6:54 when you mention this I bursted into tears. Because growing up I was the most extroverted kid I knew. Up until 4th grade. Then body issues, shy parents, abusive father, being bullied all of this shaped me into something different. And I don't know who am I anymore. Which one is the real me. The friendly, outgoing, confident me or the shy, social anxious me. I will continue to dig my real self to the surface. I want to be me. The authentic me. Not what life events and society made me into. Rewatching your videos really helps. Because the first 2 times I watched this video I didn't even notice this moment and many more.
I don't think I've ever related to a video a 100% but this is it. Even the examples you were giving had me feeling like "is this guy inside my head?" I can't thank you enough for this video🙏 Thank you❤️ Thank you ❤️ Thank you❤️
@@learningpoints862 All OCD is treated the same way - forget about your magical thinking, because the OCD jumps around from one to to another. How to overcome it is detailed in my course www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist the first 6 videos are free in my youtube video depository.
hi mr granvill. i’ve been watching your videos to try and recover from my anxiety and ocd that i’ve been experiencing since a very young age. i can remember being as young as 10 and having ocd compulsions that would keep me busy for 30 minutes before i could finally go to bed and then once i would finally get in bed i would have such crazy intrusive thoughts like i’m going to get robbed or there’s something in my closet and whatnot and i would actually sleep with the lights on “just to be safe.” But now i’m 17 and i realize thoughts like these and compulsions are ridiculous and i can sometimes stop myself when i notice i’m being compulsive but despite that they still occur everyday ie: thinking i have some sort of mental disorder or brain damage or anything silly along those lines. checking locks, checking if the faucet is running many many things. Now from your videos i have finally realized that i’ve been suffering from anxiety/ocd for as far as i can remember in life and it’s time to change this. i would like to ask you, should i ignore my compulsions completely to retrain my subconscious into not proposing them? Just try to avoid thinking and let my mental battery recharge and let my body recalibrate? even though it brings me discomfort??
Hi - learning to sit with discomfort is key to recovering from anxiety. What anxious people fail to realise is that 'confident' people still have discomfort when they start new jobs or go to university or ask a person out on a date - but they are ok with that bodily discomfort. So yes, try to avoid compulsions, this is called ERP. Secondly, you can't stop unconscious thoughts from entering your conscious mind from the brain, but you cam learn to ignore them (which is what meditation is all about, not stopping them - but learning to not be hooked by them.) Thirdly, to recharge your battery - we need to learn to let go of trying to control life. To do this we have to stop all the "what if" stories and catastrophising of all the things that could go wrong.... What about all the things that could go right? Why not contemplate on them? Video 10 explores how to see life differently and live more in the safety of the now, rather than the fear of the future (which is just a virtual story in your mind any way!) Hope this helps a little? John
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist Thank you for the response. Everything you just said was what i needed to hear right now. I’m gonna start coming back here to read this whenever i’m feeling anxious because in the moment it’s hard for me to think clearly and this will help me a lot.
Ok, so I just discovered you and for the first time in a looong time I feel hopeful. I’m going to join and use your videos to help myself get better until I can afford a therapist. I truly can’t thank you enough! I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve been isolating myself in my bedroom for three years now after losing both parents in a short period of time to illnesses. I’ve lost quality of life and I’m desperate to be functional again. Thank you! 🙏🏻
Ever since the quarantine started, these thoughts keep repeating inside my head and It become a hindrance in my daily life. I took a counseling from our school guidance and I tell them what kind of thoughts are occuring inside my head and I said that I might have OCD. I think they didn't believe me because the OCD that they know is about the excessive cleaning and some stuffs. Every night I keep debating inside my mind and trying to rationalize every thought that comes in. I hope I won't become exactly what my mind tells me that I am.
This is surprisingly normal (though crappy) and can be labeled as OCD - but remember that is a label not a disease, it is just the 'conditioning' of your mind - and you can consciously recondition it - if you are taught what to do. Unconscious thoughts are not real - just a brain story..... You don't have to understand them or stop them, just learn to place your conscious awareness elsewhere. I would suggest you watch the following free videos and talk to your parents about finding a specialist therapist who can teach you what to do. Please tell your parents you are watching them and perhaps get their buy in to watch them with you? Video 1 ua-cam.com/video/nXk75ezkRK4/v-deo.html Video 2 ua-cam.com/video/yHejSfrg_iE/v-deo.html Video 3 ua-cam.com/video/zf1J4Vwjg9Y/v-deo.html Video 4 ua-cam.com/video/sKqMJbr_caA/v-deo.html Video 5 ua-cam.com/video/pcqwsJM7Da4/v-deo.html Video 6 ua-cam.com/video/4e4yOdHizyo/v-deo.html Best wishes John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
this was such a nice and informative video on the subject and it made me feel super calm and safe. very very well explained and easy to understand. thank you!
THANK ~ YOU FOR THIS JOHN 💚 HAVING CHRONIC OCD + AGORAPHOBIA IS HELLISH ... IN MY OWN BRAIN 24 / 7 ... I DONT HAVE THOSE TYPE OF THOUGHTS , MY OCD IS SCARY THOUGHTS ABOUT BAD THINGS HAPPENING TO MY LOVED ONES 💔 ... ALONG WITH MY CLINICAL DEPRESSION / ANXIETY & S . A . D ITS OVERLOAD , I DO ACTUALLY AVOID DOING CERTAIN THINGS / GOING TO CERTAIN PARTS OF THE HOUSE WHERE I DO MY RITUALS , FOR INSTANCE WHEN I LOCK OUR FRONT DOOR SO I GET OTHERS TO DO IT FOR ME ... SO YESSS THE TIME ON MY OWN DEFINITELY MAKES MY OCD FAR WORSE ... I ALWAYS APPRECIATE YOU , YOUR VIDS & FEEDBACK ... MEL 💚 ...
