Existential thoughts are normal or a disorder?

[Buba]

In Obsessive Compulsive Disorder there is a branch called "existential thoughts" and also "existential anxiety". But some people assume you should think deep and find an answer.

I have existential thoughts since I am 13. They all without an exclusion give me fear, discomfort, depression, demotivation and etc. I have been meditating since June. My state deteriorates day by day, I feel like being on the edge or close to it. Want to cry. Because am so fed up of it. It has been 17 years pain. Do you think I should involve in them and seek an answer or stop thinking (at least trying)? I doubt I will ever find an answer by thinking, I even doubt there is an answer. I watched Leo's video about unconditional happiness. I would say I have unconditional unhappiness and my successes and gains dont give me happiness. I feel trapped. But I also dont want to commit suicide. (That is the reason I have endured it for 17 years). But I am afraid I have limits and beyond that limit I will commit suicide if I dont get relief.

I have endless questions in my mind. Should I stop seeking answers and just live and observe the life? What can I do besides meditation for raising awareness? 

[Vingger]

seeking is like trying to remember if you loose something

relax men, 

i recommend to you to see Leo's videos about mindfuck,self-deception & other topics like things goin full circle

to open your mind so you can be mindfull about this certain very counterintuitive things

consider to go in a retreat if you can afford it or making some changes in your life

maybe you are little busy, so lazy that you need to bring some consciousness to your

hero's journey so you re align again with that which is great for you

[lens]

Been there dude, it's horrible isn't? The way I dealt with was embracing it. Fear just means you know "something is not quite right"

I tried to get answers to questions i realized made 0 difference in my life, all that i thought i wanted were just stories. My advice in relation to OCD

 

When the brain tries to make sense of something:Stop it, don't dare listen to it, even if you get a heart attack from it

When you get worried or anxious:Stop, lay down, and breath, and realize that the thoughts you have are illusory

All your thoughts are literally stories, they are not real nor do they matter.

Ask yourself why you need the answer to your questions, then ask what's the thing that needs to have the answers. In end you don't need it, you just think you do

[Faceless]

Focus is a movement of thought 

[Nahm]

@Buba This state is the outcome of negative self inner talk. Likely due to past trauma inducing a strong sense of no control, and thus affirming a mental barrier, a wall of protection, to going within and discovering the self. 

In addition to at least 20 minutes breathe focus meditation every MORNING, practice 24/7 stomach breathing, practice your unconditional love 24/7 - as viscerally as possible - feel it - as much as possible, don’t effort, just get out of the way for it.

Shine the light of awareness on your triggers, the light desolves them. 

Much love, and good luck. Right now, you can’t even imagine how precious your life is becoming. Hang in there. It’s unbelievably, unfathomably, worth it to stay strong and do the practices. Mindfulness desolves all triggers, then all questions. 

[Gopackgo]

I'm very sorry to hear what you are going through. Just a few suggestions:

1) If you are meditating (but also while not meditating) Be mindful of when those compulsive thoughts arise, and when they do, ask yourself, "what is the feeling that these thoughts are interpreting." I think a lot of times, certain thoughts arise as a mechanism to dissociate from an underlying feeling that is misunderstood. It can be fear, sadness, or any other feeling that the mind has deemed too intense to actively feel. If there is a feeling lying outside of the thoughts, it needs to confronted. This may or may not make it go away, but just allowing the feeling to enter into awareness might show you that it isn't unbearable. It seems that right now you are focused only on the thoughts, and are trying to derive an answer as a means to prevent the apparently bad feeling to go away.

What the mind will do is deaden feelings of intense experience to try and avoid them. Then we relate and identify with these feelings, which breathes life into the thought processes. After a while, we feel that we are deadened or incomplete, because we unconsciously avoid a portion of the natural expression of life that we are. Think of the feelings as aliveness.

2) I would really read Already Free by Bruce Tift. It's not going to provide any definitive answers, but it might resonate with your experience.

3) Don't be ashamed to seek out help. It can be from a therapist, or a Buddhist monk, or anyone that you choose. Suicide isn't the solution, because there isn't a problem. You are aliveness. You are existence. Without you there is nothing. 

I'm sending love your way. I hope you find some peace.

[Gopackgo]

Also, I just want to say that I am in no way denying your experience. I believe that you are suffering, and I feel for you very deeply. The best thing that you can do is bring your awareness to the thoughts when they arise, and better understand how your thoughts arise and why they are cyclical. On the other hand, you are a natural expression of reality. Denying a portion of your own experience will ensure that you continue to perceive a problem with that natural expression.

