Why beating porn is hard and what to do about it

[ziva]

So look. I think it comes down to this. Humans have all sorts of drives. But the drive to have sex, is probably the strongest of them all.
We ignore hunger for sex. We sacrifice sleep for sex. We travel for sex. We look good for sex. We act tough for sex. We act nice for sex. And a lot of us pay thousands of dollars to someone who can help us have sex. Of course it's not all about the sex. Intimacy, companionship, validation, and self-worth all have to do with this as well. But we can't ignore the fact that almost all of us are here because of some sexual problem.

What does this have to do with porn? Well if you're a healthy human being, chances are you will have the desire to procreate at some point. You will get horny. You will long for a sexual partner. When you jack off to porn, you trick your brain into thinking it just had sex. That by itself is the main reason why porn is addictive. But the reason why porn may even be more interesting than actual sex for a lot of people, is because it's an unnatural super sexual stimulus. This shit is like drugs man. You want to stop watching it but you just can't. Or you say you can stop whenever you want to, but never actually tried.

If you are healthy and you stay healthy, you will inevitably want intimacy (even if you don't realize it yet!). If you have a lot great sex but still watch porn from time to time, and the porn doesn't affect you whatsoever, fair enough. But that's not most of us. Most of us who watch porn are probably addicted and have (almost) no intimacy. Of course your brain wants intimacy, so it urges you to watch porn. The only form of reliable intimacy it knows.

I can tell you from firsthand experience that laying off the porn is 100x easier when you have intimacy elsewhere. In this case I'm talking about seeing girls. If you find yourself having trouble to stay off porn, but you're also at home everyday seeing 0 girls. It will be hard for you. I have some friends that can more easily lay off the porn when they decide to, but they always end up watching it again soon after. Also those friends happen to be intimate with girls more frequently, which may prove my point. I just don't believe that the majority of us can be a chronically online basement dweller, and also somehow not watch porn. I think you really have to try and become more intimate with actual girls, and porn will just not be that important by default.

Thanks for reading, I just had to spit this out somewhere :ugeek:

 

[NightRoller]

Another important factor, in addition to sex, is that humans are social creatures. When we have more deep interpersonal relationships, sexual or otherwise, it fulfills more of the inner desire, and porn then seems more like a distraction than a pleasure source.

Make life more interesting to live, and your brain will have less urges to escape

 

[Luniac]

I was a porn addict since I was 10, at 23 I realized it was a harmful addiction and it needed to stop.

At 29 I could confidently say I was no longer a “porn addict”

At almost 33 I’m still not a porn addict and I never will be again.

In the 6 years I devoted to trying to stop my porn addiction I have of course tried so many mental gymnastics and strategies.

at the risk of sounding cliche, the missing key ingredient was “self love and acceptance”.

I’ve been doing some physical practices involving standing kung fu meditation which began the process of getting out of my head and paying more attention to how I actually feel
Eventually I found an internal kung fu teacher and the “vibe” in class was so “friendly, loving, peaceful, joyful, cheerful, lighthearted” whatever word you wanna use, every time I left class I felt a sense of lightness in my heart and soul, I just felt happier.

This is when I began to change my approach to my porn addiction, instead of futilely resisting the urge to PMO, then doing it usually hunched over my computer rubbing a quick one out within minutes and then inevitably self loathing afterwards,

What I did was say “ok I’m gonna PMO, I can feel the irresistible and that’s ok because I love and accept myself. So I’m gonna do everything in my power to help make my PMO session as comfortable, pleasurable, rewarding as I can.

So instead of hunching over at the computer rubbing one out quickly, I got coconut oil and relaxed comfortable on my couch, instead of doing it quickly I eased into it with softcore videos and jerking slowly with feeling and attention to my pleasure and comfort.

And when I was done I calmly went to bathroom washed up and calmly continued my day without a second thought or any self loathing.

The next day an interesting thing happened, the almost “spa” like experienced I gave myself still felt “fresh” in my mind, I still felt “satisfied” with yesterdays session… and so I didn’t feel as much of an urge to PMO that day

And that’s it!!! This was the key breakthrough I’ve been looking all these years!! Instead of endlessly fighting fighting fighting this monster of an addiction, I simply changed my relationship to “it”, I literally stopped fighting and started loving.

