PornIsHealthy
Member
April 23, 2019?(viewed porn today) I started to quit porn 4 years ago and have relapsed on average once a month. As soon as I feel my sexual energy Slowing down or entering flatline, I rush back to porn to invigorate my system. And in the very short term it works. I become horny again. My penis becomes sensitive again. This cycle has consumed more energy than any other goal I?ve ever set in my life. After four years of trying I?ve never made it to 90 days without porn.
At the core is a subconscious belief that porn amps up my system and makes me more interested in sex. My sexual desire and pursuit of women is an important driving force in my life, perhaps too important. Chasing women is a constant project that keeps me occupied and gives my life meaning. So when I quit porn for 30 or 40 days and my sexual energy starts to change it always panics me and it?s this phenomenon that I want to explore in this journal as I try once again to make it to 90 days without porn stimulation.
For the last six months I?ve had an accountability partner through the Covenant Eyes software. This may be effective for some people, but for me it proved to be counterproductive because the accountability partner started to take on an authority figure presence in my life. He never said anything aggressive or did anything wrong. But simply the fact that I had somebody out there watching me seemed to inspire me to beat the system and Evade His monitoring of my Internet use. So whenever I had a chance to use a computer that wasn?t monitored or watch porn on a hotel TV I took the opportunity. For me having an accountability partner was extrinsic motivation and the only thing that?s going to get me to 90 days is internal motivation.
I?ve found that daily journaling is the most important tool for me in this addiction cycle. Daily writing helps me refocus on my own internal motivation For giving up porn.
The reason I want to give up porn is my desire to return to my organic state of sexuality. This is a state I have never experienced in my life because I?ve been watching porn since age 14. 23 years of porn. And at this point in my life I don?t think I want to get married and have a family, which is a Very big life decision. Imagine if I am making that decision because of porn. What if porn makes monogamy and married life seem less attractive because my mind is so saturated with images of 19-year-old girls in my virtual harem. I also have a girlfriend and when we have sex sometimes my penis is somewhat numb and I lose interest. Perhaps this is natural. Maybe that?s just what happens when we have sex three or four times per week, my body is tired. But what if my body is Desensitized because it expects constant novelty it learned from chronic porn use?
Society tells me that porn can?t possibly alter my desires and sexuality this profoundly. Maybe that?s true. Or Maybe that?s very wrong and science simply has not caught up with the realities of high-speed Internet porn on demand. What is absolutely certain is that I have to run my own personal experiments. I have to make it to 90 days and then 180 days and then one year without pornographic stimulation in order to start observing my body?s natural sexuality and my body?s natural sexual response to being with real women. I personally do not know the effect that pornography has had on me because I?ve never lived without it. Maybe I make it to a year without pornography and don?t notice any real differences. Maybe everything changes. Maybe my penis become so sensitive that sex becomes more intense, even when I am only having sex with one woman for multiple years. At the moment I can?t even conceive of doing that because I have to pursue sexual novelty by dating multiple women and dating women for short periods of time. Maybe that is just in my genetic make up but I will never know unless I make it for a significant amount of time without the influence of pornography in my sexual desires. Please post your thoughts. I?m going to be journaling here most days.
There are many triggers to my porn habit. Today I am stuck in a hotel in a foreign country with a horrible cold and fever and pornography was comforting and entertaining. And other times my girlfriend is coming to visit and because she lives in another city sometimes I don?t have sex for a month. And before her arrival I want to make sure my erection and sexual desire is as strong as possible so I go back to pornography to wake up my system. Perhaps the biggest trigger is simply boredom. I realize that porn uses very often a symptom that you are not doing enough with your life. That you have too much time alone. Too much time at home and for the computer. Not enough time pursuing projects. Pursuing competition. Pursuing interesting social ties and economic wins. These are all the things that make in man?s biology balanced. Competition, social standing, projects, nature, intense exercise. I?ve noticed that pornography is a way of avoiding all of these much-needed but difficult endeavors. It?s always so much easier to get your satisfaction from opening up your laptop and lubing up your palm to masturbate to pixelated images of the kind of women you should be with In real life. Porn is also a way of dealing with pretty much any emotional need do you have. The need to be consoled. The need to be entertained. The need for distraction from pain. Basically any emotional situation you find yourself, porn can help for a few hours just like alcohol and marijuana really. Porn helps you regulate your emotions states in a readily available dopaminergic well of self help.
