A reader writes:
Mr. Akin,
Thanks for the OCD articles you’ve posted. Your one on promises has been a site I’ve read and re-read many times as a comfort to know I’m not alone.
In your estimation, is it OK for one working through an exposure technique to purposely think, “No matter what I think, including ‘I promise,’ I’m going to ignore it and move on”?
In my case, when I thought “I promise”, I was thinking it as if directing it to God, as you would in prayer. I immediately regretted it . . . and in fact have replayed it in my head over and over to try to comfort myself, and worry I may have double-downed on my promise.
My worry being that it wasn’t a compulsion I could blame it on, but a conscious thought. I usually take a thought of “I promise” as meaning I need to give up things I enjoy for a day (coffee, etc.). And then the days compound.
Thanks for all the help; it really is comforting.
Thank you for writing. I believe I can be of help.
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Its Treatment
For those who may not be aware, one of the most promising treatments for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder involves cognitive behavior therapy and, specifically, exposure and response prevention therapy.
In this treatment, a person with OCD is exposed to situations that can trigger his obsessive thoughts and then refrain from engaging in the compulsive behavior ritual that he normally uses to relieve the stress they cause.
He thus learns by experience that he doesn’t need to perform the compulsive rituals in order to deal with the thoughts that flit across his mind, and the OCD condition lessens over time.
While this therapy involves some initial stress, it has proved effective for many patients and is considered one of the best therapies for this condition.
Promises to God
In this situation, the reader has OCD that is manifesting in thoughts about making promises to God and then being bound by them.
This is a common manifestation among religious OCD sufferers.
When this occurs, the person feels compelled to make promises to God that will inconvenience him to a greater or lesser degree, but which he feels obligated to keep.
The fact that these are inconvenient promises is the point: The OCD wants the person to be inconvenienced, since it is the inconvenience—and the fear of disobeying God—that is the cause of the anxiety that the condition wants.
But are such promises binding?
The Answer Is No
Such promises are not binding because they (1) are not rational, (2) are made under the duress of anxiety, (3) are not fully human acts, and (4) are the product of a disordered thought process and disease that needs to be fought.
For all these reasons, they do not bind.
However, OCD sufferers can have a fear that a particular promise might have been voluntary, and so it might bind. The same anxiety thus emerges in a new form: fear that a particular promise might bind, and the cycle starts again.
The solution is this: It doesn’t matter what degree of voluntariness a particular promise had. It’s still part of an overall disease process that needs to be thought. Ignore it anyway.
Promises to a Friend
To see why, suppose you live far away from any body of water and have no interest in boating.
Then, one day, a friend who you know has OCD comes to you and says, “Guess what! I’ve had an obsessive-compulsive impulse that I need to buy you a luxury yacht! I’m not sure how voluntary this thought was, so I’m afraid it might be binding. Therefore, I promise to sell my house, pull all the money out of my bank account, liquidate my retirement savings, and buy you a luxury yacht!”
What would your response be? Would you consider him bound to keep this possibly voluntary promise he has made to you?
Of course not! You would tell him, “Hey! Slow your roll! I have no need for a luxury yacht. I don’t care whether this thought was voluntary or not. You need to fight your OCD. I do not want you to hurt yourself by giving in to your OCD. Do not sell your house. Do not pull all the money out of your bank account. Do not liquidate your retirement savings. And do not consider yourself bound by this promise. In fact, do the opposite: Fight your OCD and ignore this promise for your own good. Don’t feed the OCD! The path to getting better involves ignoring promises like this!”
That’s what a good friend would say!
What a Friend We Have in Jesus
Well, Jesus is an even better friend than the human ones we have here on Earth, so he’s going to tell us exactly the same thing.
As Jesus himself said:
What man of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! (Matt. 7:9-11)
God is better than any earthly father, and so this principle applies here. As in the case of the friend, no earthly father, knowing that his son had OCD, would want his son to honor obsessive-compulsive promises he had made to do things for him, even if the son thought a particular thought might have been voluntary. He would want his son to ignore them and so get relief from his OCD.
For a promise to bind, it not only has to be made, it also has to be accepted. No friend would accept such promises as binding. No earthly father would. And neither does God.
Just because a person has compulsively tried to promise something to God doesn’t mean God considers that promise binding.
God has no needs, which means that he doesn’t need anything we might promise him. Further, he loves us, which means that he’s not going to hold us to promises made due to the effects of a disordered medical condition that needs to be resisted.
God knows that, if OCD suffers allow themselves to play the “Maybe that thought was voluntary”-game, it will only keep them trapped in their OCD.
The Great Physician wants us to be healed, including of OCD, and the path to healing is to ignore such obsessive-compulsive promises, even if we think one might have been partly voluntary.
Therefore, whether it’s part of exposure and response prevention therapy—or not—God wants OCD sufferers to ignore such promises.
So that’s what they should do.
