Step 3: Values, You are what you want

There is a great book by Steve Peters called 'The Chimp Paradox'. I would definitely recommend it, it’s a brilliant interpretation of how the mind works in terms of the difference elements. You have the chimp, who as you would expect is easy to anger, easy to upset, entitled and could be said to be analogous to the Freudian 'ego'. You have the rational bit, the logical bit, and the is 'you' the human. A lot of problems in life are caused when you allow your inner chimp to run riot as it is an emotionally destructive powerhouse. You really don't want to do that if you want to live life happily, peacefully and hopefully amongst friends. Luckily you can reign it in with your human logical side. This is the bit that I believe is evolving in humans. The ability to empathise, to see reason, to understand that we are all interconnected and that we need each other if we are going to survive and prosper. And so, to my main point. Steve makes a powerful comment in the book that has stuck with me ever since I read it and I live my life by it. 

'You are what you want to be'.

I'm just going to leave that hanging for a minute. You are not the person raging, the person crying, the person making hurtful comments, the person struggling, the person carrying out compulsive addictions, the person lost, the person causing destructions in relationships, the person without ambition, the person who doesn't care. You may carry out less than perfect behaviours when your chimp is raging, but that's not who you are. And let me bring that a little bit closer and more relevant to home.

When you are having the intrusive thoughts, when you are carrying out the never-ending mental gymnastics to make everything right again, or carrying out the physical acts to neutralise the bad thoughts. That is NOT you. Those are behaviours that anyone else who had OCD would carry out. Who YOU are, is WHAT you WANT in your life? So, go ahead and ask yourself, 'what is it that I want'? And in that answer, you will who you really are. And it’s true. Of course, if you're anything like me, you might have a few arguments with that statement, I mean it’s not called the 'doubting disease' for nothing but I did myself the biggest kindest years ago, I read the book and I just accepted that this was the truth. And thank goodness I did. What a compass to have in life. Anytime I would drift slowly towards OCD or suddenly find myself in a moment back the OCD prison, I have always been able to ask myself that question. What is it that I actually want, and that is who I am.? I think this is particularly helpful with ROCD when you may be making decisions about relationships based on the erroneous and 'synthetic' thoughts that you might be having.

I personally don't believe that you can cure OCD and I think that if you think you can, then you may end up with more emotional pain than if you accept that you have it. There is a similar wonderful idea in the film 'Sound of Metal' in which the main protagonist (a thrash metal drummer) is trying to change the reality of his deafness by 'curing' it with cochlea implants. His guide in the film, who has taught him how to live with being deaf explains to him that they believe that there is nothing needed. there is nothing that needs changing, they are 'enough' as they are. It is an exercise in pure acceptance and the tranquillity that can come with realising the truth and reality of your situation and learning to love the world from a new perspective. And for me that was truly beautiful. Accepting that you may always have it is very important and will take the pressure off and allow you to live with it much more peacefully and even prosper. 

And so, my final point to draw from all of this is to decide on what your values are and then to let them guide you. You simply cannot rely on OCD thoughts to guide you. I tried for you years to let them guide me and the noose got tighter and tighter until I couldn't breathe any more. In fact, they are a pretty reliable way of finding out the opposite of your beliefs as OCD usually attacks you at the point that you value the most. I guess it wouldn't be that shocking to you if you were a psycho and you started having thoughts of harming others for example. It would be like, well yeah, I'm into all that kind of thing. The reality is, that it couldn't be further from who you are. I remember once meeting a girl who believed herself to be a paedophile. At the very least she couldn't discount the idea because why else would she keep having those thoughts. To anyone looking at her, listening to her, you would instinctively 100% trust her to look after your own children. In fact, I can't think of anyone I'd rather have looking after children that OCD sufferers believing that they might want to harm children. It’s the worst thing they can imagine and so it plagues them to their very core, their very values. So, what are your values? What do you believe in? Use these values to steer you and will be where you need to be. Unfortunately, even though the OCD/ROCD thoughts might seem very convincing they are not your friend and will lead you further and further away from happiness. 

In humanistic psychology therapy there is a concept known as congruence. It was put forward by Carl Rogers who said that we want to be ideally going for full congruence and that emotional tensions are caused by incongruence. And what this means is that to be living our happiest life we need our life experiences to be similar to our idealised self. When we are out of kilter with what our core values are with the behaviours and experiences that we are involved with then we will experience dissonance and unhappiness with life. That is why it is very importantly to find out who you really are and what is important to you, otherwise known as your values. Once you have established these then you then have something concrete with with to soothe the pain of OCD. The OCD thoughts are causing emotional states to flare up but what are your values. Ignore the OCD and go with your values. For example, my values might be that I want a relationship built on mutual trust and respect. I want a relationship that is supportive and one where we share common goals and values. Once you have worked this out, it should be easy to realise that the intrusive thoughts are not who you are and can be ignored.

It can be a daily struggle for a lot of us living with OCD but base your life on what you value and not what you think when you are experiencing OCD and you will find life gets a lot easier. In terms of ROCD I would recommend putting off any major decisions for 3 months, 6 months even, apply the reality of your values to the situation and watch what happens. I think you will be happily surprised and you only need the smallest insight of the reality of OCD to get that foot in the door back to reality.