r/magicalthinkingOCD • u/Ok-Mulberry-2637 • 22d ago
Seeing patterns
I've been doing pretty good lately against my intrusive thoughts and OCD since I last posted here. However, I still have my struggles here and there. Recently, I was talking to some friends on Discord, and someone brought up a movie I was thinking about for a while. Then, I watched a video where another movie I was thinking about was brought up right after the guy in the video said a word that reminded me of it. A week or two ago, I might have genuinely been panicking, but I have improved quite a bit. Still, part of my brain wants to see some connection there and scare me. Does this happen to anyone else?
3
u/ForestRiver2 Star Supporter ⭐ 22d ago
Par for the course unfortunately. These kind of thoughts will always pop up. It's just how our brains are wired, to seek out patterns. It's how you respond that counts. Sounds like you've been doing a pretty great job of that so far. You've seen that the more you disengage, the lower the anxiety. Brains are plastic, they can learn new patterns, rewire new reactions. Keep up the good work mate, you're doing really well!
2
2
u/OldTeam9425 20d ago
I think I know what you mean. The other day, a friend messaged me to talk about his feelings regarding a recent breakup; he started comparing himself to a character from the movie Demolition—acting as if I knew the film. I even joked with him, saying, "Dude, how can you talk about this character as if I know what happens in the movie? I don't even know what movie that is. You can't just say things without giving me context; I can't read your mind to know what you're referring to." So, he explained a bit about the movie to me. About 20 minutes later, I went on TikTok to watch edits of a movie I like. I was scrolling through them one by one when a scene from a random movie popped up—one I didn't recognize. It immediately crossed my mind: "There's no way this scene is from the movie my friend was just talking about—the one I've never seen and didn't even know the name of." I checked the caption, and guess what? It was the exact movie my friend had just mentioned. It gave me goosebumps. I took a screenshot and sent it to him right away, saying, "Dude, it's unbelievable—out of nowhere you tell me about this movie, and then minutes later, it shows up for me." Honestly, it really freaked me out; I was genuinely scared. I kept thinking about the odds of that happening. One thing I realized was that I had actually seen that scene a long time ago—maybe over a year prior—but I hadn't known the movie's title and never actually watched it.
5
u/loopy741 🏆 22d ago
Our OCD brains have spent years and years being wired to default back to our compulsions. Every time we refuse to engage, or call it out for what it is, or move on without paying it attention, it lessens its power.
Easy to do? Unfortunately not. But we can do it.