@Melanie MacDonalD where u able to over come your OCD I’m working on my selfie so much to over come these intrusive thoughts but still dwell and hoover in the fear
My Ocd and anxiety were bad enough in school but when I went to college I had a full on derealization episode. It was crazy hard. It felt like I was on drugs(what I imagine a drug can do). I couldn't even walk properly. I couldn't control my legs and movement. It was all in my head(i didn't lose my mobility or smth) My vision was also distorted. The outside world felt unreal, like a scene from a movie or a dream. It felt like in my head I was dreaming but I was awake.
I wish I found this video when my obsessive thoughts started. But at that time I was around 13 years old and I didn't even realized that I was doing something wrong. It felt natural to me. I struggled a lot with obsessive thoughts and mental rituals. It only got better after I let those thoughts go. And stopped "stopping" them or avoiding or replacing with other "good" thoughts. It was scary but 100% worth it. Because after a few days I realised that thoughts don't become true. What is 1 week of fear in comparison to 5 years of avoidance and mental rituals.
At least you know now! The course goes into lots of detail about how you can become more optimistic, brave and confident. www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist I will. I'm on a journey of watching all your videos on UA-cam and then moving to your content on patreon. Thank you for what you do. I'm really grateful🙂
So I started my first ever job and I was very anxious for it and all day I was fine no intrusive thoughts because I was distracted. but a hour or two before I went home I didn’t have much to do and My brain was just like don’t think of nothing horrible Ano terrible advice because soon as I said that my mind dived into intrusive thoughts and because I did reading about intrusive thoughts and read stories of people’s own experiences when I first developed intrusive thoughts I ended up thinking I don’t want to have those intrusive thoughts that other people have I wouldn’t know what to do and guess what I ended up getting brand new intrusive thoughts totally different from mine I normally suffer from violent intrusive thoughts but now it’s switched because I was so scared of getting other intrusive thoughts. If this makes sense and I thought my intrusive thoughts were bad but now there even worse and I’m scared to talk about them I’ve spoken about others but now these ones I feel I can’t because I find them even worse than the violent ones and I feel like quitting my job even tho I just started because I feel so guilty and shame anxious not sure what to do
Your answer is in your question - when you are bored you fixate on the OCD thoughts. Therefore, you need to be taught how to keep your conscious attention off of your unconscious thoughts. This video may give you some ideas? John ua-cam.com/video/2VDA7zAVh-0/v-deo.html
For me this thoughts just show where i have to put boundries in relationship, to express emotions..and of course nutrition, it is all depend how much the brain is inflamed ❤ Thank you for sharing ❤
I think it is more about how the brain was conditioned in childhood to suppress fun and creativity, if that was natural in you at that time. Regarding nutrition, eliminating all carbs and sugars for six months works wonders!
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist yes, psyhoterapy make all the sense to ocd, and how condition the person was, so long process to dig in, but for me I can say I have problem with lymbic system, that is why overactive emotions, the cause is childhood trauma.. but yes, zero carbs is amazing, lovering insulin in the brain, inflammation , ect..so better lymbic system ;) my point is that ocd shows me alot about myself, agressive thoughts for example was lacking boundries and problem to say people no...ect.. All the best ☆☆
How about existential pure O? How do you get help when those existential thoughts are kind of logical? After all, that is what philosophy is all about, right? How do you deal when you doubt the reality of people around you? When you question if things really happened after the fact? How do you deal with the feeling of things not being normal or being off?
Existential and past memory OCD are quite common, normally in clever and more free spirited people who for some a have had their free-spirited nature repressed. To get help from the existentialist OCD a starting point is to contemplate what is truth? For example, much of philosophy is not truth, just an opinion or somebodies clever observation of natures (or humans behavioural patterns). In my video 32 part 2 I ask the question 'what do you think happens to you when you die?' Of course, we don't know the truth - for an OCD mind it will swirl all the options around, often scaring or trapping the person into loops of indecision, therefore, one way to trick the mind back into 'normality' is to pick one option consciously, then to retrain the unconscious mind to accept that as true (even though consciously) you know it is just a trick to stop the OCD. For example, I don't know (consciously) if there is some life after death, but I have totally tricked my unconscious mind into believing there is, therefore it has removed the fear of death from within my brain. Once those old unconscious fear programs were overwritten, I was able to consciously revisit exploring existential problems without getting unconsciously caught up in them - or needing to find one answer (which you never will)! Regarding past memory OCD, this is an ugly condition as it forces the individual to drag others into their virtual reality stories about the past to reassure them that they didn't do bad things. The irony is that only good people worry about what they 'might' have done in the past, a bad person wouldn't worry about it! Plus the brain is notoriously bad at remembering stuff, which is why the police don't take eye witness testimony too seriously! The individual needs to learn how to trust more and re-orientate themselves into the now and start planning for the future rather than dwelling in the past, my video number 10 talks about this. They need to learn to let go of the past. Those with fake memory/past memory OCD, often had dominant people who would control and gaslight them during childhood and they forgot or never learned how to self validate and use optimism and trust wisely. Just a few thoughts - the topic is too large to put into words like this, but I do specialise in helping people to overcome or at least manage these intrusive thought patterns. One last thought, we humans are animals who learned to think. Emotions are our core behavioural modalities, logical thinking only evolved later on in our development - much of what we desire is not logical (or reasonable) - love isn't logical, it is emotional! By trying to understand everything with logic and reason makes us a little bit robotic, rather than the wonderful emotional creatures we really are! Anxiety comes from thinking too much, calmness comes from just being.
