What's the point?

[taurean]

1 hour ago, Paul92 said:

know worrying is pointless. It's just hard to stop worrying about the disappearance of things that make your life worth living. It's a terrible paradox.

I think the way to tackle this is maybe:

Without neutralising, steer focus towards enjoyment of what we have, can aim for, and just remember the cycle of life. My current friends range from small children to over 90s senior citizens. It gives me balance and hope. 

Learn some simple mindfulness techniques. Because my mindfulness-based CBT for OCD therapist steered me towards this, and it helps switch off obsessing and compulsing. 

Why so? 

She explained we do all of that in the active "doing" part of the brain, where our subconscious and conscious mind seeks answers. 

But when we switch into the benign "just being" part of the brain, and focus purely there, our mind is calm and just sensing the present the moment and immediate surroundings. 

Using this, and practising self-love and self-forgiveness, enabled me to learn how to break out of OCD repeating thought loops , and now - if I find myself tempted to engage with something OCD, I simply gently but firmly shift focus and, if necessary, slip into the mindful state. 

 

 

[Guest Paul92]

1 hour ago, taurean said:

I think the way to tackle this is maybe:

Without neutralising, steer focus towards enjoyment of what we have, can aim for, and just remember the cycle of life. My current friends range from small children to over 90s senior citizens. It gives me balance and hope. 

Learn some simple mindfulness techniques. Because my mindfulness-based CBT for OCD therapist steered me towards this, and it helps switch off obsessing and compulsing. 

Why so? 

She explained we do all of that in the active "doing" part of the brain, where our subconscious and conscious mind seeks answers. 

But when we switch into the benign "just being" part of the brain, and focus purely there, our mind is calm and just sensing the present the moment and immediate surroundings. 

Using this, and practising self-love and self-forgiveness, enabled me to learn how to break out of OCD repeating thought loops , and now - if I find myself tempted to engage with something OCD, I simply gently but firmly shift focus and, if necessary, slip into the mindful state. 

 

 

I've tried this approach, being mindful in everything that I do but I find it hard to stay there and I feel a bit zombie-like. Ill try again. I just want my old self back where I never really cared about too much. I feel weirdly spaced out and numb at the moment. 

I know I need to focus on what we can enjoy. But immediately I think how everything is meaningless if everything dies. Why are we trying to create a society? 

I've stopped Googling stuff. I'll try and put the work in again. I never thought I'd get past the solipsism theme but I pretty much have, so who knows. Not sure if this universe worry is a theme but I'll do the work.. 

[taurean]

1 hour ago, Paul92 said:

I've stopped Googling stuff. I'll try and put the work in again. I never thought I'd get past the solipsism theme but I pretty much have, so who knows. Not sure if this universe worry is a theme but I'll do the work.. 

That's the thing, all the best with this. 

Roy 

[Guest Paul92]

I'd still like to hear from anyone who has had similar existential obsessions. It just motivates me. 

A lot of this came on I think since I've been seeing this girl. I was in a bad place and then she came along and made moments in my life incredibly happy. Real ecstacy. 

I was sat at work and it hit me that one day she will be gone. But then I thought yes but her memory will live on for eternity. But of course, current predictions are that humans will become extinct.. I had to go to the toilet and just cried my eyes out. So perhaps it's attacking my fondness for her more than anything? 

There's an old couple I've known since I was born. They're in their 80s now. Recently, the husband has become seriously ill. It's likely he will pass soon. But at one point they were young together and they just lived as if they would live forever. And before they know it, they're old and going to be split apart. 

It's so cruel. 

Edited March 4, 2019 by Paul92

[Angst]

Life is finite therefore life is meaningless seems to be your mantra. So does this imply life is infinite therefore life is meaningful?

Edited March 4, 2019 by Angst

[Guest Paul92]

25 minutes ago, Angst said:

Life is finite therefore life is meaningless seems to be your mantra. So does this imply life is infinite therefore life is meaningful?

That's pretty much what I'm getting at. I know my life is finite. I've always accepted that. I just struggle to accept that the human race as a collective will one day out, as science seems to state. I can accept my death. I struggle with the death of my loved ones, but I was always comforted by the fact that their memory will live on with the future of humanity. But if we are going to die out it seems to make everything a bit pointless doesn't it? Why do we put effort into make a peaceful society when it'll all be gone, probably sooner than we think.. 

[Angst]

I pretty much doubt that the memory of most of the human population throughout human history lives on more than a generation or two or three or perhaps four.

