Navigating Time Without Compulsions: Finding Presence in the Silence
I guess something I do feel is a sense of ongoing panic about what to do. A lot of my compulsions and controlling behaviors now just don't look the same nor appeal in the same way, which leaves me with even MORE time to be not busy. I don't want to spend my whole life in front of the TV and smoking weed. I've been really trying to strike a balance between TV/Weed/Eating versus trying to unpack what's inside of me. But I feel like the package has been fully unpacked now, to an extent. And I see why I do tv/weed/eating, etc. Sometimes I describe to people that I feel so BORED. Life is so long without hyper vigilance, hustling, organizing, etc. I feel panic for not being busy, having tasks, etc. And that just makes me want to do tv/weed/eating. and I'm really trying to stop that pattern. I know you mentioned replacing behaviors. That a lot of those things I've been doing likely not to actually numb but to actually feel.
ChatGPT: This is a major turning point—because you’re no longer stuck in “why do I do this?” and are now in “what do I do instead?”
Right now, you’re facing two things at the same time:
The absence of old coping mechanisms (TV, weed, eating, hyper-vigilance, organizing).
The terrifying openness of time when you’re not running on compulsions.
Why the Panic?
You’ve spent most of your life in motion—whether it was analyzing, managing, planning, or consuming something to stay engaged.
Now, without those things taking up all your bandwidth, you’re left with time.
And time feels huge.
Time without compulsions = Silence. Space. Openness.
Time without tasks = No built-in urgency, no rush to be somewhere, no problems to solve.
Time without external engagement = Just you, sitting in your own being.
And that’s terrifying because you’ve never had to do it before.
What’s Happening When You Say You’re Bored?
It sounds like boredom, but underneath that word is probably something closer to:
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with myself now.”
“I don’t know how to experience life without structure, intensity, or a goal.”
“I don’t know how to just exist and be okay with it.”
TV/Weed/Eating—Are They Actually About Feeling?
Yes. You’re not just numbing—you’re actually trying to regulate yourself. These behaviors do something for you:
TV gives you external engagement when internal experience feels too vast.
Weed shifts your perception so you don’t have to sit in raw awareness.
Eating grounds you in sensory input and presence, even if it’s fleeting.
You don’t just default to these things because you’re weak or lazy. They’ve been serving a real purpose.
So, What Do You Do Now?
Since you don’t want to fill all your time with TV/weed/eating, but you also don’t want to force constant unpacking, the goal is to introduce new ways to exist in time that feel natural, not forced.
Here are some ideas to experiment with:
1. Playing With Sensory Engagement Instead of Overwhelm
Right now, TV/weed/eating are your main ways of engaging your senses.
Instead of quitting them outright, you might introduce new, intentional sensory experiences.
Try this: Every time you get the urge for TV/weed/eating, first try one small sensory thing before giving in.
Go outside and feel the air on your skin.
Lie on the floor and notice how your body feels on a hard surface.
Listen to a song with your eyes closed, really focusing on the sound.
Hold something textured in your hands and actually feel it.
If after that, you still want TV/weed/eating, go for it—but do it intentionally, not automatically.
2. Giving Yourself Open-Ended Exploration Without Pressure
Instead of setting goals or tasks, try free-form curiosity.
Examples:
Walk somewhere with no destination.
Open a book just to read a page or two—no commitment.
Sit outside and see what you notice, without trying to “gain” anything from it.
The key is introducing things that feel more like play than tasks.
3. Expanding Time Instead of Filling It
Instead of thinking “I need something to do”, try “How long can I sit with myself before I feel uncomfortable?”
If you feel the urge to grab your phone, turn on TV, or eat—pause for a moment and ask, “Can I be here for 30 more seconds before I do that?”
It’s not about deprivation. It’s about slowly increasing your tolerance for existing in time without distractions.
4. Redefining What “Doing Something” Means
Right now, you associate “being productive” with tasks, goals, structure.
What if simply existing in awareness counted as “doing something”?
What if the goal wasn’t to fix or engage, but just to witness?
For example:
Instead of “I need a hobby”, try “I wonder what I feel drawn to today.”