Over the past four years of trying to give up porn I?ve learned a lot. The way I write it sounds like I am critically addicted to pornography.But I?m not. At my worst I watch pornography once a week and at best once per month. That is far less than the average man consumes almost anywhere in the world, especially in the United States. But in reducing my use to this level it?s helped bring into focus the addictive nature of pornography. When you are constantly using porn every day or so you don?t realize it?s an addiction because you are always feeding your desire for it. But when you?re using it once per month you really start to pay attention to the craving which can get pretty intense at times and you start to listen to the rationalizations you?re addicted brain produces to get one more pornographic session. Your brain says, you haven?t watch porn in a month, you?re making great progress, you can enjoy a little bit of pornography today because you are using it so rarely you can?t have a negative affect on you. You deserve it, today has been stressful, you need it to sleep. The Addicted brain rattles off countless rationalizations like these and this whole debate is happening in your brain really intensely on top of the feelings of nervousness, the subtle anxiety it starts to build up when you don?t have porn to release your normal addicted cycle of sexual energy.
In this Journal I will not count days. I realized that is counterproductive Because I put so much emphasis on specific day counts that I lose track of the larger meaning of this project. Which is returning to my organic sexuality and filling my life with enough endeavors and activities that porn seems increasingly like a waste of time.I will simply state the date and then whether or not I viewed pornography. Or whether or not I viewed softcore edging material like YouTube, Instagram or Google images. Or when I had a day that was 100% clean.
I realized that softcore edging material is a sure fire path towards pornographic relapse. Even if I start off one day looking at models on Instagram that I may very well know in real life. The next day I return, a few days later I search for some sort of models or actresses on YouTube and within a week I inevitably return to pornography. The day-to-day battle happens with soft core edging material. Never convince yourself that actresses bare butt Instagram photos are not a problem. Every relapse I have ever had in the past four years began with some sort of innocent seeming edging material several days before. Those images wedged themselves in my consciousness, caused sexualized dreams and daydreams and inevitably built towards porn within just a few days or weeks even but I could always trace a relapse back to softcore edging material. Therefore the two tenants of this no porn project for me Will be daily journaling to emphasize and keep clear my motivations as well as a strict policy on edging material such as Instagram and YouTube and Google image searching and Netflix. All of these things stimulate my pornographic addiction sometimes for months and months without actually viewing pornography but always keeping me very close to viewing porn. Edging material is the enemy to anyone trying to give up porn.
At the core is a subconscious belief that porn amps up my system and makes me more interested in sex. My sexual desire and pursuit of women is an important driving force in my life, perhaps too important. Chasing women is a constant project that keeps me occupied and gives my life meaning. So when I quit porn for 30 or 40 days and my sexual energy starts to change it always panics me and it?s this phenomenon that I want to explore in this journal as I try once again to make it to 90 days without porn stimulation.
For the last six months I?ve had an accountability partner through the Covenant Eyes software. This may be effective for some people, but for me it proved to be counterproductive because the accountability partner started to take on an authority figure presence in my life. He never said anything aggressive or did anything wrong. But simply the fact that I had somebody out there watching me seemed to inspire me to beat the system and Evade His monitoring of my Internet use. So whenever I had a chance to use a computer that wasn?t monitored or watch porn on a hotel TV I took the opportunity. For me having an accountability partner was extrinsic motivation and the only thing that?s going to get me to 90 days is internal motivation.
I?ve found that daily journaling is the most important tool for me in this addiction cycle. Daily writing helps me refocus on my own internal motivation For giving up porn.
The reason I want to give up porn is my desire to return to my organic state of sexuality. This is a state I have never experienced in my life because I?ve been watching porn since age 14. 23 years of porn. And at this point in my life I don?t think I want to get married and have a family, which is a Very big life decision. Imagine if I am making that decision because of porn. What if porn makes monogamy and married life seem less attractive because my mind is so saturated with images of 19-year-old girls in my virtual harem. I also have a girlfriend and when we have sex sometimes my penis is somewhat numb and I lose interest. Perhaps this is natural. Maybe that?s just what happens when we have sex three or four times per week, my body is tired. But what if my body is Desensitized because it expects constant novelty it learned from chronic porn use?