Kings and people of note being the exception. For example the historical sites in Egypt.

Given the high infant mortality throughout human history how many babies are remembered through the generations?

Before widespread literacy and the recent invention of photographs or in some societies the relatively recent invention of individual graves and parish records, it was difficult to note, for successive generations, past humans.  

A member of the hunter gatherer extended family who died would only live in the human memory of those who knew him. Some names might be passed down through folk tales. A community of hunter gathers could be wiped out by disease, adverse weather, the killing of the hunters by animals or murder by a competing group.

There are a series of increasingly worse ecological disasters in store for us and the planet. The mass extinction of insects needed for food production. The enormous reduction in worms needed for soil health. Climate change. My answer would be political action to prolong the life of the planet and humans.

[taurean]

2 hours ago, Paul92 said:

A lot of this came on I think since I've been seeing this girl. I was in a bad place and then she came along and made moments in my life incredibly happy. Real ecstacy. 

I was sat at work and it hit me that one day she will be gone. But then I thought yes but her memory will live on for eternity. But of course, current predictions are that humans will become extinct.. I had to go to the toilet and just cried my eyes out. So perhaps it's attacking my fondness for her more than anything? 

Yep that would be it. OCD takes the things we love, enjoy - and tries to sabotage that. So hay  this is good , because we now know what the OCD core belief is which is underpinning this theme. Aka - "I love this girl, but what is the point if she and I will in due lourse become as if we were nothing?" Which has then led onto the catastrophic thinking, so typical of OCD. "Not only we, but my family and friends will be nothing. then - oh dear, the world, the solar system, the universe will be nothing".

Believe me Paul, sucking this out is good news. Because you can now see the pattern - the circle of distress, the "vicious flower diagram" for this theme of yours. And you can now look at ways to challenge the constituent parts, break up the wheel, refocus etc.

This is good therapy Paul the way it is working out. Now you know why you are thinking and feeling this way, and what you need to do.

 

[IntrusiveThoughts]

Just skim read this thread, so I do apologise if this has already been said or isn't relevant.

When I was deeply depressed a few years ago, I also had a lot of existential thoughts and I did a little reading and thinking around the subject. It is interesting, though distressing. Plenty of philosophers and scientists have also been interested in it enough to develop ideas around it. It's not invalid to be interested in it.

The problem is if you're thinking about it when you know it's harmful for you to do so. That's a kind of masochism. 

You will come to your own conclusions/comforting ideas. You will find an answer that satisfies you - through your lived experience. You will feel it, then eventually be able to put it into words, or read someone else's words and find that they fit what you've already felt. 

For me, having come out of such a serious depression, it made me appreciate a second chance at living. All life is impermanent - which is a reason to enjoy it now. You don't not turn up to a flipping awesome party just because it's going to be over in a few hours. You turn up, and enjoy as much of it as possible. 

[PolarBear]

4 hours ago, Paul92 said:

I'd still like to hear from anyone who has had similar existential obsessions. It just motivates me. 

A lot of this came on I think since I've been seeing this girl. I was in a bad place and then she came along and made moments in my life incredibly happy. Real ecstacy. 

I was sat at work and it hit me that one day she will be gone. But then I thought yes but her memory will live on for eternity. But of course, current predictions are that humans will become extinct.. I had to go to the toilet and just cried my eyes out. So perhaps it's attacking my fondness for her more than anything? 

There's an old couple I've known since I was born. They're in their 80s now. Recently, the husband has become seriously ill. It's likely he will pass soon. But at one point they were young together and they just lived as if they would live forever. And before they know it, they're old and going to be split apart. 

It's so cruel. 

Going over stuff like this, here on the forum and in your mind, is not helping you. It's actually making your situation worse.

[Guest Paul92]

2 hours ago, Angst said:

I pretty much doubt that the memory of most of the human population throughout human history lives on more than a generation or two or three or perhaps four.

Kings and people of note being the exception. For example the historical sites in Egypt.

Given the high infant mortality throughout human history how many babies are remembered through the generations?

Before widespread literacy and the recent invention of photographs or in some societies the relatively recent invention of individual graves and parish records, it was difficult to note, for successive generations, past humans.  

A member of the hunter gatherer extended family who died would only live in the human memory of those who knew him. Some names might be passed down through folk tales. A community of hunter gathers could be wiped out by disease, adverse weather, the killing of the hunters by animals or murder by a competing group.