Sir , I accidentally got into an intrusive thought which 'felt too real' about my loved one, the person who always lift me up like my mom would❤ My crappy brain made irrational stories about her and I ruminated, checking my feelings,checking memories too hard and ended up getting the exact opposite of what I felt before this crappy thoughts.like feeling of hate instead of love and such everything opposite...i ended up crying :( She's the only person i swore to not hate 😭 shes everything to me.. Sir is it possible for my real feelings, emotions, thoughts to return? Even after engaging in the irrational stories that my brain created.. I also got numbness because of this Thank you John, I'll join membership soon🙏 Love every videos Also, can you make a video on this? Ocd on Relationship/even friendship? Pardon me for ranting here🙇
I understand what you are going through, it's tough, but much can be done to change the way you react to the brains thoughts.... I would suggest that it is not your old emotions that need to return (as they led to you becoming anxious) but that, you develop a whole new attitude with respect to thoughts and feelings. Personally, I don't take my thoughts or my feelings too seriously at all! What I do do is, take any action in the NOW that will affect my future (in a positive way) regardless of what my brain is thinking and my body feeling... This way my life is always improving/changing and I am learning to be ok with the feeling of being out of control, because you are out of control and always will be out of control - that's just life, flow along with it and make the most of it, or fight it into being what your mind wants it to be!!!
OCD always works in the same patterns - once you understand it you can then starve the metaphoric parasite out by removing its source of fuel - which is fear and doubt! So the antidote is optimism and trust - my course teaches how to switch back to those modalities.
Sir thankyou for sharing such a great video... I'm stuck on a problem PureO Religious,so sometimes I used to prey as a compulsion whereas sometimes I use to repeat some phrase ,so is this normal??
This is very normal (if you have Pure OCD!) But not normal as a person without it 🙂- It is possible to stop this, not easy , but it is possible if you do the right work.
Thank you so much from Russia. I was looking for explanation about causes of ocd. Neurobiological reasons why it appears. I suffer from it from childhood and was curious if my brain differs from other people. I started to feel calmer after watching first videos from you channel
Glad to be of help! Vidoes 1 to 6 in my UA-cam channel explain how it appears - and videos 7 to 25 teach you what to do about it, they are here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist Best wishes from the UK, John.
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist hi mr john just started watching your videos today I found some of your videos were missing Moreover let me know the procedure to join ur Patreon from India.. What type of payment will be accepted
I am suffering from OCD from almost 11 years but still can't get over it . OCD thoughts are always with me no matter how hard I m trying .. Edited: Compulsions are unable to control .. Always cried and cried 😐 I am failed to get anything in my career 😞 now I m lonely desperate don't know my goal of life. OCD made me miserable in almost everyway. I m afraid of people their behaviors towards me. People don't love me anymore because of my inferiority complex , self pity, feeling of deprivation. I don't even have a self respect now . I can't put the people in their limits I m afraid, lonely and desperate.
Perhaps you just need somebody to teach you hw to understand and manage it better. I got rid of my OCD. Worrying about it won't fix you, learning how not to worry and trust more is the answer. Best wishes John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
Hi sir I'm from India I'm suffering from thought obbssesion I'm scared of my mind whenever i think about anything i feel anxious from past 1week its happening with me and everyday i get sucidal thought's
@Arpita2049yaa its too tough to deal whenever if i know I'm thinking about something i feel really anxious i spend much of my time sleeping because thoughts wont come when we sleep
There is not much more to say about it than mentioned here - the next step is the exposure therapy on the things you ar procrastinating on - my course teaches that, the first 6 sessions are free in my UA-cam Channel.
Yes, my video 26 is all about that topic. It is here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist - Though there are some free videos in this channel - my whole course (with all the answers you need) is still only £5 ($7) a month to access (which is almost free :-) Best wishes John PS Bear in mind that the insomnia is a symptom of the anxiety - so tips to reduce the insomnia will be only be addressing the symptom, not the real problem, which is that which is causing your underlying anxiety. My course teaches how to change that.
Good evening John! First of all, thank you for your videos. Do you have any advice for ROCD? Started as a very strong real event OCD and self doubt, and then all of a sudden the theme changed and my beloved partner and future husband became a focus. First two months I was so horrified of my thoughts that I didn’t leave home and cried for days, lost 5kg. Now I am calmer, but I am avoiding our photos, my memories of our time together have become darker/negative, and I have become more aggressive person (that normally I hate conflicts). What kind of ERP could I apply?
ROCD is very common and is just OCD sabotage - thinking that being out of a relationship will make your life easier - I talk about this in video 6. The ROCD is just an OCD symptom, the real issue is emotional exhaustion from worry too much, doubt and low self esteem - by working on these the OCD will back off - how to do this is what my course is all about. www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
What are your thoughts on real event OCD? Events/things that actually happened in the past whether that’s 10 yrs ago, 5 yrs ago, 3 months ago, or 2 days ago. This is by far the worst theme for me, I can’t let go of past mistakes I’ve made.
My thoughts are - the title/label is WRONG!!!!! What I mean by that is - if you make a mistake, then you made a mistake! How would you know it would be a mistake until after it happened and you reviewed it and compared it to an imaginary virtual reality story of 'what a mistake wouldn't be". Mistakes are only mistakes if you call them mistakes - I call them trying new things, learning how to do stuff etc. If you stop comparing what you did with the virtual reality story of what you "should have done" this problem goes away. Your problem is low self-esteem, self-doubt and a fear of failing or being judged harshly by others (and yourself!) - All these things can be changed if a person teaches you how to do it. Don't blame OCD for your inexperiences and fears about learning new experiences - just get out there and do everything just to see what will happen.
That is a huge question and is answered in great depth in my Paton course - www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist However, thoughts are just the thing the brain does to solve problems, keep you safe and come up with ideas. It is primarily an unconscious process - like dreaming. This video may give you some new ideas? ua-cam.com/video/XlVXzaf46jg/v-deo.html
I go into a lot of detail on how to do this in my course here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist as it is a huge topic. However, to give you some isights this clip from the course details one of the methods ua-cam.com/video/g4gHpQJFOas/v-deo.html - Half the problem with suppressed anger is it is often hidden by the ego or came from events while you were too young to remember. So a big part of recovery is stopping looking for reasons (or believing your on thoughts) yet to still be able to release that anger/fear/trauma etc. - Once again the course goes into lots of explanations and advice on what to do. - Best wishes John
Hi John, would you be able to talk more about false memories? I struggle with false memories of k*lling someone for the last decade. And I am tired, hopeless and depressed…. I lost so much and I need hope and liberation because I still love my life. I have no hope left and I was being constantly fed drugs that just destroyed me with their side effects.
