Depression and Obsessions

Anxious Sandwich wrote:My wife is very understanding and is still trying to help me find something that I can try and fill the hole with... I just want to find out if I can get the separation of dream and reality to be a wider gap than normal.

We tend to dream about things that are on our minds. If you see a scary movie, you have a scary dream. If you fantasize about a car, it gets incorporated.

Set some goals/activities that are non-car related. For instance, you don’t have the disposable income, so set some financial goals to reduce expenses or increase income. Focus on these goals, focus your time/energy on things other than gear head related activities. Lessen your participation in gear head related forums, web pages, clubs, etc.

I think you need to quit obsessing over having something and become more goal driven to obtain it. Focusing on the process to have something is the tread that carries us to each goal. It also makes us appreciate it more because we understand the journey we had to take to get it. If you have no energy for the journey then chances are strong your obsession with the car will switch to something else soon after you get it.

Always remember its the journey that ultimately matters in life. If you take your eyes off the road to only think about the destination, then you're no longer on track to get there. Work on the process, have faith in it, and move forward.

Obsession about something is usually a symptom of a deeper problem. That said it is not wrong for you to want things, even material things, if they mean something to you and you feel like you would gain satisfaction from having it.

What IS wrong, though, is denying yourself the joy of living right now, in this moment, because you feel like you won't be happy until you have X thing.

I have a lot of experience with obsession as my father suffered from it and i suffered from it in my adolescence and I still contend with it today. There are things which I strive for and want so badly that it makes me depressed because I don't have them. But the thing is, the only reason I want anything so badly is because I simply want to not feel bad, and I feel that whatever that thing is will help me escape.

And yet striving for things is a healthy, natural desire in life, and making goals and making plans to accomplish the things you want to accomplish is a good way to enjoy life and live it to the fullest.

My goal for the last number of years has been to get to a certain level of fitness. This is a great goal for anyone, except that I often times found myself attributing negative things in my life to the fact that I was not yet as fit as I should be. And so when I fell short of my goals or missed a workout or ate something I shouldn't have, I was wracked with guilt because I felt I was putting myself that much further away from the happiness I so desired. What I didn't realize was that I was yet in another bout of obsession, caused by depression/anxiety/bad feelings.

The solution to all this sounds simple, but never is. The solution is to love yourself. If you really love yourself, if you are really able to forgive yourself as readily as you would someone else whom you love, like a partner or a parent or a child, then you will be able to be okay with where you're at right now, and enjoy right now. No one is saying that you shouldn't strive to have something that you believe will make you happy, but if you are putting yourself in a spot where you aren't enjoying this second, right now, and you keep placing your happiness in some future place when you have some future thing, then you aren't going to be happy when you get that thing. The real irony is that by obsessing about the thing you need/want, most of the time you'll end up sabotaging your progress to get that thing. Only by living in the moment, loving this life, right now, can you create a solid plan and habit and routine for achieving your goals. You should definitely consider seeing a therapist though. Obsession is no joke and neither is depression. Feel free to message me if you want to chat.