There are a series of increasingly worse ecological disasters in store for us and the planet. The mass extinction of insects needed for food production. The enormous reduction in worms needed for soil health. Climate change. My answer would be political action to prolong the life of the planet and humans.

I know what you are saying. I still find it heartbreaking though. Time moves so fast too. The Romans would never have imagined mankind would ever reach 2019. But here we are. Then before we know it, it'll be Christmas again. So I worry that, in a way, we are already dead.. We can never imagine the universe coming to end as it seems to far away, but it WILL happen at some point. My mind just tells me that if something is guaranteed to happen, then it sort of already has! Which just turns my stomach.

I just do not know if this is even OCD. I really really don't.

 

1 hour ago, IntrusiveThoughts said:

Just skim read this thread, so I do apologise if this has already been said or isn't relevant.

When I was deeply depressed a few years ago, I also had a lot of existential thoughts and I did a little reading and thinking around the subject. It is interesting, though distressing. Plenty of philosophers and scientists have also been interested in it enough to develop ideas around it. It's not invalid to be interested in it.

The problem is if you're thinking about it when you know it's harmful for you to do so. That's a kind of masochism. 

You will come to your own conclusions/comforting ideas. You will find an answer that satisfies you - through your lived experience. You will feel it, then eventually be able to put it into words, or read someone else's words and find that they fit what you've already felt. 

For me, having come out of such a serious depression, it made me appreciate a second chance at living. All life is impermanent - which is a reason to enjoy it now. You don't not turn up to a flipping awesome party just because it's going to be over in a few hours. You turn up, and enjoy as much of it as possible. 

That makes sense. Just my head won't let this go. Trying to come to comforting conclusions is what my mind wants to do but it is so exhausting. I am really struggling. I feel like I won't be able to come to a conclusion, which makes me feel really sick.

 

34 minutes ago, PolarBear said:

Going over stuff like this, here on the forum and in your mind, is not helping you. It's actually making your situation worse.

But is this even fueled by OCD or have I just properly realised a truth and I can't deal with it?

 

2 hours ago, taurean said:

Yep that would be it. OCD takes the things we love, enjoy - and tries to sabotage that. So hay  this is good , because we now know what the OCD core belief is which is underpinning this theme. Aka - "I love this girl, but what is the point if she and I will in due lourse become as if we were nothing?" Which has then led onto the catastrophic thinking, so typical of OCD. "Not only we, but my family and friends will be nothing. then - oh dear, the world, the solar system, the universe will be nothing".

Believe me Paul, sucking this out is good news. Because you can now see the pattern - the circle of distress, the "vicious flower diagram" for this theme of yours. And you can now look at ways to challenge the constituent parts, break up the wheel, refocus etc.

This is good therapy Paul the way it is working out. Now you know why you are thinking and feeling this way, and what you need to do.

 

I know it does. It used to do it in my first relationship. At the time, I loved that girl. And I used to break down confessing every single thought I had that I thought was unfair to her etc. I couldn't bear it. If I walked past another girl in the street and thought she was attractive, I felt like I had murdered someone. It broke my heart. The girl I am seeing now is such a wonderful human being. As I say, she has made my life so much more interesting and exciting. But at the same time, all these thoughts about her one day passing, and her memory, breaks my heart. To the point where I really want to believe in some sort of God or deity to just give me some comfort.

Every time I try and just ignore it and live like I normally would, it just follows me in everything that I do. Every single thing. Right now I have a documentary on the TV. But my mind just says, why do we try and learn things, when we're all going to become extinct? Surely, this is just a genuine concern...

[taurean]

37 minutes ago, Paul92 said:

Every time I try and just ignore it and live like I normally would, it just follows me in everything that I do. Every single thing. Right now I have a documentary on the TV. But my mind just says, why do we try and learn things, when we're all going to become extinct? Surely, this is just a genuine concern...

No it's not a genuine concern. It's a focused negative obsessional thought. 

Look back at what I said, and stop listening to the intrusions when they come. 

Because you are giving belief to them they gain strength, become more frequent. 

 

[bruces]

On 01/03/2019 at 12:18, Paul92 said:

Has anyone ever struggled with/overcome obsessions surrounding what is the point of life, if we all die? My argument was always, yes, but we are doing out bit to create a better world for everyone to live in for the next generations.

But then I had the thought that the universe is predicted to end one day. Everything as we know it will be gone, along with the memories etc.