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist so sorry for the late reply, but thanks for the hopeful and reassuring (haha) response. I just need hope because I have been feeling very depressed and hopeless.
One note here - on intrusive thoughts like harming etc - the ERP is reversed. You don't reply harm thoughts (that just reinforces them) you run new thoughts of love and caring for them. For example - not being able to use a knife in the kitchen - the new story becomes using a knife to prepare food for those you love etc - NOT running stories of harming them!
It is just OCD and not real. OCD is either doubting your thoughts, feeling guilty about your thoughts or fearing your thoughts - then fearing your feelings. So, to overcome it you need to do what people without OCD do which is trust more, live in the now, see thoughts as of the brain (and not you) and learn how to handle emotions better. OCD is a trap that stops people from getting on with life. Pure O and its many derivatives usually occurs in creative and more playful people who have had that side of themselves shut down or repressed by their families and they need to learn how to be themselves more. My course teaches how you can do this www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
Yes, once a person has watched all 22 videos in my course - www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist I am prepared to take them on, however I will probably stop taking on new clients before the end of this year.
I have developed emotional apathy due to axienty and ocd how do you deal with that I was trying to reengage with life as you said in one of your videos but the apathy is holding back
Sorry. When you mention the animal vs logical brain, it almost sounds as if you suggest that the thoughts represent actual urges or desires of the animal side that are suppressed rather than what specialists suggest which is that thoughts become obsessive precisely because they aren’t desired and thus cause fear. So when you talk about the emotional vs logical brain, do mean to say that it’s the animal reaction of fear caused by the thoughts vs the conscious attempt to make sense of that fear?
This is answered in videos 2 and 3 freely available in this channel. And I go into further detail in the paid section of my course on Patreon. Thanks John
Of course they don't come true!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have thoughts of Anne Hathaway call me out and asking me out, and winning the lottery and flying to the Maldives on vacation - none of them have happened!
You say ocd doesn't make you act on these thoughts but my ocd comes up with ways to act on them and then confess to my partner what iv done , why would it do this?
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist not in extreme sense of sleeping with someone or affair but touching people my ocd would tell me I need to confess and that iv touched them that some people would see it as cheating and so on especially if its an attractive person and then ill act on the thought by touching them and feel the need to confess even though its embarrassing and affecting my relationship 😭 I don't understand why my body going against me and doing it anyway
@@hannahross8616 It is trying to 'unconsciously' sabotage your relationship, so you'll be alone - as it thinks that being alone will allow you to recover as you'll have less things to worry about. My video 6 talks about this in more detail.
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist thank you John ill have a watch, your videos are the closest thing iv found to getting right to the cause of my ocd. Ill be signing up to your programme very soon I know it will help me. Thank you so much
My pure o is like embarrassment snd social anxiety or just memories thar make me sad and i agree that it comes from boredom like i have social anxiety and imshy but i still feel like im extrovert and rlly like being with ppl
Pure O normally happens to extroverts and playful people who have been conditioned into self-consciousness or pleasing others too much. John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
India is under covid attack now. 😇😇😇 Not only Covid-19 but also face with its consequences such as : trauma, PTSD, complicated grief, melancholic depression, stressors, suicidal thoughts , poverty, hopelessness, jobless , etc. WPA should play the important roles to deal with it as soon as possible. Public Mental health in India is at risk and under covid attack from day to day. 😇😇😇
Strange times indeed! That is why I teach people calmness, so regardless of what happens around them (out of their control) they can still influence their own attitudes and inner calmness (within their minds). www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
6:54 when you mention this I bursted into tears. Because growing up I was the most extroverted kid I knew.
Up until 4th grade. Then body issues, shy parents, abusive father, being bullied all of this shaped me into something different. And I don't know who am I anymore.
Which one is the real me. The friendly, outgoing, confident me or the shy, social anxious me.
I will continue to dig my real self to the surface. I want to be me. The authentic me. Not what life events and society made me into.
Rewatching your videos really helps. Because the first 2 times I watched this video I didn't even notice this moment and many more.
That is a common pattern - who you was is who you are.....
I don't think I've ever related to a video a 100% but this is it. Even the examples you were giving had me feeling like "is this guy inside my head?" I can't thank you enough for this video🙏 Thank you❤️ Thank you ❤️ Thank you❤️
Thank you - You might like my course too? www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist - Best wishes John
i am so glad to have found this channel. Your videos are so helpful, i can't thank you and god enough!
Thank you, we are both trying our best :-)
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist sir please make a video on magical thinking ocd and how to overcome it please.
@@learningpoints862 All OCD is treated the same way - forget about your magical thinking, because the OCD jumps around from one to to another. How to overcome it is detailed in my course www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist the first 6 videos are free in my youtube video depository.
Hey! Are you Indian? Me too !! Do you have Pure O too?
This is a brilliant video John. Very well explained. Really appreciate you making these for people. Helps me soo much.👏👏
You are very welcome - there is much you can do to alleviate anxiety and OCD if you can find the right guidance. John
hi mr granvill. i’ve been watching your videos to try and recover from my anxiety and ocd that i’ve been experiencing since a very young age. i can remember being as young as 10 and having ocd compulsions that would keep me busy for 30 minutes before i could finally go to bed and then once i would finally get in bed i would have such crazy intrusive thoughts like i’m going to get robbed or there’s something in my closet and whatnot and i would actually sleep with the lights on “just to be safe.” But now i’m 17 and i realize thoughts like these and compulsions are ridiculous and i can sometimes stop myself when i notice i’m being compulsive but despite that they still occur everyday ie: thinking i have some sort of mental disorder or brain damage or anything silly along those lines. checking locks, checking if the faucet is running many many things. Now from your videos i have finally realized that i’ve been suffering from anxiety/ocd for as far as i can remember in life and it’s time to change this. i would like to ask you, should i ignore my compulsions completely to retrain my subconscious into not proposing them? Just try to avoid thinking and let my mental battery recharge and let my body recalibrate? even though it brings me discomfort??