Within a few months I got to only doing PMO every 4 days or so until one day I just kept going past a month, 2 months…. Up to 4 months… and then boom I felt for what felt like the first time in many years… SEX DRIVE, I read Andy’s tinder guide and the rest was history I was finally meeting women in real life.


Have I jerked off to porn since, yea here and there. Writing this now I can report that I haven’t ejaculates to porn in probably over a month or so? And before it can easily be weeks between sessions

I am truly no longer an addict as in I don’t care if I jerk of to porn or I don’t do it, I have zero fear of relapse I have literally rewired my brain as my relationship to porn is fundamentally changed.

I don’t do PMO like I don’t do cigarettes which I’ve never smoked, it’s just not interesting activity for my time.

This is how I “beat” porn, I never had to beat “it”, I was fighting myself the whole time without even realizing it.

You won’t find this kind of advice at the NoFap subreddit

Best of luck

 

[Zug]

I just don't believe that the majority of us can be a chronically online basement dweller, and also somehow not watch porn.

Yes you can. I did a 2 month break during my journey as a basement dweller. Its possible. Honestly, its a fucking relief to not have porn as a routine. The worst part of porn is the routine part, and the constant searching for new porn and novelty. I just didn't want to be that guy anymore. I didn't gain any super powers as a result, but everything got slightly better. I got more time in the day, I hated myself less, I had less in my life I was ashamed about, and I had to learn to manage my emotions via walking instead.

I think people make this shit too binary. PMO once a month, vs once a week, vs once a day is huge fucking difference. It's the same process as learning to tell the truth all the time. Getting to 95% is easy, 98% is challenging, 99% is really hard, 99.9% is sublime. If you go 2 weeks and relapse just get back on the horse. You don't need to spend a whole day masturbating then a whole week hating yourself for giving in and giving yourself an emotional rollercoaster.

One hack I used after everytime I broke a streak was to ask myself "How good was that really?". Be honest with yourself. Was it really that great? It rarely was. If anything, it was impossible to not bust immediately and there was very little to enjoy. Once you destroy the fake allure its easy to resist.

 

[Squilliam]

Yes you can. I did a 2 month break during my journey as a basement dweller. Its possible. Honestly, its a fucking relief to not have porn as a routine. The worst part of porn is the routine part, and the constant searching for new porn and novelty. I just didn't want to be that guy anymore. I didn't gain any super powers as a result, but everything got slightly better. I got more time in the day, I hated myself less, I had less in my life I was ashamed about, and I had to learn to manage my emotions via walking instead.

I think people make this shit too binary. PMO once a month, vs once a week, vs once a day is huge fucking difference. It's the same process as learning to tell the truth all the time. Getting to 95% is easy, 98% is challenging, 99% is really hard, 99.9% is sublime. If you go 2 weeks and relapse just get back on the horse. You don't need to spend a whole day masturbating then a whole week hating yourself for giving in and giving yourself an emotional rollercoaster.

Personally I find that I can stay away from porn fairly easily and rather masturbation is my issue. I'm essentially addicted to the MO part of PMO. Porn can be powerful too but honestly I'm extremely picky with what I'll watch and as a result I've been choosing to jerk off without it recently. I guess I feel like I'm the kind of guy who feels much more attracted to people that they have an actual emotional connection with/they know. I couldn't understand why my peers were so non-picky with their porn growing up, whereas I felt like I was way more attracted to girls in my class. Porn didn't feel the same.

Maybe this works for you, but with my addictive tendencies I feel like I can't really just do once a week or once a month. Once I fap once I feel like I can't really stop fapping, assuming it was a really good feeling. I might stop for a few hours but then I'll usually do it 2 or maybe even 3 more times that day.

So I've been doing NoFap for the past day or so and I'm actually feeling relatively okay with it. My rationale is I want to enjoy my sex and not have death grip where I feel nothing.

One hack I used after everytime I broke a streak was to ask myself "How good was that really?". Be honest with yourself. Was it really that great? It rarely was. If anything, it was impossible to not bust immediately and there was very little to enjoy. Once you destroy the fake allure its easy to resist.

Unfortunately for me, the answer to this question sometimes is very. I guess that's where the addictive tendencies come in. I just tend to feel more pleasure from certain things like substances and orgasms than most people do. Which makes me just want more of it non stop.