Mind Meets Machine is a video podcast by Avik where mental health, AI, and business collide in the most human way. Real conversations with founders, therapists, doctors, and creators. Practical tools, clear insights, and zero fluff. Learn to think clearer, work smarter, and live better in a tech-driven world.
Your mind can be doing everything “right” and still get stuck on the same fear, doubt, or violent “what if” that refuses to let go. That is the reality of purely obsessional OCD (Pure O) for many people: intrusive thoughts that repeat like a broken record, invisible from the outside and brutal on the inside. We sit down with Sean Robbins, a bestselling Canadian science fiction author with 49 novels to his name, to get painfully clear about what that loop feels like and why the usual stereotypes about OCD miss the point.
Sean walks us through the early warning signs that the spiral is starting, his plain-English take on the brain mechanics behind repetition, and the hardest truth: logic alone does not end an obsessive loop. Then we move into what helped him when other approaches failed, including a surprising creative coping strategy that turned obsessive mental energy into story building. Writing did not magically erase intrusive thoughts, but it gave them somewhere to go, and over time it reshaped his daily life, his work, and even his sense of identity and legacy.
We also keep this practical for listeners who do not write at all. The core idea is not “be an author,” it is “pick something creative you enjoy and start,” then stay with it long enough to notice your attention begin to rewire. Sean shares where this approach can hit its limits during major crises, and how to think about creativity as ongoing mental health support rather than a one-off distraction. If you find this helpful, subscribe to Mind Meets Machine, share the episode with someone who needs a clearer picture of Pure O OCD, and leave a review so more listeners can find it.
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Dearlessness, imagine your mind as a loop that never stops spinning. Not a creative loop, but not the kind that leads to the inspiration, but the kind that traps you in the same fear, the same thought, the same what if over and over. For some people, that loop is relentless. It doesn't care that you have checked the door. It doesn't care that the answer hasn't changed. And it just keeps going. Now imagine finding a way to redirect your that energy, not by fighting it, but by channeling it into something that gives back. That's what we are exploring today. So, dear listeners, I'm your host, Abik, and you are listening to Mind Meets Machine, where we slow down to ask the questions that matter about how we think, how we create, and how we live alongside the tools and the stories we build. And today, dear listeners, and joined by a lovely guest, please welcome Sean Robbins. So welcome to the show. Hi, happy to be here. Amazing. Thank you, thank you so much, Sean, for being here. And uh, dear listeners, like before we get into the discussion, I'd quickly have to introduce you to Sean. So he's a best-selling Canadian science fiction author with 49 novels to his name and nearly 200,000 books sold. Huge and a lifetime of experience stirring the chaos of purely oppositional OCD into creative that approval storytelling. So I do not want to take much of a time dear response. Let's get started.
Welcome to the show again. So, Sean, like a lot of people they think that OCD is all about being neat or organized, maybe uh washing your hands a lot of time. So you live with purely obsessional OCD. So, which is different? Like, so what do you wish like more people understood about what that actually feels like day to day?
SPEAKER_01
Actually, you just described my life in the beginning of the show. You ask, what if your mind goes in a loop and it doesn't stop, right? Yeah, that's basically pure O, purely obsessional OCD. It's just like the normal OCD, but instead of washing your hands, it's a thought. It appears out of nowhere, you think about it, you make a decision, you justify it, whatever, you put it aside, 30 seconds later it comes back. Okay, and then same process. 30 seconds later it comes back. Just like the person who cannot stop washing his hands, you can't stop thinking about it. And trust me when I tell you, it's torture. When it starts, your life finishes for as long as this process continues, which could be a few days, could be a few weeks, could be a few months, and it always can start over the silliest things, like something that any logical normal person would laugh at, you will sit down and think about it for five days. It's it's a really bad thing.
