What is it like when I'm obsessed with something? Does my thinking follow a pattern? Describe.

"Obsessed"...To have the mind excessively preoccupied with a single topic.
A. What's it like to be obsessed?
Hmmm. Back in the using days it was "normal". I was obsessed with drugs, perfectly described in the NA meeting pre-amble: "getting & using and finding ways and means to get more".

After 16 years of recovery, I find obsession to be unpleasant and am deeply suspicious of my mind doing this. I can get obssessed with people : A passing interaction with some random woman can see me obsessed; imagining scenarios that result in me selfishly experiencing her sexuality. Or some other interaction with (typically) a male that leaves me feeling disrespected and bitter; allowing me to sink into yet another pit of resentment. I have earnt many methods to avoid this ugliness.

• I pray for them.
• I write my petty bitterness on paper and burn prayerfully.
• I challenge my arrogance, that gives me seemingly god-like abilites to interpret the motives of others

B. Does my thinking follow a pattern?

Hmmm. Not so much a pattern of thinking, more a pattern of experience: My focus turns inward. I am no longer living in the moment, allowing life's sounds and sights and feelings to move past me: The focus moves inside my head, switching from my memory of the whatever caused the pain to projections of vengeance.