metacognition and extreme self-awareness

In simple terms, we can define metacognition as "thinking about one's thinking". It's about being aware of the thinking process and acclaiming one as a thinker and learner. Metacognition is something people do every day, sometimes even without meaning to. For example, I sometimes reminisce about how different my lifestyle, state of mind, and thinking are different from a year ago. Right now, I'm even thinking about different thoughts in my head about the phrasing and structuring of this passage!

During metacognition, you're self-evaluating and analysing your thoughts, you're assessing and trying to understand everything that's going on in your head. It's a form of self-awareness. Metacognition has its benefits yes, you can work on yourself and try improving your way of thinking to bring about a positive change to you and your surroundings. For example, you just ate a snack and now you need to dispose of the waste from it. You immediately think of throwing it into the street, but you can think of your idea for a second, decide if it is right for the environment and decide the best plan of course. We are all aware that it is not okay to litter and now because your self-awareness comes into play, you can choose to throw the trash into the recycle bin which is a better option for the environment.

Small and better changes can be made with the way you think with the help of metacognition.

However, for some people, it's quite the opposite. It is a well-known fact that too much self-awareness is harmful and it applies to metacognition too! People start overthinking every word, every action, every thought that can cause more harm than good. This is usually connected to mental health disorders. We can now derive a knowledge question here

"to what extent do excessive metacognitive behaviour affect a person's well being"

Internal self-awareness is a metacognitive process in which people are aware of their own aspects (eg seeing your own face in the mirror). External self-awareness is a metacognitive process in which we become aware of how we appear to others. Paying too much attention to each of these causes issues such as anxiety, and even Obsessive-compulsive Disorder! There are even studies being performed to show connections between schizophrenia and metacognition.

On the other hand, I found a paper online where there's a psychological treatment called "metacognitive therapy" used to treat patients with OCD, based on a metacognitive model. To conclude, I can say that metacognition is a good thing when utilised correctly. It allows for improvement and even for treatment!