Why do we have these thoughts, like driving down the road and just feel like swearing or being High up and feel like jumping down
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I would suggest talking to a therapist. You might be experiencing depression or anxiety or some other psychological issue that is causing you stress subconsciously. There’s no shame in talking to a licensed medical professional about your mental health.
If you feel a very strong urge to drive off the road or jump off a cliff, I would suggest a meeting with a therapist.
On the topic at hand, the Human brain evolves to have these kinds of thoughts. It allows you to simulate and prepare for unexpected situations. Basically, if you are driving then there is a chance that you might lose control and go off the road, so your brain urges you to think about the situation. So in the unlikely case that you actually go off the road, you’re already prepared for it.
So, the explanation i was taught is that everyone experiences these feelings or thoughts at one point or another in their lives, or atleast most people. It is perfectly normal and ok for it to happen.
It becomes a problem when it morphs into suicidal ideation; where you can’t just brush these thoughts away, and instead fantisize or imagine actually dying for more than a second or minute. And often.
I want to assure you that the two are distinct, and If you experience the latter, talking to a professional is advised.
As for *exactly why* the first one happens, there is no real conclusive evidence that i’ve come across, i learned about it through education about five years ago, so new science may have come out.
The call of the void is one of my favorite emotions, i feel truly alive when i realize that i am just a single action away from certain death, but i never act on this or long for it to happen, nor do i imagine my death in situations outside these short lived experiences.
I can’t find it now, but I read an article about this that supposed our reason for having these feelings is that we are analyzing the situation and we ultimately decide it’s a bad idea. The urge to do the thing isn’t so much your brain pushing you to do it, but rather considering what would happen if you did.
That said, there is nothing wrong with talking to a therapist if you really feel like acting on these things.
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Intrusive thoughts such as this are common, everyone has them. The reason is because our brains are constantly having thoughts and we just don’t pay attention to most of them. In any situation your brain is analyzing all kinds of possibilities, and automatically ignoring the irrelevant ones for the most part. Occasionally you notice them and if they are scary or unpleasant it might seem upsetting for a moment but most of them time you can easily dismiss them. Unfortunately sometimes some people, usually due to mental illness, being in a temporary bad mental state, or for other reasons pay more attention to these kind of thoughts than they need to which can lead to anxiety, depression, and in unfortunate cases dangerous action. If you find yourself experiencing these kind of thoughts on a frequent enough basis (or they feel particularly strong) it’s a good idea to talk to a mental health professional. There is help available and you absolutely can do something about it.
Clinical Psychologist here. This is taking on board the fact you said you don’t want to act on these thoughts. I can’t really speak for you specifically as we haven’t had an assessment together, but these thoughts really are normal. We can’t control things like this. The problem is not the thoughts. The problem is worrying about the thoughts, and trying to control them.
There isn’t really a conclusive scientific explanation, because the brain is weird and complicated and we know very little still about the actual mechanisms behind mental illness. Basically everyone normally experiences some symptoms of neurodivergence/psychosis once in a while, and the problem is when someone has those traits scaled way up and it’s affecting their day-to-day experience of life and relationships with other people.
Intrusive thoughts are a particularly interesting example though, because (and I’m speculating here but I think some folks would agree) they could be a way to imagine potential future scenarios, elicit a fear response, and plan accordingly to avoid harm. So you might be thinking “what if I did that” and you get temporarily fixated on that idea, but your brain may actually be trying to get you to take care to avoid a dangerous/deadly outcome.
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