I have been using Brain Lock for my OCD symptoms. I like Schwartz's method because it frees me from having to worry about my obsessions--they're just thoughts, and they're coming from the bad information my brain is giving me.

Looking at the obsessions from an outside, impartial perspective makes it much easier to break the cycle of compulsions. Instead of obsession--compulsion--anxiety relief--obsession--compulsion--anxiety relief I can have an obsession and analyze it...is this really important? Is this just an OCD symptom? Will performing the compulsive action really prevent the obsession from coming true?

No--counting the reflectors on the side of the road in groups of 5 won't prevent me from having an accident. Typing all of my thoughts to myself as I think them will not prevent bad things from happening to me. Touching an object that somebody who doesn't "look right" has touched will not cause a family member to die.

Developing the "impartial spectator" has made a huge difference. At first it was hard to always think "Is this what a 'normal' person would do in this situation?" How do I think like a normal person? The rule of thumb I've been using is that if I think a thought might be an OCD symptom, it probably is, and I need to think about it, let the anxiety pass, and put off the neutralizing compulsion as long as possible, skipping it entirely whenever possible.

You will develop better tolerance for anxiety as you go, by gradually exposing yourself to more anxiety provoking situations as you can handle them. For example, I had to become comfortable waiting five minutes to wash my hands after getting something not especially gross, like milk, on them, before I could be comfortable handling other people's dishes without feeling anxious.

Another thing that helped me was reading other books that contained a lot of case studies of OCD. Seeing other people's symptoms helped me get over the embarrassment of mine. The weird thing about OCD is that we know how crazy our thoughts are but we can't just stop them...I could go around the "I must be crazy but crazy people wouldn't know that they're thinking crazy but I must be crazy..." merry-go-round forever before I learned that if I'm having a weird crazy OCD thought many people have probably thought the same thing before me!

Good luck with the program--let us know how it works for you. I'll be curious to see how it goes.

Take care,
apislily