SPEAKER_00
Okay, so okay, and and when those intrusive thoughts show up, so then what is the first thing that happens in your body or in your mind that signals this is not just a kind of passing worry?
let's say As soon as see if it is a passing worry, if it is scientifically, and I'm not a doctor, but they say there is this chemical in your brain, in a normal brain, that takes a thought from your front lobe and takes it to be stored in back here, right? And apparently people who have this problem and all other kinds of OCD miss that chemical, whatever its name is. So when a thought starts in my front lobe, it doesn't get back to get stored. It keeps being repeated and repeated and repeated. As soon as the same thought comes back five times in a minute, you know that oh my god, here we go again.
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, obviously, like it's a kind of I'd say a reminder that mental health conditions don't always look the way we expect them. So the invisible struggles are often the hardest to name it. And naming them is where the work actually begins.
So, like as you have said, that writing became a therapeutic method for you. So, what was it putting the words on a page and about building fictional worlds that helped you manage something as persistent as purely kind of obsessional OCD as well? So, what is it?
SPEAKER_01
Well, I struggled with what we just discussed for years, right? I tried so many things. I tried medication, I tried meditation, I you all kind of therapies, nothing ever worked. Then once I read somewhere that people who have this problem, it's because they have an overly active imagination. And if they can channel that into something creative, that helps, right? So nine years ago, I had a fight with my now ex-wife, and my mind just started the loop, and I was like, oh my god, here goes the next six months. And then I figured, you know what, let's try. Let's try something creative, right? On that note, I've always wanted to be a writer. Like I'm a real bookworm, right? So, and it's one of those childhood dreams that you know you grow up and you get a career and you go to work and you forget about it. But then, and I never thought I would have the discipline to sit at the laptop and write and write and write for hours and hours a day, right? But then this happened. So I sat down, I wrote my first book, and it turned out to be extremely helpful, a lot of fun, and then very, very successful. So nine years later, here I am. OCD is mostly gun, but it's not gun, it's replaced by now stories, you know, because really your mind cannot think about two things at the same time, right? And mine, when it starts thinking about the story, then there is no room left for something else. Now my mind thinks about the story non-stop, and that's how I ended up with 46. You said 49, that's because I have 46 published books, and then I started a new series, which I thought is gonna be three books, but at this point it's gonna be four books by the time it's finished, right? Let's say 46 published books, and yeah, 200,000 books sold on that note. That's actually something like 120,000 books and audiobooks, and 21 million pages read on KU. It's easier to put them together and say 200,000.
SPEAKER_00
So, like, was there a specific moment or say a specific story where you felt that shift where the writing stopped being just an escape and became something that actually helped you process what was happening inside.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, exactly the story that I told you. From the first day that I started writing, like for real, you could feel the shift. You could see that. My mind started putting the same energy that it used to put into looping thoughts, into coming up with the stories, right? So that's how I come up with so many ideas, because now it's one idea after another. As soon as I finish a book, there is an idea for another book, and so on and so forth. My mind used to have like 50,000 looping thoughts a day, most of which would make me miserable. Now it has several hundred book ideas and then keeps chewing over them, you know, which is why I go for a walk and I come back and there is a book in my mind. So it has been very helpful, extremely rewarding, and also good for my bank accounts.
SPEAKER_00
That's really interesting, you know. And and when we are talking about this, like something powerful about uh externalizing what loops inside us. And writing doesn't erase the thoughts, but it gives them somewhere to go, and sometimes that's enough to break the cycle as well. So, and if we talk about our daily life, right? So, from
there I'll I'll come like for someone who doesn't write 49 novels, who maybe doesn't write at all, so then how does this show up in their everyday life? Like, what does it look like when the OCD is active and you are trying to function, to work, to connect with people? So that time.
