One session
"I'm close to zero, actually."
He came to a session carrying an intrusive thought that had shown up a couple of days earlier, out of nowhere — a flashback, a did-I-do-something-wrong. He knew it wasn't true; that was never the point. Underneath it sat an old belief — I'm a bad person — and a low-level anxiety that ran all day. His mind had spent years arguing with it: "my brain was trying to find that moment and analyse it. And then I was just like, okay, stop thinking about this right now. But then it came up again."
We didn't argue with any of it. He found where it was living in his body, put a number on the belief — a six — and instead of pushing it away, he turned toward the part of him that had been carrying it since he was small, and stayed with it. We rated it again: a three, maybe a four. So we went again.
"Only a one." … "I'm close to zero, actually. I just had my inner child resting on my lap. I think it just went away."
Then I asked him to try to bring it back — to make himself feel it again on purpose. He couldn't:
"I'm trying to bring that up again, and it's not sticking. I'm trying to emphasise it to stick, just to see. It's not sticking. It's weird. I know that it's not true, but this still gave me anxiety. Now it's not. It's weird."
— Arjun* (US), in his own words, from a single session. It took two passes, and it isn't always this clean — but this is the move, and it's yours to make.
"More material has kept moving but I have not been performing any compulsion. It's now more just watching mental noise."
— Jack (Australia), whose intrusive thoughts used to land "at any time, on anything" — near the end of the work
"Meeting my nine-year-old self has been the most important thing in a long time."
— Jack (Australia), on the heart of the work
"Before I used to wake up and go, what am I going to worry about all day today? How am I going to dance around fire, trying to avoid all these problems. And now it's kind of like, I just wake up and just go."
— Mark* (US), four months in
"Got through this weekend with flying colors. I haven't washed my hands, I haven't done anything."
— Mark* (US), after a weekend that would once have floored him — twenty-two years of contamination OCD
"You're feeling a lot better, aren't you?"
— a family member of Mark's, unprompted — they have no idea he's doing any of this work
"I no longer feel the urge… my perfectionist urges have decreased significantly, and the belief that I am worthless/not enough."
— Anton (Australia), whose OCD was entirely internal — mental compulsions no one outside could see
"It has helped me tremendously and I see it as an answer to prayers."
— Joanne (US), five months in the Recovery Circle
"I'm not cured, but I'm connecting to a dimension of life I thought I had lost."
— Larissa, the evening after finishing the audiobook
"I felt the desire to ruminate and review but it wasn't as desperately demanding as in the past and I just..... stopped."
— Larissa, ten days later
"Staying with it ( allowing) “ feels” like something bad will happen.. feels scary but if I DO stay, the warmth shows up and I know I’m ok. That feeling of safety is present."
— Joanna, on what happens when she stays with it instead of leaving
"I did find the light on the other side, and it is worth it."
— Joanna, a month later
"I’ve used allowing and being in my body for driving and it’s been quite a miracle."
— Erica, in the community
"No rumination what so ever. This is huge because stopping rumination is basically critical to dealing with this, and it broke my belief that rumination is automatic. It's not. Big W"
— Daniel, at the piano
"I have found that the frequency and intensity of compulsions has reduced. I felt the intensity of the protector firing reducing noticeably even after the first few times practicing allowing."
— Billy, in his first weeks of the practice
"Therapy and medication have NEVER been helpful with my OCD… Nearly every time I have done this, I have been successful in NOT doing a compulsion."
— Maria Bennett (US), Trustpilot review, February 2026
"Not all the way there yet, but have made so much progress, and see the light that was missing from view. I'm able to "allow" and have compassion on myself that I never had before."
— Celeste C. (US), Trustpilot review, July 2026
"I have had the best month in terms of much reduced compulsive thinking that I have had in perhaps 30 years."
— Kit F. (UK), OCD for 30+ years
"i am still half way the book and i am already noticing major improvements because it explains OCD inside out."
— Thabit Khamis (Oman), Trustpilot review, August 2026
"…explains the core of OCD and shows the path to complete recovery so incredibly well."
— Anita (Brazil), Trustpilot review
"I have been suffering with OCD for 8 years and nothing has made more sense than it does now."
— Jemma, in the community
"I don't know how David came up with this book, or where he learned it from, but it really summarises the experience of what you deal with as you heal"
— Daniel, in the community
"the book brought tons of clarity."
— Dee Jay (Chile), Trustpilot review
"An iconic and brilliant work that will fundamentally change the way that OCD is viewed forever."
— Deborah F., lawyer
I'll be straight about the proof: the one complete recovery I can point to without any qualification is my own — I lived it end to end. Two people doing this work with me have now met their own definition of complete recovery. The rest are earlier in their own, and already moving in ways all that managing never gave them.
No one on this page was paid for their words. Two people received something free: Anton, a toolkit in return for his review; Thabit, three months in the Recovery Circle, after his review, for help with an Arabic translation. None of it is a promise about your outcome — everyone's pace is their own.