¶ Intro / Opening
Music. Hello and welcome to the OCD and Anxiety Podcast where we explore how to have a more positive relationship with anxiety disorders taking back control so that you can start living the life you choose and not the one chosen by your fears.
¶ Introduction to OCD and Anxiety
Hello and welcome to episode 499 i hope that you're doing very well today wherever you are and if you are struggling with ocd or anxiety and you would like to get some support with that well i offer a free discovery call to get that you can head over to my website robertjamescoaching.com there's a link in the show notes. Now in today's episode I'm going to be talking about one of the most infuriating and difficult aspects of OCD and that is intrusive thoughts.
These really annoying things that happen when we're trying to get on with our day and you know you get these thoughts just popping up out of nowhere and it can be so difficult to know what to do with them. So today I'm sharing five steps that you can take to help you with those annoying, infuriating, intrusive thoughts. If you find this podcast helpful, it would be amazing if you could subscribe and leave us a review.
It really does help other people who might be struggling with OCD to find the right kind of support.
¶ Understanding Intrusive Thoughts
If you have any questions at all about anything I speak about today, do please let me know. And off we go. Step one is to name the pattern and not the thought. With OCD, we get so caught up in these stories and these narratives. Really, these are limiting beliefs, things that we tell ourselves about the OCD that we can't deal with this, we can't move on until we have certainty. We're always going to be stuck because of this or that.
And really, these are patterns of behavior. it's very helpful actually if you can write down your limiting beliefs if you can you know take some time really sit down and reflect on it what are some of the stories that you typically tell yourself about the OCD that are not factual they're just stories that you know maybe you you created at some point but actually you know that they're not true and if you write them down and you display that somewhere or you kind of return to that
each day and you remind yourself of what these limiting beliefs are. What that does is it helps you to start bringing more conscious awareness to these kinds of stories that you're telling yourself and it can help you then to be able to kind of spot the patterns and to be able to let go of them. Step two is simply to refocus your attention as much as possible onto the present moment.
You may have heard of Eckhart Tolle in The Power of Now where he discusses that in the present moment we don't actually have too many problems. Most of the problems that we have are created in our minds about the future or about the past. And, you know, if we are actually in the present and inhabiting the present, we're more in our bodies and we're, you know, we're kind of doing things where we're, you know, when we're with people, well, we're actually with them.
You know, so often in the past when I was really struggling with OCD, I would be with people, but I wouldn't actually 100% be there because I'd be in my head at the same time, thinking about all of the ruminations, all of the obsessions, trying to have certainty about them. And actually being in the present moment is realizing that you don't have to do that. If you're with people or if you're doing an activity, try to be really there, really present to it and that can be really helpful with OCD.
Step three is to pause before engaging and this is so important. Of course, OCD creates this urgency. It wants us to kind of get into the battle to start trying to figure it out straight away. But when we pause, when we take a deep breath in and we say, right, I'm not going to try to figure that out right now. Maybe I'm going to postpone for a minute or five minutes or an hour. You know, what we're doing here is we're giving the nervous system an opportunity
to calm down. When we are really triggered, you know, the body is really stressed. It's pumping out stress hormones. The sympathetic nervous system is activated.
¶ Steps to Manage OCD
And if we start thinking in that moment well our thoughts are likely to turn catastrophic quite quickly if you can pause even just for a few moments you can give your your your body an opportunity to kind of calm down a little bit and it may be that you know the moment passes or that the obsession loses a little bit of its severity step four is to use playful diffusion and actually bringing humor and playfulness into OCD can be an incredibly powerful weapon.
OCD does not want us to bring humor to it at all. It wants us to be serious.
It wants us to be angry and frustrated with it. But when we bring, you know, humor, even sarcasm sometimes to the OCD, you know, it can really help us to kind of learn to break free, to untie some of those knots that we find ourselves tied in you know sometimes i find it really helpful to be sarcastic with the ocd like i can give it a silly name sometimes i can joke with it i can take the mick out of it you know and i find that when i do that you know i don't take the thoughts
quite so seriously and i know it can be really challenging when you're experiencing really horrible or distressing thoughts to do that. You know, so it can be difficult at times. But if it's something that you can, you know, explore and just try to practice a little bit, it can be something that is really beneficial. Step five is to take values-based action. And again, this is incredibly important.
It relates to acceptance commitment therapy. when we choose to focus on our values our goals and we get busy with those things you know we really occupy ourselves with things that are meaningful and important to us you know rather than you know focusing on the fear or trying to have that certainty we're more focused on this stuff that brings us joy or that we're interested in or that we actually want to be doing and when we do that when we choose to focus on our values instead of our fears well
i think it kind of frees us up a little bit it actually brings us back into the present moment which is obviously one of the earliest steps and it allows us to bring a bit more acceptance to the anxiety and again when you're choosing to focus on your your values and your goals you're also kind of pausing because you're you know you're kind of saying well i'm going to focus on this now you know if if the anxiety is still here later or if the obsession is still here later well
i can deal with it then but for now I'm going to postpone and I'm going to really try my best to focus on this valued activity and again this is something that's been a real game changer for me in learning how to manage OCD.
¶ Conclusion and Resources
So many thanks guys I really hope that you found that helpful if you have any questions at all about anything I've spoken about today do please let me know and remember I offer a free discovery call to get that you can head over to my website robertjamescoaching.com. There's a link in the show notes. And now just a quick reminder of my disclaimer.
Any information that you view on my website, Instagram page, Facebook group, or anywhere else online, or any information that you listen to on the podcast is for informational purposes only. Music.