from the clear and cloudless evenings, or pen-planting rows of thought along my journal, I love thinking and reflecting and meditating. When I first began writing as a craft, I started a blog titled “Prone to Wonder.” Ah, what a ragamuffin soul, (if I don’t say so myself).

But there are risks to the hobby of introspection. Thinking about things is good in principle, but thinking about thinking can quickly bleed into psychological scab-picking. In the worst moments, to spelunk too far down the cavern of introspection can erode one’s epistemological confidence entirely. (Thankfully, a friend has helped us by thinking out loud on the subject.)

So at the risk of scratching an itch better left alone, I’d like to think a little about our thinking. My life story, boiled down to a haiku for convenience, will serve as our outline:

Once, I overthought

Then, I was underthinking

Better now, I think

Two Scripture truths serve well as shoes to clod our feet to plod the path of wisdom. The first extols the prescience of providence, the other upholds the precedent of prudence. They are both proverbs.

Here is the first.

Better than Overthinking

Trust in the LORD with all your heart,

and do not lean on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge him,

and he will make straight your paths. (Prov 3:5–6)

I love this passage. Practically, it means “going Godward,” asking the Lord for help, deciding in relation to the divine. Philosophically, it means epistemological humility and contentment. I cannot know everything, so I cannot understand everything. But I can know God truly, and understand him truly, so I can trust him with what I don’t know—and with what I do. Spiritually, these lines have a gospel shape. They prepare me to cling to God and his path, even when he takes a different direction than I’d expect. Truly, his thoughts are not ours, and his ways are higher: he is merciful to sinners (see Isa 55:6–9).

I needed this wisdom when I was a solipsistic college student obsessed with my own development, preoccupied with measuring spiritual progression, and always casting my imagination into postulations about the future. When I was incessantly “prone to wonder” about future jobs, future cities, future family, I needed to be told,

“Stop overthinking everything. You won’t know till you get there, and then you will, but not before. Trust in the Lord. Honor him, and get on with it.”

That’s a good word. Especially for a college student.

And … if the only way you correct the habit of overthinking is by thinking less, you’ll be riding the bike of life lacking one pedal. Proverbial wisdom speaks clearest in conversation, and the wisdom of Proverbs is in the whole picture. So we need another text to foil this one lest we pedal over the precipice of underthinking.

Better than Underthinking

By itself, the single-pedal of Proverbs 3:5–6 could take us too far into the inscrutability of God’s wisdom. We might, from the joy of our emancipation from ego, reject all reflection. Dash those dastardly diversions of decision-making, I’m living by faith henceforth! So, “lean not on your own understanding” translates to “lean not on any understanding.” But this is only a half-step toward spiritual adulthood.

This is not merely a potential overreaction to overthinking. It is an entire mood that dominates Christian communities, masquerading as maturity while perpetuating the opposite.

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