SPEAKER_01
Say anything creative doesn't need to be writing, could be a sculptor, could be painting, right? Anything that would channel this energy into something creative. My own personal experience is that it really works, and it's not like it's some new idea that I came up with, I experienced it firsthand, but there is a ton of literature about this. That's something, in fact, it's it's believed that a lot of scientists, authors, you know, there are people who have slight or big mental issues, and that's how they ended up being inventors and authors and musicians, you know. So I would say anything creative, but it has to be something that you enjoy, right? Like if you if you hate writing, you're not gonna write and deal with this problem. But there should be something that you like, it's creative, it would really help with this problem. And I haven't experienced this one myself personally, but I bet it helps with normal OCD also. Because that also comes from an overactive imagination, you know? So when see what happens is that you feel the urge to go and wash your hands, and you really feel you start thinking that if you don't wash your hands, something terrible is going to happen. But if your mind is busy producing, say, story, that second stage is not going to come. The part that if I don't wash my hands, something terrible is going to happen will not come because you're thinking about something completely different. So my suggestion would be: whoever is suffering from this, I'm not saying it's gonna be a silver bullet and solves everything. I'm just saying, based on my own personal experience, pick something that you like, something creative, whatever that is, and apply yourself to that, that would take care of or at least help with DOCD. And if you're lucky, a few years later you would end up like me. That that thing that you started as therapy becomes a second or in fact a main income in your life.
SPEAKER_00
I agree. That is interesting, yes. And like, how do you navigate the gap between what's happening internally and what you are able to show or explain to the people about you?
SPEAKER_01
So I'm sorry, I didn't catch the question.
SPEAKER_00
I'm saying, like, how do you actually talk about the gap which is between uh what's happening internally and what you are able to show or explain to the people around you?
SPEAKER_01
Just the way that I just did it right now. I just explained everything that was going in my mind in I would say very simple English. So that's what I would do. If I want to talk about this, it's the way that I just talked to you. I just explained my thought process, the science behind the whole thing, and a possible solution, which has worked great for me. I'm just hoping that maybe, maybe some people who watch this or listen to this would go ahead and try something similar and have the same success. It helps them in their lives. Then I think our job here is done.
Like, so you mentioned about writing as a therapeutic method, not about just a kind of distraction. So, what do you think? I mean, what does that process actually look like for you? Like, is it structured or is it spontaneous or is it something that you return to when things get hard?
SPEAKER_01
No, it's something completely spontaneous and ongoing. So it is not a structured at all. I know a lot of authors they have like a strategy, they say, okay, I must write to the market, so it's gonna be like if you research, and the the hero has to be like this, and then the story has to have these beats. For me, it's none of that. For me, it comes spontaneously and continuously, as in it never stops, which 46 books is proof of that, right? And as soon as I like just recently, I wrote this four-book series, which did very well, and because it did very well, I really pushed myself to finish it. Because you know, you publish a book, it explodes, you wait six months to publish a second book, by that time everybody has forgotten about it, right? So I published books two, three, and four really quickly. I worked hard, hours a day, I finished. The next day I sit here when I'm talking to you, and I'm like, I I heaved a sigh of relief, and I was like, oh good, I can take a rest now. And a thought came to my mind that asked, what will happen if a combat android has free will? That was it. By the end of the breakfast, I had the new series in my mind. So answering the two question, completely spontaneous, and I'm going. Once you start, and I'm assuming it's for anything creative that you do, it's not something that you do when you have a problem or you want to distract yourself, it's continuous.
SPEAKER_00
So in in that process, do you find any certain kind of words or stories or the characters help more than the others, or is it like more about the act of certain uh I mean creation itself?
SPEAKER_01
No, it's it's creation. I jokingly say it's like Godhood. I create a new universe, universe, right? I often say it's like these things are really happening in an alternate universe, and I just watch and report. I do not sit down and say, okay, my character should be like this, and then the story this should happen so that people would like it. Things, it's like things really actually happen. And sometimes the things that happen are very controversial, and people might hate them, but this is how it is.
SPEAKER_00
Exactly. And wow, I mean it sounds like the stories uh become a language for things that didn't have words otherwise. And that's not just a therapy, that's a survival through meaning making, I'd say.
thing. Not that you just mentioned meaning. This everything that I told you is that the therapy, the financial aspects, just the fact that people read my books makes me happy, right? But the meaning that it gives your life, that's really awesome. Before this all started, I'm an English teacher, I work in a college here in Abu Zebi. People ask me what's your job, and I'm like, I'm a teacher. Now it's like I'm an author, and then it becomes a legacy. Like you want to have as many books as written, and I honestly say this whenever I'm gone, people will still read my books for years to come. You know, the whole thing gives your life meaning.