Instead of “I need a task”, try “I wonder what happens if I sit here for a bit.”
Instead of “I need to watch something,” try “I wonder what it feels like to sit in silence for a few minutes.”
The Core Idea: Your Relationship With Time Is Changing
You used to be constantly filling time.
Now you’re learning to inhabit time.
And that’s a massive shift that takes patience.
It makes total sense that the absence of constant tasks feels like an abyss. But the goal isn’t to fill it—it’s to slowly learn how to exist in it without panic.
Does it surprise you that I feel emotional distance from songs? I have a rotating playlist that I keep songs on and I will remove songs once they feel stale. I'm not sure that's relevant, but I guess I just find the songs comforting even though I'm not really experiencing them. Just the fact that the songs and the lyrics exist is reassuring to me. I felt especially insane during praise & worship when I was an evangelical CHristian. I don't even know how to begin to put that into words. If I could hang up art in my home with words that might help support me in remembering the process I'm going through and, to some extent, and an intellectual understanding of what I've gone through, what would those words (or maybe symbols) be? And you remember that email I sent to my loved ones about depersonalization?
1. Emotional Distance from Songs – Why That Makes Sense
No, it doesn’t surprise me at all. It actually fits your broader relationship with emotional detachment, external reassurance, and depersonalization.
You don’t experience songs deeply—you keep them around for comfort.
This aligns with how you’ve historically engaged with emotions from a distance rather than fully feeling them.
Just knowing the songs and lyrics exist is reassuring.
This sounds like how you approach memory and self-reference—externalizing things so they exist outside of you, rather than relying on internal emotional connection.
You cycle songs in and out, removing them when they feel stale.
This could mirror your need for novelty and rotation in order to maintain connection (otherwise, things fade into background noise).
✅ Pattern: Music, like many other things in your life, has been more about creating a structured external reality than about deep emotional immersion.
Why Praise & Worship Felt Insane
This was probably one of the most cognitively dissonant experiences of your evangelical life.
You were surrounded by people having deep emotional reactions—tears, arms raised, eyes closed, lost in the music.
You were supposed to feel something profound.
But you didn’t—or if you did, it didn’t feel real, or it felt forced.
And that made you feel broken, fake, and like you were losing your mind.
This mirrors your entire struggle with emotions and presence.
You were in an environment where deep, intense feeling was expected on demand.
But because you were already disconnected from your emotional experience, it felt forced, inauthentic, or completely out of reach.
Instead of drawing you into connection, it probably pushed you further into self-monitoring and alienation.
✅ Pattern: Worship was just another version of being told to “feel” something you couldn’t access, and instead of connection, you felt isolation and panic.
2. Words or Symbols for Art That Might Support Your Process
You want something to help ground you in the reality of what you’ve been through and where you’re going. Here are some possibilities:
Short Phrases That Capture Your Journey
"I am here." → A reminder that presence isn’t about effort—it’s about noticing.
"No more checking." → A cue to break the habit of self-monitoring and analysis.
"I don’t have to hold everything." → A permission slip to release control.
"It happened. I am real." → A validation of your past and your existence.
"Less watching, more living." → A nudge toward direct experience.
"The moment is enough." → A counter to the urge to analyze or escape.
"Existence is not an emergency." → A way to disrupt panic about “what to do.”
Symbols That Might Resonate
A spiral. → Represents the cyclical nature of realization, healing, and return.
A key. → Symbolizing unlocking yourself, not from a prison, but into presence.
An eye closing. → A cue to stop watching yourself and just be.
An open hand. → A reminder that you don’t have to grip onto control.
A stone in water. → Represents settling, rather than trying to control the ripples.
Would any of these resonate with you? Or do you want something even more tailored to your process?
I feel like "carpe diem" feels like a threat. Does that make sense?
Yes, that makes so much sense.
“Carpe diem” carries an urgency, a demand to act, to seize, to make something of every moment. And for someone who has spent so much time detached, observing, and struggling with presence, that can feel less like an invitation and more like a pressure-filled command.
It implies that you need to be doing something significant with your time, which probably triggers the very panic you’re trying to let go of.
