The Light At The Other End Of OCD

Not everything we think and feel is true or real.

People with OCD know what I mean, your worst nightmares play on repeat in your mind’s eye, pushing you to ask, what does this mean?

(Spoiler: the answer is nothing).

Some thoughts ask for attention and then say that to conceive of evil is to be evil.

If this was true, then what is fiction?

Imagine with me that our minds are a channel we censor. We reflect on our musings, on the sparkle of an idea, on just the faintest hint of an idea of a musing.

They swirl and bounce off each other creating something new, these hopes, worries, memories, night dreams, and day dreams.

And we react to it. We decide what’s ours and what’s not.

But for people with OCD, at the faintest hint in our minds eye of something we don’t like, we say that it is bad and that we are bad for thinking it. And so our brain lights up and says “woah, what a strong reaction, let me try that again,” and so your imagination escalates and creates a torturous cycle of what if what if what if that and oh no oh no oh no and I’m awful I’m awful I’m awful.

Maybe trying to gain control you attempt to make this go away by locking the door three times just to be sure

Someone won’t break in, or analyze and replay a thought to make sure you don’t want something bad to happen. And hey, aligning my physical world in utter perfection makes my brain feel more calm and controlled.

But this makes the cycle stronger.

So you forget that this is your nightmare that doesn’t reflect you, and you forget that you uniquely censor thoughts before they are complete, and you forget that you care more than most people do.

That’s the key. It’s what we say and do by way of our conscious mind that’s true.

You are not a monster for having OCD, in fact, you probably care more than most.

And maybe the bright side is that you realize it is not enough to stop at a mind’s picture of peace and love. That your imagination swims to the lowest depths, but can also soar to the highest skies. It is the conception that we choose to make real, that is a reflection of us.