Hi - learning to sit with discomfort is key to recovering from anxiety. What anxious people fail to realise is that 'confident' people still have discomfort when they start new jobs or go to university or ask a person out on a date - but they are ok with that bodily discomfort. So yes, try to avoid compulsions, this is called ERP.
Secondly, you can't stop unconscious thoughts from entering your conscious mind from the brain, but you cam learn to ignore them (which is what meditation is all about, not stopping them - but learning to not be hooked by them.)
Thirdly, to recharge your battery - we need to learn to let go of trying to control life. To do this we have to stop all the "what if" stories and catastrophising of all the things that could go wrong.... What about all the things that could go right? Why not contemplate on them?
Video 10 explores how to see life differently and live more in the safety of the now, rather than the fear of the future (which is just a virtual story in your mind any way!)
Hope this helps a little? John
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist Thank you for the response. Everything you just said was what i needed to hear right now. I’m gonna start coming back here to read this whenever i’m feeling anxious because in the moment it’s hard for me to think clearly and this will help me a lot.
Ok, so I just discovered you and for the first time in a looong time I feel hopeful. I’m going to join and use your videos to help myself get better until I can afford a therapist. I truly can’t thank you enough! I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve been isolating myself in my bedroom for three years now after losing both parents in a short period of time to illnesses. I’ve lost quality of life and I’m desperate to be functional again. Thank you! 🙏🏻
Ever since the quarantine started, these thoughts keep repeating inside my head and It become a hindrance in my daily life. I took a counseling from our school guidance and I tell them what kind of thoughts are occuring inside my head and I said that I might have OCD. I think they didn't believe me because the OCD that they know is about the excessive cleaning and some stuffs. Every night I keep debating inside my mind and trying to rationalize every thought that comes in. I hope I won't become exactly what my mind tells me that I am.
This is surprisingly normal (though crappy) and can be labeled as OCD - but remember that is a label not a disease, it is just the 'conditioning' of your mind - and you can consciously recondition it - if you are taught what to do.
Unconscious thoughts are not real - just a brain story..... You don't have to understand them or stop them, just learn to place your conscious awareness elsewhere.
I would suggest you watch the following free videos and talk to your parents about finding a specialist therapist who can teach you what to do.
Please tell your parents you are watching them and perhaps get their buy in to watch them with you?
Video 1 ua-cam.com/video/nXk75ezkRK4/v-deo.html
Video 2 ua-cam.com/video/yHejSfrg_iE/v-deo.html
Video 3 ua-cam.com/video/zf1J4Vwjg9Y/v-deo.html
Video 4 ua-cam.com/video/sKqMJbr_caA/v-deo.html
Video 5 ua-cam.com/video/pcqwsJM7Da4/v-deo.html
Video 6 ua-cam.com/video/4e4yOdHizyo/v-deo.html
Best wishes John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
this was such a nice and informative video on the subject and it made me feel super calm and safe. very very well explained and easy to understand. thank you!
Thank you I appreciate your feedback, I hope you will enjoy my course www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
When I have hard times, I watch your videos and it helps me get back on track. Thank you so much.
Glad they help. Best wishes to you. www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
Thank you John.! Your videos have helped me a lot.
I'm glad they are helping :-) - John Glanvill www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
THANK ~ YOU FOR THIS JOHN 💚 HAVING CHRONIC OCD + AGORAPHOBIA IS HELLISH ... IN MY OWN BRAIN 24 / 7 ... I DONT HAVE THOSE TYPE OF THOUGHTS , MY OCD IS SCARY THOUGHTS ABOUT BAD THINGS HAPPENING TO MY LOVED ONES 💔 ... ALONG WITH MY CLINICAL DEPRESSION / ANXIETY & S . A . D ITS OVERLOAD , I DO ACTUALLY AVOID DOING CERTAIN THINGS / GOING TO CERTAIN PARTS OF THE HOUSE WHERE I DO MY RITUALS , FOR INSTANCE WHEN I LOCK OUR FRONT DOOR SO I GET OTHERS TO DO IT FOR ME ... SO YESSS THE TIME ON MY OWN DEFINITELY MAKES MY OCD FAR WORSE ... I ALWAYS APPRECIATE YOU , YOUR VIDS & FEEDBACK ... MEL 💚 ...
Thanks for your feedback.
I can understand you Melanie
@Melanie MacDonalD where u able to over come your OCD
I’m working on my selfie so much to over come these intrusive thoughts but still dwell and hoover in the fear
This is so helpful, thank you 🇨🇦🤗
You are very welcome.
My Ocd and anxiety were bad enough in school but when I went to college I had a full on derealization episode. It was crazy hard. It felt like I was on drugs(what I imagine a drug can do). I couldn't even walk properly. I couldn't control my legs and movement. It was all in my head(i didn't lose my mobility or smth)
My vision was also distorted.
The outside world felt unreal, like a scene from a movie or a dream.
It felt like in my head I was dreaming but I was awake.
That sounds like disassociation - quite normal (just feels scary).
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist
What’s a the solution to this
@@viralthings2173 Do you mean Pure O or disassociation?
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist disassociation
@@viralthings2173 This video may help you ua-cam.com/video/XhYOrUBLnRA/v-deo.html
I wish I found this video when my obsessive thoughts started. But at that time I was around 13 years old and I didn't even realized that I was doing something wrong. It felt natural to me.
I struggled a lot with obsessive thoughts and mental rituals. It only got better after I let those thoughts go. And stopped "stopping" them or avoiding or replacing with other "good" thoughts. It was scary but 100% worth it. Because after a few days I realised that thoughts don't become true. What is 1 week of fear in comparison to 5 years of avoidance and mental rituals.