[Faceless]

If thought attributes to itself as being different or independent of thought “reality” this is disorderly thinking. 

[vizual]

In your heart you know there is light at the end of the tunnel, even if your mind is thinking gloomily. 

Keep that faith in your heart alive. Sometimes the mind has to dance out its dance, and there is nothing you can do about it no matter how hard you try(and no matter how unpleasant it can be). Yes, even so unpleasant it can drive people to do horrible things, whether to themselves or others. But don't give into that.

The heart prevails in the end my friend. The mind is a sprinter, it's always looking for the quick fix, the quick answer in some easily defined concept. But the heart is the marathon runner which will beat out the mind eventually.

[Buba]

23 hours ago, Mighty Mouse said:

They are a disorder with reference to being a fully functional contributing member of a sleeping society.

They are also how you wake up, assuming that's what you want.

 

Do you mean I should keep thinking to wake up? When somebody says this I get defensive of not thinking, because my first problem arose because of long thinking when I was 13 (In 2000). I remember clearly, how I thought about life, existence, Allah (I was muslim), soul and etc several consequent days and jumped to a conlusion that there is no Allah, or any other extraordinary omnipotent power, there is no soul, nothing is sacred, we are just biologic creatures with mind. I was shocked. As if something very valuable disappeared inside me. I fell into emptiness. The fear took the whole me. I tried to kick those thoughts away, but could not. The following days I thought more and I could not understand why we are here, who am I, can I trust myself, what if everything is an illusion. Very freak thoughts came to my mind which I cant articulate well. When there is a period that I am very busy with something (material things), these thoughts dont come or come rarely. But since 2013 I feel terrible and on antidepressants. When I contemplate existential stuff, I get worse. Do you think, I should think no matter how I feel?

 

On 1/26/2018 at 5:48 PM, Vingger said:

seeking is like trying to remember if you loose something

relax men, 

i recommend to you to see Leo's videos about mindfuck,self-deception & other topics like things goin full circle

to open your mind so you can be mindfull about this certain very counterintuitive things

consider to go in a retreat if you can afford it or making some changes in your life

maybe you are little busy, so lazy that you need to bring some consciousness to your

hero's journey so you re align again with that which is great for you

I have been meditating since June and since December it seems I have decreased the amount of thinking and daydreaming. But have not seen any improvement in my mental state.

 

On 1/26/2018 at 6:00 PM, lens said:

Been there dude, it's horrible isn't? The way I dealt with was embracing it. Fear just means you know "something is not quite right"

I tried to get answers to questions i realized made 0 difference in my life, all that i thought i wanted were just stories. My advice in relation to OCD

 

When the brain tries to make sense of something:Stop it, don't dare listen to it, even if you get a heart attack from it

When you get worried or anxious:Stop, lay down, and breath, and realize that the thoughts you have are illusory

All your thoughts are literally stories, they are not real nor do they matter.

Ask yourself why you need the answer to your questions, then ask what's the thing that needs to have the answers. In end you don't need it, you just think you do

Horrible. Constant pain. And I desperately want relief. When fear is overwhelming I panic, cry, beg.  When fear is not that strong I embrace it. I embrace pain. Especially during meditation. My heart seems it will stop, but I go on. However neither pain nor fear disappear.

Today I told myself I would not involve my mind until 1st March. So after that date I may start to think and seek answers. I was somehow successful in it. Although pain went up, I tried to stay in present moment and neglect mind, no matter how insecure I felt. But as soon as fear came, I tumbled down to my mind again in order to find immediate relief with the help of thinking. The worst is when I am outside, because even in such a situation I dont want to show my weakness to strangers (I care other people's opinion so much) and therefore fear doubles outside.

I know why I need to answer my questions. I want to find absoluteness. So I wont get lost. I want to see the meaningfulness. I dont see meaning. But I guess I would not see meaning even if there was a God. I would still say why and feel discontent. I remember when I was 13 I imagined eternal life in heaven and got scared. I thought dying and not having a soul is better than eternal life. But actually when I feel terrible everything sounds scary to me.

22 hours ago, Outer said:

OCD is ego on steroids. Have you ever had thoughts that you couldn't stop, even by distracting yourself or focusing?

And yeah, the DSM-IV is mostly just bullshit. The easiest way for someone to deem themselves & society sane is by defining the insane.@Buba

Thoughts especially with "i/me/my" should be considered to be unuseful and cause suffering. Have you tried any treatments? Of course thoughts can nag nag nag and comment and intellectualize. But you can dance too and be in the flow. Or surf waves on a surfboard. Nice is the big dance, when the dance never ends or the flow. Have you ever experienced that?