Society tells me that porn can?t possibly alter my desires and sexuality this profoundly. Maybe that?s true. Or Maybe that?s very wrong and science simply has not caught up with the realities of high-speed Internet porn on demand. What is absolutely certain is that I have to run my own personal experiments. I have to make it to 90 days and then 180 days and then one year without pornographic stimulation in order to start observing my body?s natural sexuality and my body?s natural sexual response to being with real women. I personally do not know the effect that pornography has had on me because I?ve never lived without it. Maybe I make it to a year without pornography and don?t notice any real differences. Maybe everything changes. Maybe my penis become so sensitive that sex becomes more intense, even when I am only having sex with one woman for multiple years. At the moment I can?t even conceive of doing that because I have to pursue sexual novelty by dating multiple women and dating women for short periods of time. Maybe that is just in my genetic make up but I will never know unless I make it for a significant amount of time without the influence of pornography in my sexual desires. Please post your thoughts. I?m going to be journaling here most days.
There are many triggers to my porn habit. Today I am stuck in a hotel in a foreign country with a horrible cold and fever and pornography was comforting and entertaining. And other times my girlfriend is coming to visit and because she lives in another city sometimes I don?t have sex for a month. And before her arrival I want to make sure my erection and sexual desire is as strong as possible so I go back to pornography to wake up my system. Perhaps the biggest trigger is simply boredom. I realize that porn uses very often a symptom that you are not doing enough with your life. That you have too much time alone. Too much time at home and for the computer. Not enough time pursuing projects. Pursuing competition. Pursuing interesting social ties and economic wins. These are all the things that make in man?s biology balanced. Competition, social standing, projects, nature, intense exercise. I?ve noticed that pornography is a way of avoiding all of these much-needed but difficult endeavors. It?s always so much easier to get your satisfaction from opening up your laptop and lubing up your palm to masturbate to pixelated images of the kind of women you should be with In real life. Porn is also a way of dealing with pretty much any emotional need do you have. The need to be consoled. The need to be entertained. The need for distraction from pain. Basically any emotional situation you find yourself, porn can help for a few hours just like alcohol and marijuana really. Porn helps you regulate your emotions states in a readily available dopaminergic well of self help.
Over the past four years of trying to give up porn I?ve learned a lot. The way I write it sounds like I am critically addicted to pornography.But I?m not. At my worst I watch pornography once a week and at best once per month. That is far less than the average man consumes almost anywhere in the world, especially in the United States. But in reducing my use to this level it?s helped bring into focus the addictive nature of pornography. When you are constantly using porn every day or so you don?t realize it?s an addiction because you are always feeding your desire for it. But when you?re using it once per month you really start to pay attention to the craving which can get pretty intense at times and you start to listen to the rationalizations you?re addicted brain produces to get one more pornographic session. Your brain says, you haven?t watch porn in a month, you?re making great progress, you can enjoy a little bit of pornography today because you are using it so rarely you can?t have a negative affect on you. You deserve it, today has been stressful, you need it to sleep. The Addicted brain rattles off countless rationalizations like these and this whole debate is happening in your brain really intensely on top of the feelings of nervousness, the subtle anxiety it starts to build up when you don?t have porn to release your normal addicted cycle of sexual energy.
In this Journal I will not count days. I realized that is counterproductive Because I put so much emphasis on specific day counts that I lose track of the larger meaning of this project. Which is returning to my organic sexuality and filling my life with enough endeavors and activities that porn seems increasingly like a waste of time.I will simply state the date and then whether or not I viewed pornography. Or whether or not I viewed softcore edging material like YouTube, Instagram or Google images. Or when I had a day that was 100% clean.
I realized that softcore edging material is a sure fire path towards pornographic relapse. Even if I start off one day looking at models on Instagram that I may very well know in real life. The next day I return, a few days later I search for some sort of models or actresses on YouTube and within a week I inevitably return to pornography. The day-to-day battle happens with soft core edging material. Never convince yourself that actresses bare butt Instagram photos are not a problem. Every relapse I have ever had in the past four years began with some sort of innocent seeming edging material several days before. Those images wedged themselves in my consciousness, caused sexualized dreams and daydreams and inevitably built towards porn within just a few days or weeks even but I could always trace a relapse back to softcore edging material. Therefore the two tenants of this no porn project for me Will be daily journaling to emphasize and keep clear my motivations as well as a strict policy on edging material such as Instagram and YouTube and Google image searching and Netflix. All of these things stimulate my pornographic addiction sometimes for months and months without actually viewing pornography but always keeping me very close to viewing porn. Edging material is the enemy to anyone trying to give up porn.