At least you know now! The course goes into lots of detail about how you can become more optimistic, brave and confident. www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist I will. I'm on a journey of watching all your videos on UA-cam and then moving to your content on patreon.
Thank you for what you do.
I'm really grateful🙂
You are welcome!
Same problem here. I had this issue as far as I can remember... But I didn't know it was an OCD
This is fantastic
Thank you - there are lots more in my youtube channel.
Amazing video man
Thank you - lots more here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
Amazing ! Thank you for your job!
You are very welcome - John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
So I started my first ever job and I was very anxious for it and all day I was fine no intrusive thoughts because I was distracted. but a hour or two before I went home I didn’t have much to do and My brain was just like don’t think of nothing horrible Ano terrible advice because soon as I said that my mind dived into intrusive thoughts and because I did reading about intrusive thoughts and read stories of people’s own experiences when I first developed intrusive thoughts I ended up thinking I don’t want to have those intrusive thoughts that other people have I wouldn’t know what to do and guess what I ended up getting brand new intrusive thoughts totally different from mine I normally suffer from violent intrusive thoughts but now it’s switched because I was so scared of getting other intrusive thoughts. If this makes sense and I thought my intrusive thoughts were bad but now there even worse and I’m scared to talk about them I’ve spoken about others but now these ones I feel I can’t because I find them even worse than the violent ones and I feel like quitting my job even tho I just started because I feel so guilty and shame anxious not sure what to do
Your answer is in your question - when you are bored you fixate on the OCD thoughts. Therefore, you need to be taught how to keep your conscious attention off of your unconscious thoughts. This video may give you some ideas? John ua-cam.com/video/2VDA7zAVh-0/v-deo.html
For me this thoughts just show where i have to put boundries in relationship, to express emotions..and of course nutrition, it is all depend how much the brain is inflamed ❤
Thank you for sharing ❤
I think it is more about how the brain was conditioned in childhood to suppress fun and creativity, if that was natural in you at that time. Regarding nutrition, eliminating all carbs and sugars for six months works wonders!
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist yes, psyhoterapy make all the sense to ocd, and how condition the person was, so long process to dig in, but for me I can say I have problem with lymbic system, that is why overactive emotions, the cause is childhood trauma.. but yes, zero carbs is amazing, lovering insulin in the brain, inflammation , ect..so better lymbic system ;) my point is that ocd shows me alot about myself, agressive thoughts for example was lacking boundries and problem to say people no...ect..
All the best ☆☆
@@stellaancimer8505 Did you see my video about responsibility here ua-cam.com/video/eoSMcZSEdhE/v-deo.html
How about existential pure O? How do you get help when those existential thoughts are kind of logical? After all, that is what philosophy is all about, right? How do you deal when you doubt the reality of people around you? When you question if things really happened after the fact? How do you deal with the feeling of things not being normal or being off?
Existential and past memory OCD are quite common, normally in clever and more free spirited people who for some a have had their free-spirited nature repressed. To get help from the existentialist OCD a starting point is to contemplate what is truth? For example, much of philosophy is not truth, just an opinion or somebodies clever observation of natures (or humans behavioural patterns). In my video 32 part 2 I ask the question 'what do you think happens to you when you die?'
Of course, we don't know the truth - for an OCD mind it will swirl all the options around, often scaring or trapping the person into loops of indecision, therefore, one way to trick the mind back into 'normality' is to pick one option consciously, then to retrain the unconscious mind to accept that as true (even though consciously) you know it is just a trick to stop the OCD.
For example, I don't know (consciously) if there is some life after death, but I have totally tricked my unconscious mind into believing there is, therefore it has removed the fear of death from within my brain. Once those old unconscious fear programs were overwritten, I was able to consciously revisit exploring existential problems without getting unconsciously caught up in them - or needing to find one answer (which you never will)!
Regarding past memory OCD, this is an ugly condition as it forces the individual to drag others into their virtual reality stories about the past to reassure them that they didn't do bad things. The irony is that only good people worry about what they 'might' have done in the past, a bad person wouldn't worry about it! Plus the brain is notoriously bad at remembering stuff, which is why the police don't take eye witness testimony too seriously!
The individual needs to learn how to trust more and re-orientate themselves into the now and start planning for the future rather than dwelling in the past, my video number 10 talks about this. They need to learn to let go of the past.
Those with fake memory/past memory OCD, often had dominant people who would control and gaslight them during childhood and they forgot or never learned how to self validate and use optimism and trust wisely.
Just a few thoughts - the topic is too large to put into words like this, but I do specialise in helping people to overcome or at least manage these intrusive thought patterns.
One last thought, we humans are animals who learned to think. Emotions are our core behavioural modalities, logical thinking only evolved later on in our development - much of what we desire is not logical (or reasonable) - love isn't logical, it is emotional! By trying to understand everything with logic and reason makes us a little bit robotic, rather than the wonderful emotional creatures we really are! Anxiety comes from thinking too much, calmness comes from just being.
Sir , I accidentally got into an intrusive thought which 'felt too real' about my loved one, the person who always lift me up like my mom would❤ My crappy brain made irrational stories about her and I ruminated, checking my feelings,checking memories too hard and ended up getting the exact opposite of what I felt before this crappy thoughts.like feeling of hate instead of love and such everything opposite...i ended up crying :( She's the only person i swore to not hate 😭 shes everything to me..
Sir is it possible for my real feelings, emotions, thoughts to return? Even after engaging in the irrational stories that my brain created.. I also got numbness because of this
Thank you John, I'll join membership soon🙏 Love every videos
Also, can you make a video on this? Ocd on Relationship/even friendship?
Pardon me for ranting here🙇
I understand what you are going through, it's tough, but much can be done to change the way you react to the brains thoughts.... I would suggest that it is not your old emotions that need to return (as they led to you becoming anxious) but that, you develop a whole new attitude with respect to thoughts and feelings. Personally, I don't take my thoughts or my feelings too seriously at all! What I do do is, take any action in the NOW that will affect my future (in a positive way) regardless of what my brain is thinking and my body feeling... This way my life is always improving/changing and I am learning to be ok with the feeling of being out of control, because you are out of control and always will be out of control - that's just life, flow along with it and make the most of it, or fight it into being what your mind wants it to be!!!
