People with OCD often fume "why do the god damn thoughts have to ruin everything?!?!" Don't get me wrong,, unwanted words and pictures in our heads can be pretty unpleasant. But they don't actually ruin activities. Imagine thoughts as insects and whatever activity you care about as a camping trip. In this analogy, the question "why do the thoughts always ruin x" becomes "why do mosquitoes always ruin camping trips?" - As anyone who enjoys spending time outside can tell you, insects are everywhere. Most are boring and we pay them no attention. Some, like butterflies are super pretty or interesting, and we enjoy them. Some insects bite. Mosquitoes are like unwanted thoughts, we'd rather they not be there because they bite us and cause some discomfort. - Most camping trips have mosquitoes. If mosquitoes always ruined camping trips, or even ruined most or half of camping trips, camping just wouldn't be a thing. Yet loads of people love camping, despite mosquitoes. So clearly mosquitoes aren't the problem. What can ruin a camping trip is the person's response to mosquitoes. Mosquitoes will only ruin your camping trip if you ... 1)expect there will be no mosquitoes 2)don't prepare for mosquitoes (bug repellent, appropriate clothing and tent) 3)get onto the campsite and go "omg, these mosquitoes SHOULDN'T be here" 4)get bit a couple times and DISQUALIFY THE POSITIVE by thinking "yeah, fishing was fun, but it doesn't matter because I got bitten up" 5)use BLACK AND WHITE THINKING and conclude that any the trip is with all good or all bad, so getting bit by mosquitoes meant it wasn't perfect sooo "this trip was the worst. The mosquitoes ruined it" And, it's pretty likely that by the time you've done those five things, you OVERGENERALIZE your bad experience on this camping trip and say "all camping trips are a miserable waste if time! I'm never going on one again". If you follow through and never camp again, you lose out on an activity that could have brought you great joy as well as opportunities to learn that mosquitoes don't ruin camping trips. - Now, let's apply this to unwanted thoughts during activities (in this example, game night9 we want to enjoy. Here's how to set yourself up to not let the thoughts ruin the activity - 1) expect some unwanted thoughts to occur during game night 2)prepare in advance for the unwanted thoughts (acceptance statements, response prevention plan, having someone there to encourage you, a list of benefits of fighting OCD and engaging in the activity prewritten out on a notecard in your pocket) and then use the tools you prepared yourself with 3) when an unwanted thought arises, think something like "look, a thought. It's about time you showed up! You can stay as long as you want, but I'm not focusing on you" 4) name both enjoyable and unenjoyable parts of the activity without using one to cancel out the other "the intrusive thoughts were unpleasant and I didn't especially like the dessert they served. The board game was so exciting, we didn't know who would win up until the final moment. And petting the dog was pretty sweet too" 5) use balanced thinking "overall, game night was pretty good. There were some unpleasant parts, but I enjoyed a whole lot of it. 6) it's unlikely you'll overgeneralize at this point, but catch yourself if you do. Attend game night a few more times before deciding if you want to make it a regular activity.