Hey all, I was wondering on what it looks like to you to accept your anxiety and let the intrusive thoughts flow? I’ve heard this a lot but to me this prolongs my anxiety. For context I’m struggling with intrusive thoughts of beastiality and wanting to go watch it and it’s giving me high anxiety, I’m trying to accept it but I feel like it’s prolonging the anxiety.

An important distinction: accepting it doesn’t mean dwelling on it! Accepting that it’s there doesn’t mean that you have to (or that you should) spend your energy thinking about it. This is rumination, which can be a compulsion. Instead, accepting it means accepting that the initial intrusive thought (or series of thoughts if it’s gone that far) occurred to you, knowing that that’s ok/doesn’t have to be significant, and moving forward with whatever you’re doing. Accepting that a feeling (anxiety) is there doesn’t mean focusing on that feeling being there. It’s just trusting that the feeling will pass, even if you don’t DO anything (a compulsion or rumination) to make it pass more quickly.

It will prolong it because you’re not giving OCD what it wants. The anxiety belongs to OCD. Imagine it like a kid in a supermarket asking for sweets - you’re carrying on shopping not giving them sweets & they’re getting more and more agitated - that’s what’s happening to OCD & that’s honestly the best way to RETRAIN your brain to not let the OCD win. I know it’s so hard tho X hope you’re okay as soon as you can be xx

I’ve taught myself not to pay any attention to my thoughts going on through my mind, so though I have intrusive thoughts, they don’t become themes anymore. I have accepted I am not my thoughts/they don’t define me, everyone has horrible thoughts and I’m not alone, and interacting with my OCD will only make things worse—it is futile to try. So, it “wins” in the sense it can shoot out any and all images, thoughts, urges, etc. but I do absolutely nothing in reply to them. I go about my daily routine and I never stop for one second in response to any of them. They do not matter; what matters is my actions and the present moment.

Wow thank you all for such thoughtful replies. I appreciate it so much and am very thankful :) ❤️