I got the intrusive thought "What if you unknowingly ran into your kitchen, pumped soap in your hands & rubbed it on your TV". My compulsions now are trying to figure out if I did that, looking for potential soap rubbed on the TV. How would you apply ERP to this scenerio? I'm confused about how it works to break the cycle.

the "what if" is what is causing the doubt, the more you question yourself the more real the thought will feel. if you really did what you said, you would know for sure and you wouldn't wonder "did i". also checking isn't helpful, it just adds to the imaginary story. try saying "I might have and so what" then focus on something else. when you look back later, it becomes more clear that this was just a thought. or sit with the idea that you might have put soap on the tv .. what's the feared outcome.. imagine that over and over until your anxiety reduces ?

dont rub soap on the tv, the goal here is to work on thoughts, you dont need to turn it into anything else except a thought. breathe and let it pass without dwelling ?

Sit with the discomfort tell yourself "maybe, maybe not", you can also make scripts and listen on repeat. The core thing is to allow the thoughts, not suppress them or trying to figure them out.

I get you. No I think the best way is that you work on your mental compulsions, stop the analyzing and just welcome the thoughts. But Im no therapist?

Okay, thank you for your response. I'm going to try and sit with thoughts and not do anything Some people have suggested I actually rub soap on the TV, but I'm not sure if this would helpful because dried soap on TVs can actually damage the color pixels inside. And my intrusive thought was "What IF I've done this and didn't know it?" And my compulsion is to check. So yeah, it's kind of weird that a couple people are suggesting that I rub soap on the TV .