I am on treatment since 2013. I have seen two different psychotherapists. I want to neglect the pain and live my daily life outside of my mind, but it consumes my energy. Can anybody with a strong headache dance? Nor me with strong mental pain.

 

22 hours ago, Outer said:

Most people don't have thoughts when they do stuff and focus.

 

It's just ego. People aren't themselves/ ego all the time.

What to do then? Meditation?

 

22 hours ago, Nahm said:

@Buba This state is the outcome of negative self inner talk. Likely due to past trauma inducing a strong sense of no control, and thus affirming a mental barrier, a wall of protection, to going within and discovering the self. 

In addition to at least 20 minutes breathe focus meditation every MORNING, practice 24/7 stomach breathing, practice your unconditional love 24/7 - as viscerally as possible - feel it - as much as possible. 

Shine the light of awareness on your triggers, the light devolves them. 

Much love, and good luck. Right now, you can’t even imagine how precious your life is becoming. Hang in there. It’s unbelievably, unfathomably, worth it to stay strong and do the practices. Mindfulness devolves all triggers, then all questions. 

Can I get better without enlightenment, or will I suffer until I get rid of ego (which I doubt will happen to me) ?

Is it better to neglect mind completely until I am doing something related to my job? The more I neglect the mind, the worse I feel, sometimes a huge pain, which I think I wont handle. But it seems the only way to recover. Should I decrease mind day by day or stop it abruptly? I have quitted cigarette, cannabis, alcohol. Is quitting mind also like them?

22 hours ago, Gopackgo said:

I'm very sorry to hear what you are going through. Just a few suggestions:

1) If you are meditating (but also while not meditating) Be mindful of when those compulsive thoughts arise, and when they do, ask yourself, "what is the feeling that these thoughts are interpreting." I think a lot of times, certain thoughts arise as a mechanism to dissociate from an underlying feeling that is misunderstood. It can be fear, sadness, or any other feeling that the mind has deemed too intense to actively feel. If there is a feeling lying outside of the thoughts, it needs to confronted. This may or may not make it go away, but just allowing the feeling to enter into awareness might show you that it isn't unbearable. It seems that right now you are focused only on the thoughts, and are trying to derive an answer as a means to prevent the apparently bad feeling to go away.

What the mind will do is deaden feelings of intense experience to try and avoid them. Then we relate and identify with these feelings, which breathes life into the thought processes. After a while, we feel that we are deadened or incomplete, because we unconsciously avoid a portion of the natural expression of life that we are. Think of the feelings as aliveness.

2) I would really read Already Free by Bruce Tift. It's not going to provide any definitive answers, but it might resonate with your experience.

3) Don't be ashamed to seek out help. It can be from a therapist, or a Buddhist monk, or anyone that you choose. Suicide isn't the solution, because there isn't a problem. You are aliveness. You are existence. Without you there is nothing. 

I'm sending love your way. I hope you find some peace.

I have a huge emptiness inside me, which seems to produce fear.

Yes I try to avoid pain and bad feelings. I try to focus on something else, because I am afraid I will not be able to handle those feelings.

18 hours ago, Faceless said:

If thought attributes to itself as being different or independent of thought “reality” this is disorderly thinking. 

Are not all thoughts different and independent of each other?

 

14 hours ago, vizual said:

In your heart you know there is light at the end of the tunnel, even if your mind is thinking gloomily. 

Keep that faith in your heart alive. Sometimes the mind has to dance out its dance, and there is nothing you can do about it no matter how hard you try(and no matter how unpleasant it can be). Yes, even so unpleasant it can drive people to do horrible things, whether to themselves or others. But don't give into that.

The heart prevails in the end my friend. The mind is a sprinter, it's always looking for the quick fix, the quick answer in some easily defined concept. But the heart is the marathon runner which will beat out the mind eventually.

Should I believe in fairy tails, happy ends or live without expectations?

Do you think existential thoughts are easily defined concepts? Actually sometimes I dont get those thoughts, but get those feelings that everything is alien, stranger. Everything is dark.

I want to live so much. I think this is also a problem. I should face the possibility that I may suffer forever or may commit suicide. Eternal pain is sometimes inevitable. 

[Natasha]

@Buba Replace the 'I' in your OP with 'ego' and you'll get the answer. The ego is scared shitless of existential thoughts because it means the end of it. 

