A Trained Memory is the Key to Overcoming Checking OCD

stronger than ocd- fire, flood, burgled banner png

I was locked in an invisible cage for 5 years because I didn’t know how to overcome my OCD checking and rechecking.

What I’ve learned is that many of my compulsive checking behaviors were due to not trusting my memory. In order to overcome OCD checking you need to boost your memory as you’re checking so this ‘Doubting Disease’ can no longer trick you.

In the next few minutes, I’m going to give a quick exercise that will allow you to overcome the OCD checking of your front door. By the end of this short article, you’ll be thinking “This is so simple. Why didn’t I think of this?”

All you’ll need is a small two dollar Christmas bell you dangle from the Xmas tree. If you don’t have one then a long piece of string or ribbon would do just fine.

Here are the steps:

Go to your front door and lay the bell, string or ribbon on the ground in front of it.
Now lock the door and turn the handle to make sure it’s locked.
Now pick up the bell, string or ribbon and tie it around your arm.
Then to finish off turn the door handle one more time to check it’s locked…done!

Now when leaving the house your mind will be put at ease because we tied the bell to our arm at the same time we locked it.

Now as we walk around our house (or down the road) the slight little clanging Christmas bell will remind us that our door is absolutely safely locked.

This is because we tagged this object to our body at the same time we were physically checking the door.

This tagging is only ever done when we are actually checking the door is locked with our hands and eyes…this is a must.

Tying the bell to our arm is pointless if we just do it while we’re watching the telly.

This will only create doubt which brings me to my main point.

Conventional therapy helps you to condition yourself to live with this fear and doubt.

This short little exercise will remove that doubt.

What you’ve just experienced is a variation of a memory system to help you overcome your ‘security-based ocd checking.’

Now you may be thinking. “This is great for checking the front door but that’s not the only thing I check. What about the fridge door, the faucets, the power outlets, the windows, the stove, the curling irons, the heater, my car doors, my handbrake, my car windows, the coffee maker at work, etc, etc…”

You’re thinking do I have to tie bells all over my body? I’ll look like a giant Xmas tree that clanging during Spring Break.

Rest easy.

The truth is that you don’t need bells, string or ribbons.

What you truly need you already have.

Your imagination.

You see to remove our doubt all we have to do is boost our memory as we’re checking.

The tagging exercise you just did is part of a 4 part memory system that helps you to remember what you’ve checked has been checked properly.

Making sure everything is off, locked and closed regardless of where you are.

Except in the system, we refer tagging as ‘labeling.’

Welcome to ‘Stronger than OCD’. This is the place where I teach you a memory system to instantly and easily overcome your Security-Based OCD Checking.

Breaking Free from the OCD Cage

NOTE: This video was initially made for therapists but is still applicable to those of us with the illness.

OCD is like a prison. We live behind bars that no one else can see yet they are very, very real to us.

I use to spend hours rechecking water faucets, door locks, the oven dials, the heater was off, power outlets off, the fridge door was closed not to mention calling the plumber for repairs.

It had me trapped for five years.

But then something hit me as I was checking the stove one day.

I realized that while I did live with constant anxiety due to my checking the real problem was that I couldn’t remember if the stove was truly off after I had checked it.

This type of Security-Based OCD Checking I realized was a cage that had a combination lock that I could pick, as long as I could find the right combination.

Luckily I have always been fascinated by the human potential and what we’re truly capable of.

This led me to study ancient mnemonic techniques that helped me to pick the lock on my OCD cage.

It does not work for all types of OCD and never will.

But if you constantly worry that you haven’t locked the door, or turned the faucets off, etc…and you fear that accidentally leaving these things on will result is the house burning or flooding or being burgled then this system may be of benefit to you.

Conmen and Captives

Now at this stage you may be thinking I’m a conman preying on vulnerable people with one of the most disabling stronger than ocd-scales-of-justice- graphic png illnesses known to man.

You’re probably thinking “If this works then why doesn’t my therapist know about it? Why isn’t this common practice? Why don’t the top OCD organizations around the world know about it?”

These are great questions and I would be asking them myself if our roles were reversed.

The truth is that I came up with this system about 12 years ago.

But I didn’t start promoting until the last couple of years. And the truth is that this marketing gig is just as hard, if not harder than developing the system in the first place.

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve been refining this system for over a decade and it works super fast with super quick results.

But there’s a possibility that my efforts won’t be recognized until after my death (like many unorthodox and new strategies.)

This is especially true in medical and health space.

Here’s where I’m different from many other people in the online marketing space promoting a system that seems like it’s promising too much but delivering too little.

I give away my secrets for free.

I’m not sure how many others do this online. And I’m pretty sure most therapists don’t work ‘pro-bono.’

Please don’t undervalue what you’re learning here.

Read, apply and judge for yourself.

Just because I may not gain recognition in my life doesn’t mean it can’t or won’t work.

I’ll give you the how’s and why’s of what to do, you just do it.

What’s Under the Hood? How this System Works

The mechanics of this system is quite simple.

It’s a 4 part memory system I’ve called the Look, Lock, Label and Leave system.

The tagging exercise we did earlier on the front door is the ‘label’ part of the system.

As I hinted to earlier it’s all applied in our imagination which is great as it can be used covertly. In other words, nobody else needs to know when you’re using it.

Also just as a side note it’s an amazing party trick you can pull on your therapist or partner to show them how fast you can check things then leave the house.

Basically what happens is that we use these four steps to imprint in our minds and on our body that what has been checked is safely off, locked and closed.

Here’s how it works:

Look- we look at the thing we’re checking
Lock- place a coded image on the thing we’re checking
Label- place a similar image on our body
Leave- stop looking at the thing we’re checking

So what happens after we’ve left what we checked and are down the road or in another room and we start to get anxious?

Simple. We simply review the coded image on our body that we labeled to it while we while applying the system.

This is what we did at the very beginning of this article when we tagged the Christmas bell to our arm…except we do it all in our imagination.

Summary

We started off tying a small Xmas bell at the same time we were locking our front door.

This tagging or labeling process gives us a visual, feeling and auditory confirmation that we have safely locked the door when we leave the house.

We know this since we only ‘label’ the bell as we’re physically checking it.

Then I likened OCD to being trapped in a cage, which I’m sure you can associate with.

But then we realized that this specific type of OCD prison had a flaw in its security.

Most OCD prisons have a padlock sealing their cells whereas our security-based OCD has a combination lock that can be picked.

The combination to the lock is found in using a specific memory system I’ve called ‘Look, Lock, Label & Leave.’

I also let you know why virtually nobody knows about it.

I invented it.
New revolutionary systems take a long time to be accepted by the establishment (if ever.)
Presenting this system to the world is difficult to get right.

But I also let you know that this isn’t a barrier to applying the system and having it work for you, your spouse or your friend.

Even your therapist could use it once I teach them.

Welcome to ‘Stronger than OCD.’