100 percent correct that’s exactly what I’m going through 😭
OCD always works in the same patterns - once you understand it you can then starve the metaphoric parasite out by removing its source of fuel - which is fear and doubt! So the antidote is optimism and trust - my course teaches how to switch back to those modalities.
Sir thankyou for sharing such a great video... I'm stuck on a problem PureO Religious,so sometimes I used to prey as a compulsion whereas sometimes I use to repeat some phrase ,so is this normal??
This is very normal (if you have Pure OCD!) But not normal as a person without it 🙂- It is possible to stop this, not easy , but it is possible if you do the right work.
Sir so pure o will create any type of doubt to catch my attention about organizing things, contamination,etc
Yes, it will indeed! This may explain it in a wider context ua-cam.com/video/2VDA7zAVh-0/v-deo.html
The best always
Thank you!
Thank you so much from Russia. I was looking for explanation about causes of ocd. Neurobiological reasons why it appears. I suffer from it from childhood and was curious if my brain differs from other people. I started to feel calmer after watching first videos from you channel
Glad to be of help! Vidoes 1 to 6 in my UA-cam channel explain how it appears - and videos 7 to 25 teach you what to do about it, they are here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist Best wishes from the UK, John.
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist thank you. I will acquaint with it ✨
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist hi mr john just started watching your videos today I found some of your videos were missing
Moreover let me know the procedure to join ur Patreon from India..
What type of payment will be accepted
@@mindovermovement6401 Hi, you can join here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist - Paypal or a credit card is accepted. Many thanks John
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist fine... credit card option is good from India.. thanks
I am suffering from OCD from almost 11 years but still can't get over it . OCD thoughts are always with me no matter how hard I m trying ..
Edited: Compulsions are unable to control .. Always cried and cried 😐
I am failed to get anything in my career 😞 now I m lonely desperate don't know my goal of life. OCD made me miserable in almost everyway. I m afraid of people their behaviors towards me. People don't love me anymore because of my inferiority complex , self pity, feeling of deprivation. I don't even have a self respect now . I can't put the people in their limits I m afraid, lonely and desperate.
Perhaps you just need somebody to teach you hw to understand and manage it better. I got rid of my OCD. Worrying about it won't fix you, learning how not to worry and trust more is the answer. Best wishes John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
@Anxiety & OCD Discernment sir please make a video on magical thinking ocd and how to overcome it please.
I don't know what magical thinking is - can you be more specific please?
Hi sir I'm from India I'm suffering from thought obbssesion I'm scared of my mind whenever i think about anything i feel anxious from past 1week its happening with me and everyday i get sucidal thought's
Sorry you are going through this, however it is very common (sadly). Have you watched the first 6 free videos I have in this channel yet?
@Arpita2049yaa its too tough to deal whenever if i know I'm thinking about something i feel really anxious i spend much of my time sleeping because thoughts wont come when we sleep
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist sir is there any cure for this
Thank u
We hope more videos for pure o ocd
There is not much more to say about it than mentioned here - the next step is the exposure therapy on the things you ar procrastinating on - my course teaches that, the first 6 sessions are free in my UA-cam Channel.
Hi john, are there any tips you can share with insomnia arising from anxiety? It really adds up to the delay of recovery, thanx for the free vids😊
Yes, my video 26 is all about that topic. It is here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist - Though there are some free videos in this channel - my whole course (with all the answers you need) is still only £5 ($7) a month to access (which is almost free :-) Best wishes John
PS Bear in mind that the insomnia is a symptom of the anxiety - so tips to reduce the insomnia will be only be addressing the symptom, not the real problem, which is that which is causing your underlying anxiety. My course teaches how to change that.
I am grateful
Me too, always grateful to have had the chance of life - of all those eggs and sperms - I made it, and I won't waste one second of this precious life.
Good evening John! First of all, thank you for your videos. Do you have any advice for ROCD? Started as a very strong real event OCD and self doubt, and then all of a sudden the theme changed and my beloved partner and future husband became a focus. First two months I was so horrified of my thoughts that I didn’t leave home and cried for days, lost 5kg. Now I am calmer, but I am avoiding our photos, my memories of our time together have become darker/negative, and I have become more aggressive person (that normally I hate conflicts). What kind of ERP could I apply?
ROCD is very common and is just OCD sabotage - thinking that being out of a relationship will make your life easier - I talk about this in video 6. The ROCD is just an OCD symptom, the real issue is emotional exhaustion from worry too much, doubt and low self esteem - by working on these the OCD will back off - how to do this is what my course is all about. www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
But why do they feel real ? Why do thoughts feel real ?
Because the body can't differentiate between a thought, a dream, watching a film, or something real happening! It is as simple as that!
Why then doesnt everyone who watches movies gets traumatised
What are your thoughts on real event OCD? Events/things that actually happened in the past whether that’s 10 yrs ago, 5 yrs ago, 3 months ago, or 2 days ago. This is by far the worst theme for me, I can’t let go of past mistakes I’ve made.
My thoughts are - the title/label is WRONG!!!!! What I mean by that is - if you make a mistake, then you made a mistake! How would you know it would be a mistake until after it happened and you reviewed it and compared it to an imaginary virtual reality story of 'what a mistake wouldn't be".
Mistakes are only mistakes if you call them mistakes - I call them trying new things, learning how to do stuff etc.
If you stop comparing what you did with the virtual reality story of what you "should have done" this problem goes away.
Your problem is low self-esteem, self-doubt and a fear of failing or being judged harshly by others (and yourself!) - All these things can be changed if a person teaches you how to do it.
Don't blame OCD for your inexperiences and fears about learning new experiences - just get out there and do everything just to see what will happen.