Edited January 27, 2018 by Natasha

[Nahm]

@Buba If you can actually just quit thinking, do that. Most people can’t. And I think the best path is to begin to realize thoughts are things, exactly the same as birds and trees and cars. Don’t believe the thoughts, they are not you at all.  If you’re having thoughts you don’t want, see that you couldn’t pick just a little bit better thought in any given moment.

This is mastering a very deep part of the illusion, the unbelieving of our own thoughts. It’s very worthwhile. It’s freedom.

[Faceless]

?

[Buba]

The bad thing is that I am lost. I dont know what to do. i dont have directions. Here also I get contradicting responses, some say dont think, some say think. I am lost to the point that I dont know if I should strive to get better or just leave it and not have attachment to life. To the point I say why to run away from pain and death, why not to let have a miserable life or commit suicide. There is no meaning in anything anyway. What is the point to live happy or unhappy if eventually I will die and it will not matter what a life I had. But my instincts say: live, avoid pain, live happy life. Enjoy every moment. Love. Marry. Have kids. Get old.

Years ago I found the facebook profile of the 20 years old guy who jumped off a building writing a status that, he cannot bear it anymore. I investigated his profile and I saw that he was once a believer, muslim, who then started to rationalize life and became an atheist (just like me) and questioned the meaning of the life and was debating with his friends about the life, existence, about its meaninglessness. His parents took him to psychotherapists, but his state did not improve and he committed suicide. I was so scared that it would happen to me as well. 

14 hours ago, Nahm said:

@Buba If you can actually just quit thinking, do that. Most people can’t. And I think the best path is to begin to realize thoughts are things, exactly the same as birds and trees and cars. Don’t believe the thoughts, they are not you at all.  If you’re having thoughts you don’t want, see that you couldn’t pick just a little bit better thought in any given moment.

This is mastering a very deep part of the illusion, the unbelieving of our own thoughts. It’s very worthwhile. It’s freedom.

When I say I should not believe in my mind, who says it? Not my mind? Can anything else in me can understand, speak, decide, contemplate besides mind?

I try to quit thinking. But when I give instructions myself how to cope with my current state or figure out something related to my state, dont I use my mind? I read Echart Tolle's story how he got enlightened in midnight. He says:

"I cannot live with myself any longer." This was the thought that kept repeating itself in my mind. Then suddenly I became aware of what a peculiar thought it was. `Am I one or two? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the `I' and the `self' that `I' cannot live with." "Maybe," I thought, "only one of them is real." I was so stunned by this strange realization that my mind stopped.

So did he use his mind to get enlightened or what?

 Is not no-mind impossible? If I dont believe my thoughts what can I believe? Should I have hope for happiness or be without expectations? I have endless questions. Endless. And I worry if I dont find answers to them I will not have a direction to recover. By the way Mighty Mouse and Natasha recommend think and resolve my questions. I got confused.

14 hours ago, Outer said:

The pain will still be there but no suffering. I'm talking about flow states here. You'll be so focused the world drops away and time flies if you've ever experienced that. That's one goal you can have to first experience and then sustain and I'm sure if you talk with someone else about it they'll mention they have it from time to time. Pain will be forgotten as there's no suffering in flow states.

Go back to a psychologist and talk about this, and do more cognitive behavior therapy and ask about mindfulness-based therapy to go along with it. For most men meditation doesn't work, but it does work for women very well.

If I catch myself in flow I will try to sustain it and spoil everything. Sometimes when I meditate I notice that I have not thinking for seconds and meditate very well, instantly I spoil it and start to think. Or for example yesterday suddenly I noticed that I feel ok and there is no fear and tried to sustain it and pain and fear came back. 

Edited January 28, 2018 by Buba

[Buba]

15 hours ago, Natasha said:

@Buba Replace the 'I' in your OP with 'ego' and you'll get the answer. The ego is scared shitless of existential thoughts because it means the end of it. 

So meaninglessness, emptiness demotivates my ego, not me?  My real me (I have no idea what it is) is content in emptiness, meaninglessness? Because I (or my ego) see emptiness, meaninglessness as darkness, as tragedy.

[Buba]

15 hours ago, Mighty Mouse said:

I mean you should resolve the questions that they represent, rather than continue denying them.

 

Yes, that fear is exactly what prevents people from facing reality and waking up. Everything we do and say and believe and cling to, is to avoid that emptiness by projecting a black hole of despair onto it. That's what you're finding out.

