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Tuesday, October 11, 2005

More on Unwanted Thoughts

Some unwanted thoughts are what we call "obsessive thoughts." These thoughts are generally of a violent, sexual, or religious nature and are just the opposite of what we truly believe and/or want. These thoughts can be in words or in pictures. Because they are the opposite of what we truly feel or think, they are very distressing. The technical name for this is "ego dystonic," i.e., they feel bad to our ego.

The way to deal with these thoughts is not to fight them but to see them for what they are. They are coming from some part of our brain but they are not really us. As such, there is no reason to fight them. They simply need to be set aside. Fighting them seems to energize them. Usually, the best course of action is to simply set them aside with as little mental energy as possible and go on to distract ourselves with something else.

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