If the universe went on infinitely, I could accept dying. Because then I'd be doing my bit and in a way I and my loved ones would live on forever. Which is a beautiful thought. But science tells us this is unlikely.

Everything we love and everyone we love, will be gone one day.

Trying my best to not think about it... but everything seems pointless at the moment. Why do anything is one day it'll all be gone and nobody or no thing will ever remember it?

Is this even OCD? My enitre body just feels totally numb.

I think like this a lot too it drives me to the brink of insanity,I try to imagine a world where nobody dies or ages and nobody gets sick but that is t the world we live in. 

I think the problem is,as a species we know our fate from an incredibly young age,I often wonder if animals too know their fate or they just do what they do? 

Its mind blowing 

[IntrusiveThoughts]

1 hour ago, Paul92 said:

That makes sense. Just my head won't let this go. Trying to come to comforting conclusions is what my mind wants to do but it is so exhausting. I am really struggling. I feel like I won't be able to come to a conclusion, which makes me feel really sick.

I know how you feel. I struggle with 'solving' big complex problematic situations. I have learnt to practice seeing the situation, seeing that I'm trying to solve it, then reminding myself that the solution will come to my mind when the time is right. It's not a maths problem, you can't solve it with thinking - it's something to be felt, and feelings can't be rushed, no matter how we might try. 

Have faith that you will find a conclusion for yourself, when the time is right. This is out of your control, and that's ok. 

You have to feel it out, in time, with your life experiences. Live your life. The answers will come. 

[dksea]

10 hours ago, Paul92 said:

But is this even fueled by OCD or have I just properly realised a truth and I can't deal with it?

I'll go back to the guideline I was taught: If you think it might be OCD, it probably is.  Everything about your existential worries reads to me like OCD.

A mentally healthy person might also consider and confront these kind of issues, but they very likely wouldn't experience such extreme distress from it.  While it might cause them to reconsider some of their priorities, they would face the reality, as should you, that this is an unanswerable question and a situation that you simply have no control over.  Spending time worrying about it is not beneficial or healthy in any way.  

Perhaps it would help you to reframe it:

• If you are right, the human race will go extinct, the universe will end, and thats it:
  1. You can lose all hope, live the rest of your life in despair and you will have gained nothing
  2. You can live your life anyway, enjoy the rest of your life, and have a positive impact on the people around you
• If you are wrong, there is something more after all this, be it an afterlife, another existence, a new universe, etc.
  1. You lose all hope (because you think the first answer is true), live the rest of your life in despair and you will have gained nothing, then you find out there is more and you regret what you wasted all your time on
  2. You live your life with meaning anyway, enjoy the rest of your life, have a positive impact on the people around you, and you find out that its all lead to something even more!

In neither case does losing hope, worrying about it, wasting your time on the thought that eventually this will all be gone actually benefit you in any way.  Its all negative going down that route.  The most logical thing to do is to live your life with purpose, either from some external source, such as religious faith or a moral cause, or an internal source, find the things that are meaningful to you and enjoy them as best you can.  If its all for nothing, well then you were free to do what you wanted anyway.  If it does matter, well then you have lead a more enjoyable and rewarding life!

 

[Guest Paul92]

I think my mission for today is just try and distract myself as much as possible. But even as I type that the thoughts keep coming at me how meaningless everything is and I get really anxious. I can't go on like this, I'm exhausted.

 This is the weird thing, I have gone many years without getting that anxious feeling in my stomach about anything. Now if I even hear a conversation about my friends arguing over the weekend, I feel myself getting anxious. This isn't like me.  Another examples is about this girl I'm seeing. I told my friend something about something between us over the weekend.. and now I feel terrible. I keep imagining the conversation we'd have if she found out what I said and it makes me really really anxious.

59 minutes ago, dksea said:

I'll go back to the guideline I was taught: If you think it might be OCD, it probably is.  Everything about your existential worries reads to me like OCD.

A mentally healthy person might also consider and confront these kind of issues, but they very likely wouldn't experience such extreme distress from it.  While it might cause them to reconsider some of their priorities, they would face the reality, as should you, that this is an unanswerable question and a situation that you simply have no control over.  Spending time worrying about it is not beneficial or healthy in any way.  

