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Recovery blog

Resolution​

I struggled for two years with existential OCD in my early adulthood. I wasn’t aware of existential OCD at the time and struggled all on my own, fortunately, I pulled myself out. I’m in a good state in the past 10 years. Recently, the existential doubt hit again, but only stronger. I’m consumed by questions like meaning-of-life, what-makes-it-worth in the past two months to the extent of borderline mental paralysis.

OCD creates strong and constant doubt/uncertainty, it feels at the moment, any other pursuit is secondary as compared to having the answer. The pursuit for meaning/motivation is valid, however no definite answer exists. With existential OCD, It was difficult to accept or put-off these thoughts and continue to engage in life.

Ultimately, we have to realize we’ll never rational ourselves out from the OCD trap. All rationals can be challenged, and OCD magnifies all the uncertainty. Ultimately, it is not a mental search, it is a resolution we have to make, as well as radical acceptance for whatever doubt the OCD imposes.

It is painful to accept that the mental pillars (family/enjoy/goals) that supported me in the past 10 years are in doubt. The strong sense of nihilism casts doubt on any value, and challenges that all my positive thinking is merely an instinct for survival.

Yet, I do have a resolution: even if I am still in the existential crisis. I refuse to let OCD dominate my mind. The existential pursuit goes on, but I can only do so without OCD. It suffocates me with negative emotion, biases my thinking, and impacts my judgement. I’ll live with the doubt and crisis, no longer respond to OCD until OCD fades.

It won’t be easy. I’ll share my recovery progress.

The negative is true​

Continue to live on the resolution of die OCD free. It is still difficult to stay positive on life/meaning/why. However making progress by allowing co-existence of positive and negative views.

A mental trap is the black-and-white thinking: life is either a miraculous journey, or a worthless absurdity. Allow both to co-exist.

Reproduce from my other post: the negative view is still heavy in my mind, not because it is inherently more significant, or more right than the positive one, but because I devoted much of my energy and attention to feed it. Once I start to starve it, focus on positive views and act on them, the positive mind will be back.

This is how I recovered from my first episode of existential OCD. Still difficult at this moment, but I try my best to trust the negative thought will starve, and positive ones will grow stronger.

Why me​

One obsession during the existential OCD is why me: how come other folks don’t need to realize these or easily dismiss these thoughts. This triggers a sense of being a victim, anxiety, and more reassurance.

One way to accept it could be think of the positive side: it is not all bad, in the future, we can use the nothingness and nihilism on any setbacks and difficult times we go through. Yes, going through this is difficult, but it is rewarding as well. As we will be able to ignore downsides in the future. That makes life more worth living.

Meaning-of-life​

In last session, my therapist asked me what does meaning exactly means in my struggle that life feels meaningless ? I realize I actually don’t have a good definition for it.

Here is what I tried: instead of obsessing on whether or not there is an undefined meaning, I ask alternative questions: what are the good things in life that I enjoy and look forward to. The answers are much easier and clearer: love, responsibility, passion, pleasure, curiosity. Given all these wonderful things that life offers, do I want to see more, enjoy more, explore more ? My answer is Yes. Whatever keeps me going, keeps me saying Yes, is the meaning I am looking for.

Well, it won’t be this easy. With that momentary Yes, there came the uncertainty/doubt that all these things are great, however they will end 😦 . I think the key is to cut the automatic thought of however they will end here.

These thoughts came yesterday, hope someone found it helpful. Hope myself in the future remembers the momentary, but strong feeling of appreciation for the wonder of life.

Mindfullness​

Today I learned more about mindfulness: a core idea is to stay in present: most of our negative emotions are either about the past or the future. Well known, but for the first time, I consider this may be a major thinking trap causing my troubles.

Focus on the present, feel the sunshine, feel my breathing, appreciate the peace and joy. I still need more exercise but it seems achievable.

For each of the present moment, life is good. Once we let-go the burden of figure-out life once-for-all, it is less over-whelming. Life simply consists of all the present moments, they take care themselves to stitch together. All we need to do is to make sure each moment is worth living, when it is hard, it will pass soon.

Think of why life is worth living at the present, with concrete sensations and feelings, instead of think of it as abstract terms and concepts. With OCD, thinking in abstract terms is strongly biased to negativity. Stay present, think small could be the key to unlock the existential OCD. A little more time, I’ll get there.

Regression​

Feeling great last week. However, as expected, there are up and downs this week.

Yes, I enjoy the moment, have things that I look forward to. Life is great. However, OCD came in demanding for a stronger cause than feeling good. Feeling good alone doesn’t seem satisfying. After all, these are emotions, my OCD mind demands better from life than able to feel good. This urge is largely driving the existential OCD I have.

I’ve had some great discussions on Reddit, but I wish there is a way that more people struggling through the same issue can open up, share the struggle and progress, share experiences with therapist/psychologist. This may be the most valuable lesson we’ll need to learn, they deserved a better way than getting buried deep in Reddit.

Stay Positive​

Today’s key learning is to stay positive: it is so easy to go negative with existential anxiety, especially combined with OCD. One of my pattern is to start with thinking positive, however shortly realize they will all end and fall back to the negative swirl. The key of stay positive is to be aware the negative thought comes after every idea, be aware and let go.

Think of the loved ones, the feeling of warm, appreciation, aspirations, responsibilities. However, the negative (rational) mind came in to challenge that love and responsibility are all emotions driven by biochemicals in my brain, they merely reflect instinct, instead of a deeper purpose or meaning. These scary thoughts, however, are logically correct. Pushing them away only reinforces them.

Stay positive, these type of negative thoughts plagues all the thinking process. Once I let them go, recognized they are a valid choice of how to look at life, but firmly choose another view of appreciation and gratitude.

Elon Musk​

Elon musk is one of the greatest entrepreneurs of our time, maybe simply the greatest. However, starting from today, he is my hero.

EMOTIONAL Elon Musk Motivational Video (MUST WATCH!) - YouTube 1 from 15:37 to 19:31 for his view on some existential questions. Elon has clearly went through existential reflections. He set a bold goal to make human a multi-planet species and made remarkable progress. Not sure how far he can get, but with generations of people like him, it could happen.

Part of my existential crisis is due to the realization that life for individuals, and life for this planet as a whole is limited. Making human civilization beyond Earth is a big relief. I believe in this mission and people brave enough to actually work on it and making progress are my heroes.

I’m also convinced Elon’s motivation behind Tesla is much less on making a successful business, but to solve the energy problem on earth. The success of Tesla will give him more resource to address large problems.

Many existential questions are hard. Even if we are not confined to the age of earth, we are still confined to the age of the universe. However, as Elon said in the video, we can choose to be optimistic and wrong, rather than pessimistic and right. As we continue to increase the scale of scope of our consciousness, we will ask better questions and find more answers.

This does not answer all existential questions, but the optimism and courage is inspiring to me. The universe may still ends in cold nothingness, but who would argue life devoted to the mission of understanding and creating solutions, is not worth living. Not everyone has the skills or resources to do so, but at least we could believe and appreciate.