SPEAKER_00
That is true, that is very, very true. And and like, I mean, how do you sustain this practice over time? Like, I mean, after 49 novels, after years of using writing this way, what do you do when writing itself feels very hard, or when kind of OCD pushes back and makes it harder to create things? So neither of those has happened.
SPEAKER_01
Okay. People ask me, no, honestly, people ask me because there is something called the writer's block, apparently. People ask me what will happen if if you face that. And I'm like, it has never happened. My problem is the exact opposite. My problem is that my brain works so hard that I cannot catch up with it. There is not enough time for me. I just told you, this last year, I finished a fourth book series. As soon as that finished, I did a six book series. As soon as that finished, I started the new series, which as of now is gonna be four books. My problem is there is not enough time to catch up with this, you know? So no, that wouldn't happen.
And like I said, since told, yes, sometimes OCD pushes back so hard that even this cannot deal with that. Those are really big events. When the war in Ukraine started, my ex-wife is Ukrainian, she was in Ukraine, she was in Kiev. I totally lost my mind for like three or four months. When COVID started, and here in Abu Zdadi, we were under the most serious lockdown you can imagine. I had a really hard time coping. But those are once-in-a-generation events, which I know happened to me twice in a few years, but those are not everyday events that we are trying to deal with, right? In those two particular occasions, I honestly confess that writing didn't help and neither did anything else. But for your everyday normal life, super helpful. And I want to emphasize again, I'm not saying even necessarily writing, I'm saying anything creative, anything that channels this loop into something creative would help.
And if you have to give one advice to the listeners today who are listening right now, maybe they'll be listening later, what that will be.
SPEAKER_01
Same thing that I said two or three times already. Choose something creative that you like and start doing it. Just start, right? As soon as you start and you keep at it, give it a few days. Then you will see what I hope, I hope you will see what I experienced. Again, um it's this is not like something that I say, I'm not a doctor, but there is a ton of literature about this, which is how I found this to begin with, right? Give it a few days, keep at it, and hopefully you will see the difference between when your mind just wanders around non-stop, whichever way it likes, or when it is channeled into something creative. And if listeners want to connect with you, how they can connect. Just Google my name, Sean Robbins, with six books, six, sorry, 46 published books. I'm all over, right? But the easiest way would be to find me on Amazon because I have my own Amazon page. Again, look for Sean Robbins. Sean is like Sean Connery, S-A-N, and Robbins is like the ice cream with one P. And you will definitely see pages after pages after pages of my books and myself. I'm all over.
listeners, what I'll do is I'll put all the links, details, everything into the show notes for your easy reference. And yeah, I'll just say like sometimes the tools that save us are not the ones that we went looking for, they are the ones we stumbled into and the ones that are built without permission, the ones that give give us a way to keep going when nothing else would. Right. So I definitely thank Sean for sharing your perspectives and be here. And it is it is really helpful to clarify about the misconceptions and what people think about OCD. So uh thank you so much for that. And also uh thank you everyone for being here to whosoever is listening right now, or maybe you'll be listening later.
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you know what would make me very happy if somebody writes to you in a few days or a few weeks and says, I tried this and it worked. Thank you guys. If it happened, please let me know.
SPEAKER_00
Exactly, exactly. And like everyone who's listening, uh, maybe the question is not whether you have the right tools to manage what you are carrying right now, or maybe it's whether you are willing to try. Like Sean said, just try it and share your personal I mean, what you think, what you felt. It will be really helpful, right? So do let us know over the social media and on the podcast channels as well. And that's the beginning. So, with this hope, this is your host, Avik, and this is Mind Meets Machine. Take care of your mind, and we'll talk again soon. Thank you so much.
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