Is it okay to use "overworked" instead of "was overworking"? Is there any difference?
Native speaker’s answer
Rebecca
"Was overworking" is past continuous tense. So "I was overworking it" means that he was in the process of "overworking" in the past, but it was never done because it got interrupted or he was just never done working. In contrast, "overworked" is simply past tense. If you replaced "was overworking" with "overworked" here this would imply that in the past when he was overworking, or working too hard, he had finished working. In this case, the meaning doesn't change too much if you were to use "overworked", however, the nuance is slightly different because of the different tense. Usually the differences between past continuous tense and past tense have more of an impact on the meaning of a sentence, so it is good to be aware of these tenses. Here's another example of past continuous tense versus past tense: Ex: I was doing my homework before dinner. Ex: I did my homework before dinner. The first sentence shows that the person was not finished with their homework before dinner, while the second expresses that they had already finished doing their homework before dinner.