Perhaps it would help you to reframe it:

• If you are right, the human race will go extinct, the universe will end, and thats it:
  1. You can lose all hope, live the rest of your life in despair and you will have gained nothing
  2. You can live your life anyway, enjoy the rest of your life, and have a positive impact on the people around you
• If you are wrong, there is something more after all this, be it an afterlife, another existence, a new universe, etc.
  1. You lose all hope (because you think the first answer is true), live the rest of your life in despair and you will have gained nothing, then you find out there is more and you regret what you wasted all your time on
  2. You live your life with meaning anyway, enjoy the rest of your life, have a positive impact on the people around you, and you find out that its all lead to something even more!

In neither case does losing hope, worrying about it, wasting your time on the thought that eventually this will all be gone actually benefit you in any way.  Its all negative going down that route.  The most logical thing to do is to live your life with purpose, either from some external source, such as religious faith or a moral cause, or an internal source, find the things that are meaningful to you and enjoy them as best you can.  If its all for nothing, well then you were free to do what you wanted anyway.  If it does matter, well then you have lead a more enjoyable and rewarding life!

 

I know what you are saying but it is so difficult to just push it away. Like why do I bother going to work? Sure, it makes sense to try and enjoy life, because that is the best option really. But then my mind latches onto how fast time moves an how impermanent everything is. I feel like I am in some sort of Matrix movie or something. Like as if we are all living in an illusion? I don't understand how astrophysicists and cosmologists can just get out of bed in a morning when they know more than anyone how pointless life is.

What makes me doubt whether it is OCD is the fact that, quite reliably, science predicts that humans will become extinct. There isn't really any doubt. And OCD is all about doubt, isn't it?

I was so much happier living in the illusion as I see it. Ignorance really is bliss.

[dksea]

6 hours ago, Paul92 said:

I know what you are saying but it is so difficult to just push it away. Like why do I bother going to work? Sure, it makes sense to try and enjoy life, because that is the best option really. But then my mind latches onto how fast time moves an how impermanent everything is. I feel like I am in some sort of Matrix movie or something. Like as if we are all living in an illusion? I don't understand how astrophysicists and cosmologists can just get out of bed in a morning when they know more than anyone how pointless life is.

The bold part is one of the major flaws in your argument, and should give you a clue that your thinking is being affected by the OCD.
You are asserting something as fact which is not. In order for astrophysicists and cosmologists to "know how pointless life is" they would have to first buy your assertion that in order for life to have a meaning, in order for life to have a "point" it must fit your specific definition.  You can't simply declare that your (current) belief in what the point of life is to be the objectively true one because people have different views on what the point of life is!
 

6 hours ago, Paul92 said:

What makes me doubt whether it is OCD is the fact that, quite reliably, science predicts that humans will become extinct. There isn't really any doubt. And OCD is all about doubt, isn't it?

First, absolutely there is doubt.  There is doubt in everything, especially things which have yet to occur.  That doubt may be low, but its still there.  At this point the human race is not extinct.  Based on current models of how the universe works and our solar systems evolution etc. is it likely the human race will go extinct? Sure.  But thats not a guarantee.  The human race could evolve into some higher plane of existence which does not rely on the laws of the physical universe as we know it to continue.  The human race could travel back in time and continue in an indefinite cycle.  The human race could escape to another universe.  The human race could be taken up to some afterlife.  Some as yet unknown force could cause the universe as we know it to stop expanding, to introduce new matter and energy in to the universe and for the human race to continue indefinitely in to the future.  These are all possibilities, however remote, which cast doubt on your declarative about the "fact" that things will happen as you imagine they will.  But really thats not whats important.

OCD is defined by two features, obsessions and compulsions.
Do you have obsessions, repeated intrusive thoughts that cause distress, particular thoughts that one has difficulty dismissing?  Yes, clearly, your current intrusive thoughts certain around the meaning and purpose of life and the potential fate of the universe as well as the flow of time.
Do you have compulsions, repeated behaviors which are used in an attempt to manage/reduce/control the obsessions?  Yes, clearly you are engaged in rumination and reassurance seeking along with researching.
There you go, OCD.  Doubt is one way in which OCD manifests, or is described by sufferers, but the doubt is just a manifestation of the demand OCD places for absolutely certainty in order to allow us to move on.  In your case the demand is for absolute certainty that there is some meaning in life.  Without that sense of certainty you remain trapped by the OCD, dwelling on an impossible to answer question, and drawing faulty conclusions as a result.  

 

7 hours ago, Paul92 said:

But even as I type that the thoughts keep coming at me how meaningless everything is and I get really anxious. I can't go on like this, I'm exhausted.

