- Username
- chey
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Our culture has a very unhealthy relationship with death. (Western culture) You must learn to befriend the idea and allow it to help give your life meaning. Accept that it is an inevitsble part of life. Does worrying about it change it? No it does not. Obviously easier said than done with OCD, but you should listen to MEDITSTIONS by Marcus aurelius. Excellent exposure on this theme.
Thank you ❤️
+1 on adopting a stoic philosophy, it actually keeps my OCD at bay in general as it's all about letting go of what you can't control. As for the death gives life meaning thing though, I actually think that's a rationalisation, where you try to twist things to make something as awful as being forced to no longer exist into something we can cope with. I'm more on the transhumanist boat, I think death and disease are awful, and are also obviously not strictly necessary, seeing as there are plenty of animals which don't experience ageing to death. I don't think there's a balance between life and death woven into the universe, all the evidence points to it being a quirk of our biology, and therefore not something to give up on doing something about. And if we all got whacked over the head with truncheons every Thursday, people would come up with all sorts of reasons why it's a good thing, including that it makes you more appreciative, or happier on the non-truncheon days, or other benefits. But if you asked someone who doesn't get hit in the head on a weekly basis whether they'd like to start, they'd thing you're crazy for asking. If we didn't have ageing or death and somebody came along and suggested it would be a really good thing to suffer more and more and have your body fall apart and then stop existing forever, we'd think they're mentally ill. But I think for you in this particular case, it's more that you find death triggering because it causes those worries about things not being made better and whole before you die, and happiness potentially being taken away from you. I think there's a combination of perfectionism and catastrophisation going on there- like your life has somehow gone wrong if you don't get to experience it being perfect before your death, and the taken away thing is fear of the unknown and of risk. So I have two things to say. The first is that you don't need to be healed to have happiness, and that people are always broken. The trick with life is finding ways to get moments and periods of happiness, contentment and excitement out of a life which isn't, and is never going to be, perfect. Most people, yes, do die with plenty of trauma still unresolved, but that doesn't make their lives worthless or a blight, or mean that they went wrong. Closure is a myth. The second thing is that, whilst I don't buy into rationalisations of death as something good, it can still help to take it as a given, at least for now, and try to make something positive OUT of it as an inevitability. Not calling it a good thing, just calling it an unavoidable part of your life for now. Even though that causes anxiety, it SHOULD provide perspective for you- like how they say it's better to have loved and lost than never to have lost at all. It's the stoic catchphrase: Memento Mori, remember that you're going to die. You can interpret it nihilistically as "what's the point then?", or you can choose for it to serve as a motivator to pack as much living into your life as you possibly can, rather than living in fear. I'm pretty sure there's a quote that says not to take life so seriously, after all you're not going to get out alive. It can be a freedom.
Yup we’re basically agreed
God you wrote a lot. Are you always this serious 😂 let me get (or buy) some reading glasses
@TheBigCahuna I'm autistic so idk maybe. But I've spent a lot of time thinking about this topic and these are the conclusions I came to so I may as well give them in detail. And I read a lot of cognitive science/transhumanism/decision theory stuff, so I find dilemmas like these and figuring out how you should behave in the presence of uncertainty pretty interesting.
@Scoggy Agreed. Everyone ideally should find a way to come to terms with it; whether by accepting it or by trying to advance science in the manner in which you describe
Thank you so so much. Helps a lot❤️
No I haven’t but you should look into The stoics and what they have to say about death. It can either be a scary thing or a very affirming and equalizing thing. Death gives life MEANING. It gives significance to every day you are alive. So you can be greatful to who or whatever created you to have this experience! I hope that helps. I’m unsure if it does.
Thank you, I’ll check that out.
When you say death, do you also mean afterlife? Like what will happen when we do pass?
Like I’ve never really thought about death. And like to one day not be here anymore, my brain can’t wrap around that concept. Then I get worried I won’t be able to heal and be happy before I die. Like if I get happy, it will be taken away (extreme, by dying).
