Releasing Obsessive Thoughts: Rumination, OCD, and Dealing with Fear

Being Well with Forrest Hanson and Dr. Rick Hanson

Being Well

Education, Self-improvement, Health & Fitness, Mental Health

4.8 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 17 April 2023

⏱️ 69 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Forrest and Dr. Rick delve into a frequently requested topic: how we can let go of obsessive and intrusive thoughts. They explore why we get trapped in certain thoughts, the negative effects of rumination, and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). They also discuss facing our fears, which allows us to get close enough to a problem that we can do something about it…without getting so close that we become overwhelmed by it. Watch the Episode: Prefer watching video? You can watch this episode on YouTube. Key Topics: 0:00: Introduction 1:20: What is rumination? 5:00: Why we get stuck in certain thoughts 8:10: Two kinds of obsessive thoughts 11:00: The brains attempt to problem solve 13:40: Assessing a hypothetical client 20:15: We all have weird thoughts 22:35: Reality testing, naming thoughts and not feeding them 25:20: "Completing the gestalt" 31:40: Rick completing a gestalt on psychedelics 33:45: Balancing closeness and distance 39:45: Exaggerating the obsession vs. thought suppression 42:35: Widening your view and surrendering to the worst 44:50: The intrinsic emptiness of a ruminative thought 48:10: Another hypothetical case study 56:10: Doing good in the world as an antidote 59:30: Recap NEW Offering from Rick! Join Rick and 5 world-renowned teachers – including Dr. Gabor Mate, Tara Brach, and Thupten Jinpa – for The Heart of Compassion, a 5-week online program that will teach you how to access, grow, and apply compassion. Head to rickhanson.net/hoc to learn more, and use code BEINGWELL10 for 10% off. Support the Podcast: We're now on Patreon! If you'd like to support the podcast, follow this link. Sponsors: Zocdoc helps you find expert doctors and medical professionals that specialize in the care you need, and deliver the type of experience you want. Head to zocdoc.com/being and download the Zocdoc app for FREE. Then find and book a top-rated doctor today. Finally get that project off the ground with Squarespace! Head to squarespace.com/beingwell for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch use coupon code BEINGWELL to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Join over a million people using BetterHelp, the world’s largest online counseling platform. Visit betterhelp.com/beingwell for 10% off your first month! Want to sleep better? Try the Calm app! Visit calm.com/beingwell for 40% off a premium subscription. Connect with the show: Subscribe on iTunes Follow Forrest on YouTube Follow us on Instagram Follow Forrest on Instagram Follow Rick on Facebook Follow Forrest on Facebook Visit Forrest's website Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey everyone, welcome to Being Well, I'm Forest Hanson.
0:10.2	If you're new to the podcast, thanks for listening today, and if you've listened before,
0:14.3	welcome back.
0:15.3	I'm joined today as usual by Dr. Rick Hanson, Rick is a clinical psychologist, the best
0:20.2	selling author of books like Buddhist Brain and Resilient, which we wrote together, and
0:25.0	he's also my dad, so dad, how are you doing today?
0:27.6	I'm really good for us and always, always tickled pig to do this with you.
0:33.2	Yeah, very much the same.
0:34.8	I've been looking forward to today's episode for a little while, because today we're going
0:38.9	to be focusing on one of the questions that we get most frequently, which is how a person
0:43.9	can deal with intrusive or obsessive thoughts.
0:47.4	It's normal for thoughts to get stuck in our heads sometimes, or for things to happen
0:51.1	to us that we have a really hard time letting go of.
0:54.2	But when thoughts are negative, persistent, recurring, and generally uncontrollable, they
0:59.5	can have a really huge impact on our quality of life.
1:03.6	And we've got a lot of questions from listeners outlining how they've been tried to deal
1:07.0	with the same persistent thought for literally decades, which highlights just how difficult
1:12.1	these thought patterns can be to break.
1:13.8	So that's what we're going to be exploring today, how we can break out of cycles of rumination
1:18.8	and release obsessive thoughts.
1:20.9	So dad, I just used a word there, rumination.
1:23.5	It's a bit of a technical word.
	...

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