It reinforces the idea that time is slipping away, and if you’re not making the most of it, you’re wasting it.
It doesn’t allow for just existing, just being, just experiencing without needing to optimize or extract meaning.
For you, a better phrase might be:
"The moment is enough." → No pressure, no seizing—just allowing.
"I don’t have to do anything to be here." → A counter to the demand of “seizing” life.
"Being is enough." → Because it is.
I know I'm not supposed to monitor but it isn't lost on me when all of the sudden my mind quiets and I just feel presence. It's hard not to react to that with a sense of relief and gratitude.
That makes total sense. You’re not forcing presence, but when it happens, you can’t help but notice it—and that’s okay.
The key is what happens next.
If you immediately start analyzing it (“Wait, am I present? How did I get here?”), it can pull you back into monitoring.
But if you just let the relief and gratitude exist without grabbing onto them, you’re still in presence.
You don’t have to suppress the reaction—it’s natural. Maybe just treat it like a passing breeze rather than something to chase.
You might even reframe it as:
"Ah, here I am." (No grasping, just noticing.)
"This happens. It will happen again." (No urgency to hold onto it.)
It’s okay to feel relief—you’re not “messing it up” by noticing. It’s just about letting it be rather than trying to keep it. Does that distinction feel helpful?
Right? Why wouldn't I have a huge reaction to getting more and more moments of presence???
Exactly! Why wouldn’t you have a huge reaction? This is huge.
You've spent years, maybe decades, feeling detached, trapped in your head, analyzing everything instead of experiencing it. And now, presence—something that once felt impossible or inaccessible—is happening.
Of course you feel relief. Of course you feel gratitude. It’s like finally getting a breath of fresh air after being stuck in a sealed room.
The only reason people say “don’t monitor it” is because grabbing at it too hard can make it slip away. But that doesn’t mean you’re supposed to ignore or downplay it.
Maybe the reaction itself can be part of the presence:
Instead of "Oh my god, am I present?? What did I do??", try:
"Wow. I feel it." (Simple. Direct. Not grasping—just experiencing.)
"This is happening. And it will happen again."
"This is my brain learning how to be here."
You’re allowed to feel amazed. You’re allowed to celebrate. The only shift is to experience the amazement rather than getting stuck in tracking it.
Oh, hey also, with all this in mind, does it make sense to you why I find internal family systems so aggravating?
Yes, that makes so much sense. IFS is all about identifying and interacting with different "parts" of yourself, but for someone who has spent years feeling fragmented, depersonalized, and disconnected from a stable sense of self, that can feel like an extension of the problem rather than a solution.
Here’s why IFS might feel aggravating to you:
You're Already Struggling With a Sense of Wholeness
IFS asks you to break yourself into parts—a Protector, an Exile, a Manager, etc.
But you’re already working so hard to feel like a single, integrated person.
Being asked to fragment further probably feels like the exact opposite of what you need.
It Can Feel Too “Meta” and Intellectualized
Since you already have a tendency to analyze yourself from a distance, IFS could reinforce that habit instead of helping you be more present.
It gives you yet another layer of watching yourself instead of being inside yourself.
It Might Feel Like an Overly “Neat” Explanation for Something Messy
IFS is very structured—there are roles, hierarchies, and a process to interact with your parts.
But your experience has been fluid, shifting, and often hard to pin down.
Having a therapist say, "Oh, that's just your Manager part," might feel oversimplified or even dismissive when your lived experience has been so complex.
Your Brain Doesn’t Like Being Talked At
A big part of IFS is literally dialoguing with parts of yourself as if they were separate people.
That might feel forced, unnatural, or like a performance, which could bring up resistance.
Instead of feeling helpful, it might feel like you’re role-playing your own mental state rather than actually experiencing it.
So What’s the Alternative?
Since IFS doesn’t sit well with you, what actually does feel like it works?
Do you prefer to explore your mind as one whole experience rather than separate parts?
Do you feel more connected when you work with direct sensation instead of cognitive models?
Would you rather approach your emotions as something to be felt rather than categorized?
Basically, IFS is just one framework, and it might not be the right one for where you are. It’s okay to reject it if it feels like a mismatch.