Sir can yu explain what is thought does it really come 24 hours into a persons mind
That is a huge question and is answered in great depth in my Paton course - www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist However, thoughts are just the thing the brain does to solve problems, keep you safe and come up with ideas. It is primarily an unconscious process - like dreaming. This video may give you some new ideas? ua-cam.com/video/XlVXzaf46jg/v-deo.html
How can suppressed anger be eliminated?
I go into a lot of detail on how to do this in my course here www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist as it is a huge topic. However, to give you some isights this clip from the course details one of the methods ua-cam.com/video/g4gHpQJFOas/v-deo.html - Half the problem with suppressed anger is it is often hidden by the ego or came from events while you were too young to remember. So a big part of recovery is stopping looking for reasons (or believing your on thoughts) yet to still be able to release that anger/fear/trauma etc. - Once again the course goes into lots of explanations and advice on what to do. - Best wishes John
Hi John, would you be able to talk more about false memories? I struggle with false memories of k*lling someone for the last decade. And I am tired, hopeless and depressed…. I lost so much and I need hope and liberation because I still love my life. I have no hope left and I was being constantly fed drugs that just destroyed me with their side effects.
Yes, they are false memories - therefore, not real; they are false! So let them go, as they are false! I'm sorry this is so obvious, but it is!
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist so sorry for the late reply, but thanks for the hopeful and reassuring (haha) response. I just need hope because I have been feeling very depressed and hopeless.
So much of my course is about showing people how to let go of the addiction to thinking and trying to control outcomes.
Do deliberate exposures have a place in Pure O OCD treatment?
Absolutely - they are the primary source of recovery. John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
One note here - on intrusive thoughts like harming etc - the ERP is reversed. You don't reply harm thoughts (that just reinforces them) you run new thoughts of love and caring for them. For example - not being able to use a knife in the kitchen - the new story becomes using a knife to prepare food for those you love etc - NOT running stories of harming them!
John what about real event ocd? Doing something that later on you feel makes your ocd fears real? 😭😭
It is just OCD and not real. OCD is either doubting your thoughts, feeling guilty about your thoughts or fearing your thoughts - then fearing your feelings. So, to overcome it you need to do what people without OCD do which is trust more, live in the now, see thoughts as of the brain (and not you) and learn how to handle emotions better. OCD is a trap that stops people from getting on with life.
Pure O and its many derivatives usually occurs in creative and more playful people who have had that side of themselves shut down or repressed by their families and they need to learn how to be themselves more.
My course teaches how you can do this www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
Is there anyway to actively work with you personally?
Yes, once a person has watched all 22 videos in my course - www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist I am prepared to take them on, however I will probably stop taking on new clients before the end of this year.
I have developed emotional apathy due to axienty and ocd how do you deal with that
I was trying to reengage with life as you said in one of your videos but the apathy is holding back
Did you watch video 4? The answer is in there.
I wish you could be my therapist
My course teaches you everything I could :-)
Sorry. When you mention the animal vs logical brain, it almost sounds as if you suggest that the thoughts represent actual urges or desires of the animal side that are suppressed rather than what specialists suggest which is that thoughts become obsessive precisely because they aren’t desired and thus cause fear. So when you talk about the emotional vs logical brain, do mean to say that it’s the animal reaction of fear caused by the thoughts vs the conscious attempt to make sense of that fear?
This is answered in videos 2 and 3 freely available in this channel. And I go into further detail in the paid section of my course on Patreon. Thanks John
So does this mean intrusive images don’t come true it’s just our mild playing with us in all the what if situations
Of course they don't come true!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have thoughts of Anne Hathaway call me out and asking me out, and winning the lottery and flying to the Maldives on vacation - none of them have happened!
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist thanks that’s a relief
You say ocd doesn't make you act on these thoughts but my ocd comes up with ways to act on them and then confess to my partner what iv done , why would it do this?
But you haven't done those things - yoou thought them. Did you have an affair, did you cheat? No, they were thoughts you didn't act upon.
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist not in extreme sense of sleeping with someone or affair but touching people my ocd would tell me I need to confess and that iv touched them that some people would see it as cheating and so on especially if its an attractive person and then ill act on the thought by touching them and feel the need to confess even though its embarrassing and affecting my relationship 😭 I don't understand why my body going against me and doing it anyway
@@hannahross8616 It is trying to 'unconsciously' sabotage your relationship, so you'll be alone - as it thinks that being alone will allow you to recover as you'll have less things to worry about. My video 6 talks about this in more detail.
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist thank you John ill have a watch, your videos are the closest thing iv found to getting right to the cause of my ocd. Ill be signing up to your programme very soon I know it will help me. Thank you so much
@@hannahross8616 You are very welcome.
My pure o is like embarrassment snd social anxiety or just memories thar make me sad and i agree that it comes from boredom like i have social anxiety and imshy but i still feel like im extrovert and rlly like being with ppl
Pure O normally happens to extroverts and playful people who have been conditioned into self-consciousness or pleasing others too much. John www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
@@TheComplexAnxietySpecialist yes I feel like that definitely me
But my family doesn’t agree because i suffered from social anxiety
@@minishay7158 you learned how to be socially anxious, you can unlearn it too!
I should use my ocd to come up with horror stories
Yes, become a writer.
India is under covid attack now. 😇😇😇 Not only Covid-19 but also face with its consequences such as : trauma, PTSD, complicated grief, melancholic depression, stressors, suicidal thoughts , poverty, hopelessness, jobless , etc.
WPA should play the important roles to deal with it as soon as possible.
Public Mental health in India is at risk and under covid attack from day to day. 😇😇😇
Strange times indeed! That is why I teach people calmness, so regardless of what happens around them (out of their control) they can still influence their own attitudes and inner calmness (within their minds). www.patreon.com/theanxietyspecialist
I am not happy with your videos. They can be improved.
All helpful advice will be eagerly received, please feel free to explain where I can improve them. Thanks John
@Anxiety & OCD Discernment sir please make a video on magical thinking ocd and how to overcome it please.
What do you mean by magical thinking?