 

That's what I did. Do you have a choice? You may find that denial has already stopped working long ago. Of course you want relief, everyone does. That's why waking up tends to be unpleasant, it brings out everything we've been avoiding.

The only way out is through. If you're going through this now, it's because you can handle it now. But you have to be willing to let go of your illusory control and of everything society considers normal or says you should do. They don't have a clue about this.

And you have to stop telling yourself that you can't do it. You don't have to do anything, it's already happening. All you have to do is start trusting the process and allow it to happen. It's not easy, but it doesn't have to be complicated. The more you can surrender yourself to it, the more it takes care of itself.

Even during the time when I was thinking existential thoughts, I got no result. Just the number of questions increased. I got no answer. Sometimes I relax myself and be in emptiness without thinking. I suffer. But I be there. Is not it facing emptiness? The only control right now I try to hold is to stay in present and not dwell in my mind.

[lens]

Quote

Horrible. Constant pain. And I desperately want relief. When fear is overwhelming I panic, cry, beg.  When fear is not that strong I embrace it. I embrace pain. Especially during meditation. My heart seems it will stop, but I go on. However neither pain nor fear disappear.

@Buba Don't deny the fear when it feels like it will kill you, wanting relief is a way of denying what the emotion means, it's a temporary distraction from the truth. It's the biggest shock to the ego is complete and total vunerability, and yes it's horrible but hang in there, you need to embrace it, even if this kills you you need to accept the emotion, running away only makes matters worse

 

Quote

Today I told myself I would not involve my mind until 1st March. So after that date I may start to think and seek answers. I was somehow successful in it. Although pain went up, I tried to stay in present moment and neglect mind, no matter how insecure I felt. But as soon as fear came, I tumbled down to my mind again in order to find immediate relief with the help of thinking. The worst is when I am outside, because even in such a situation I dont want to show my weakness to strangers (I care other people's opinion so much) and therefore fear doubles outside.

try not to set dates to when, you don't control the mind, by trying to control it this happens:

you:okay, don't think about x till this date

mind:don't think about what till that date? OH YOU MEAN X, YEAH X, YOU MEAN X, YEAH, I WON'T THINK ABOUT X, DON'T WORRY, X WILL NOT COME.

in trying to avoid you are remenbering yourself of it. And yeah, most of my life i could not enjoy going outside with people because in the back of my mind i'd be constantly thinking about life, "for fuck's sake i'm eating mcdonalds, who cares where i go after I die?", when I had the ego i thought those questions mattered, but truth is they don't,  nor do they have any significance. deconstruct the fuck out of your beliefs and see if they hold any water

Quote

I know why I need to answer my questions. I want to find absoluteness. So I wont get lost. I want to see the meaningfulness. I dont see meaning. But I guess I would not see meaning even if there was a God. I would still say why and feel discontent. I remember when I was 13 I imagined eternal life in heaven and got scared. I thought dying and not having a soul is better than eternal life. But actually when I feel terrible everything sounds scary to me.

Okay, so here's the thing that i realized, there is no why, there is no reason, any explination you try to come up with serves as an artificial meaning. because essentialy anything that needs "doing" serves no true purpose other than to have a purpose of something needing to be "done" and becomes meaningless. What is the purpose of a hammer? to hammer things, why hammer things? to make things, why make things? to make things do stuff, why do that? because it can make ours lives better, why make our lives better? to make our lives better, but why do we need to? why can't we just end it all? there is no point, there is no "mission", it's like a movie, the characters in it think they need what they need, but that's only so the movie can have a plot. to say it has no meaning it's not something to be scared of, it's truth! you can do whatever in here, you don't need a purpose to kill people in GTA or to fall in love, you are here for the experience, and yes it's meanigless in the grand scheme of things, but you need to accept it, it's freeing, you can decide what to live for, that's your meaning! if life had a meaning it would be meaningless. the truth of all truths ins't why is there a universe, it's why you are in it, find out what this "I" that is in it is and you will see everything for what it is and no questions will bother you anymore

Edited January 28, 2018 by lens

[Nahm]

@Buba https://tinybuddha.com/blog/living-right-now-you-are-not-your-thoughts-and-feelings/

❤️

[Natasha]

7 hours ago, Buba said:

I (or my ego) see emptiness, meaninglessness as darkness, as tragedy.

Truth is not tragedy, it's liberation, peace, end of suffering, unconditional love. You're already truth embodied, just haven't realize it yet. Once you 'see' through the veil of the false sense of self (ego), you'll recognize your true nature is infinite being.

[Faceless]

.

 

Edited January 28, 2018 by Faceless