Transcription
The only way we know how to calm down our mental struggle or our mental anguish is by going through these behaviors. And so essentially what we want to teach is the ability to tolerate that negative emotion and not give in to the behavior.
And the reason that I think this is important even if you don't have OCD is because this is a fundamental skill that everyone needs to learn, right? If we really think about it, what causes us problems in life? It's essentially a lot of mental anguish, right?
So if I don't want to go to a party because I feel embarrassed. If I don't want to go to a party because there's someone there that I asked out a week ago and it's going to feel awkward. So what do I end up doing? I end up not going to the party. I end up using an avoidance strategy to avoid triggering that negative emotion.
And so then, and people with OCD do the same thing. One of the key hallmarks of the actual diagnosis is the development of avoidance behaviors, right? So if certain things will trigger obsessional thoughts and then I have to go shower three times and I can't watch any TV or anything like that that could trigger even a remotely sexual thought.
And so then what happens with people with OCD is they start to build walls around their life and they're not able to actually like live a full life because they're so terrified of triggering the OCD that they start to avoid particular aspects. And we see that in normal people as well that when I start to avoid negative thoughts, when I start to avoid particular situations, when I start to avoid putting myself in an uncomfortable state, I start to close off the doors of opportunity in my life.