@cheyennesanchez I went through this about 2 years ago. I am going to be honest, I kept having to tell myself that death is the only thing absolutely guaranteed in life. It is something we cannot control or change. We cannot re-direct the outcome. The only thing we can do in our waking life is to try to be the best versions of ourselves. I understand where you are coming from as I am also on a healing journey and am afraid I will forever feel this way; however, we will get through this! Death is something that we are not supposed to be able to understand. We are not supposed to know the answers. If we did and could find the answers, this world would operate much differently. You got this. Try to focus on the here and now.
@rosulatoki Thank you!❤️
death has been a big one for me i think what i hate most about the death obsession is how it makes me scared of time too like how much time do i have left wow im waisting my life because death is certain then ive waisted 28 years of my life not really trying to do things i want to do or i think about how much time my loved ones have and how i need to be around them all the time so that way i have no regrets on conversations we didnt have or hugs i will miss but whats weird is everyone says oh people with ocd are afraid of the unknown of uncertainty but death is certain and not just any certainty but a certain end we will all face so its like being afraid of uncertainty with other themes and certainty with this one at the same time and im very afraid of it mostly how it will feel and that i will be alone and no one can help me escape it and that i cant stop it from happening to my loved ones and i fear aging and the loss of youth ugh i hate it, it's so depressing
someone told me to try death acceptance meditation or something like that for an exposure but im waiting to do that after ive faced easier erp things
I feel like it’s what I’ve been obsessing with for months so I should start with that. I don’t know I start therapy next week for erp. I know this sound weird but I feel like in denial about dying. I feel like I won’t die.
@cheyennesanchez yeah most of my whole life i would joke like oh im not gonna die ill get frozen like walt disney or han solo and freeze my whole family i refuse death it was like if i could make a joke of it or act like it wont happen to me or people i love then i could live in the moment and it was like oh yeah i lived like id never die then its like oh great now im just realizing it can and will happen i even feel weird saying will like that freaks me out and i think what the hell is wrong with me? but ive had this theme before when i was younger i just didnt know it at the time and so i think it will go away i just need to do the erp and talk about it with my therapist and hopefully with time it will fade for both of us wishing you the best 🙏✨
@cheyennesanchez It's really common to feel like you're not going to die, apparently it doesn't start to sink in for most people until their late 40s-50s. Also idk if I'm somehow delusional but it's probably not necessary to actually take it as a given. The exponential way technology is progressing, especially in longevity science and computing power & algorithms, there are quite a few scientists who suspect that we are going to be able to cure the effects of ageing within our lifetime. They've managed to double lifespan in rodents. That said, I prefer to treat it as a known unknown like any of the rest of my obsessions, nothing special.
Thank you for sharing! It’s really tough because there’s no logic to it. No answer to be found.
Existential/philosophical obsessions? Anyone dealt with this before? I literally feel like I’m getting better with it and boom I get triggered by something I read unintentionally on the internet or talks with others, movies or tv and I feel like I’m back to square one with a new existential obsession that I feel like I need to solve. I just am so frustrated I’m trying to go about this in the right way I’m trying but I just don’t know how to go about it right. My ocd has taken many forms and everytime it’s one I wish for the other it’s so wierd. Like right now I rather be dealing with my health obsessions then this. But if it’s not one it’s the others it’s like I’m addicted to ocd and juggle obsessions. I just want peace but idk what to do. Does anyone else feel like they conquer one obsession and a new one pops up? I feel like I constantly am in a loop I look at old notebooks and realize I’ve been jumping around the same obsessions for over 3 years. Insanity. I would love to hear what has helped you guys and what I you think I should do?
Has anyone had success recovering from existential ocd? I’m so sick of the constant thoughts and anxiety around death and non existence. I’m doing ERP but I’m finding it challenging to find good exposures. Just looking for some hope that it’s possible to get better to keep me going. Also and tips on exposures would be appreciated!
I began struggling with my intrusive thoughts last March and after 5-6 months finally got to a place of more so peace and not thinking they mean something. But I work two jobs and have school and have to commute an hour for one of them and have felt pretty burnt out lately. I started to feel just tired and low mood which then made me I think get stuck on now a 3 week hamster wheel of checking, stuck on thoughts of what if it’s real this time? What if I can’t handle it, etc. my question I guess is any advice on how to bring myself to place of not listening to every podcast, looking up everything on google I possibly can, Instagram accounts, reassurance seeking, etc. Have trouble reminding myself of truth when in it
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