The thoughts won't just stop, you can't force them to just stop.  If you want them to go away you first have to get to the point where they don't matter, where your brain becomes BORED with them, and that requires choosing to not engage them, to recognize this as OCD and to realize you don't have to answer the questions they pose, you don't have to respond to them, you can ignore these thoughts if you want.  Yes, at first it'll be hard, you'll still encounter these thoughts often.  Just like a smoker who decides to try and quit, the cravings/intrusive thoughts will be strongest at the beginning.  Over time, if you follow the steps, then it will get easier, but the fact that it doesn't just go away right now when you decide to start doing something about it doesn't mean recovery won't happen, it merely means you are still at the beginning and you need to keep going.  Rome wasn't built in a day and OCD isn't going to be overcome in a day.  If you want to get back control of your life there is a way, but it takes some time and you have to do the work.  And the first step is to make the choice that you are going to treat this as OCD and follow the steps laid out by CBT.

[Guest Paul92]

@dksea Thanks for that post. It really all makes sense. Above anything, I think out of respect for you taking the time to right that out to me, I will try my best again to do the work. I did it once with the solipsism theme, which I never thought would pass, so I will do it again now.

Today I haven't Googled anything trying to prove or disprove my fears. I do feel quite anxious at times and sometimes the new age spiritual stuff comes over me and scares me a bit. I have been reading a bit of Dr. Claire Weekes' books, about recovering from nervous exhaustion. Her books helped me so much years ago when I was having panic attacks and with the onset of my OCD. The reason I started reading her again is that I have started getting more and more physical anxiety symptoms, I.E. feeling sick when waking up a morning, feeling constantly nervous and uptight, sometimes numb and always lethargic. She talks about how we become sensitised to thoughts, but if we let our nervous system recover it helps as our body doesn't give off the physical sensations compounding everything. So I'm doing a lot of deep breathing and trying to stay loose.

I definitely think so part of it is trying to attack me as I found happiness with this girl I have met. It's attacking her, in that it keeps telling me one day she will die. And attacking me, because I get feelings of happiness, that everything is pointless and happiness is an illusion.

I'm around 9 hours into a 12 hour shift at work but it is quiet, so I think I'm just going to get myself on youtube and watch some guitar reviews like I normally would haha.

Thanks again

[Guest Paul92]

Really struggling at the moment. A few days ago I read something on a spirituality forum that keeps popping up in my mind. About how atoms can't be destroyed so we are just illusions are particles just transform into us constantly and we don't keep the same cells at all as nothing is permanent. So I'm freaking out a bit that everything is an illusion and people aren't real etc.. And how everything is infinite so we can't be real etc

 

STRONG urges to Google things but so far I haven't. When I find myself ruminating I stop myself and refocus. 

Just trying to carry on. 

Don't offer me any reassurance, but can anyone let me know if I'm doing the right things, and what else I can do. What exposure can I do etc etc 

Edited March 6, 2019 by Paul92

[taurean]

Well Paul you must cut out going on those forums. Because that just makes things worse - you are seeking a certainty you, and other sufferers, cannot have. 

Exposure for you is about experiencing intrusions but thinking what the helpers here have told you and refusing to believe the intrusions - sticking with them, feeling the anxiety. 

Then stop the session. 

Repeat it again when you are ready. 

Believe what we have told you, not what the OCD is telling you. 

[taurean]

Get yourself busy on work or if not working other, beneficial, things away from your OCD themes, and really work on inclusion within them. 

By that I mean get really involved in them. 

My wife has been unwell so, to stop herself worrying about that, she has thrown herself into reorganising our kitchen diner. 

She is loving this, and is forgetting about her health issues. 

 

Edited March 6, 2019 by taurean

[PolarBear]

Paul, you need to stop going to spirituality forums. Stop reading anything about the meaning of life, etc. Those are compulsions and they are keeping you stuck.

[Guest Paul92]

I know polar bear I'm not going on them anymore. I haven't since Monday. Just anxiety through the roof today. 

Trying to tidy my house but the thoughts are bombarding me, what is the point, you're an illusion etc 

[taurean]

I have been there Phil. I would go to work with thoughts bombarding me, and without connecting to them. 

The point is to keep working at therapy, chipping away until we start to break through. 

When we do, we can start to motor and be on the path to recovery. 

[paradoxer]

Life might be pointless,  I, incidentally, quite like the idea of us being victims of a cosmic joke, but when it's the focus of an OCD related obsession it doesn't warrant discussion. Want to philosophize? Fine, but don't mash it up with a obsessive disorder.