The Long Way Home

zackergeet

Active Member
Relapse.

Not directly, but in my heart at the end of the day I knew I had crossed the threshold. I had decided to take the day off and when I was reading something for my own pleasure, the "stranger" (with its seductive chant) prompted me, just like that, out of nowhere. Long story short, I ended up looking at ads and then short pornography clips for hours. It was a real battle to stave it off. I ended up deciding to masturbate having a bath but without any images or anything (but the fire from having watched so much certainly was coursing through me).

---

The first voice that came to me was that I had failed, and that I had been failing for the past weeks, that I was going downhill. That when I believing things were going better they were actually headed for the worse. There was a sense that I had deserved this, that I deserved to crash and that I actually was no better than this.

Then came the second voice. The rebellious voice: things were not getting worse, I have had a few setbacks but on the whole I was doing better! Better - not perfect! And all that was not to waste; it is not wasted, for as long as I persist. You either change in the other's terms or you change on your own.

Sometime later a third voice announced itself. I have been working relentlessly for the past weeks, and I just don't have a good mechanism to ease this intensity. The relapse happened exactly as I tried to calm down from work; when I'm fully in work-mode there is (usually) no real issue. Deeper change will no doubt still be needed. I need to harness a stronger power still--find my power in the world.

I don't see what happened yesterday as a failure, but a communication that there is still more work to do on myself. The system for the past 13 weeks has worked comparatively well--damn well, in fact--but now I get the chance to learn, reflect and tweak it further. This relapse is an opportunity for even more growth and development. So I already started going to the gym and to the swimming pool, I try to keep minimum 2 sessions a week but ideally I want 3. I have then the physical stuff down. What I need more of, however, is the social stuff, or perhaps also something new.

Something else that's been bugging my mind over the past several weeks is that working this hard doesn't make me directly happy (classic, I know). What I mean is that I do enjoy most of the time the work, keeping busy, etc. But then there are moments where I go like "oofff, what is all this for? At the end of the day, I always return alone. Nothing I do is for anyone other than myself. But I am also nothing for anyone else." This last cannot be true, because my closest friends are not nothing to me, and so, being a proper friendship, I cannot be less than nothing for them. This thought is just plain false. Be that as it may, perhaps it genuinely expresses my emotional self?

@Orbiter Thanks for your thoughts dude! I agree completely with what you say, and I deleted the apps this morning. Unfortunately, there is just no way I can take a week off (I'm at the end of my degree here). At best, I can take a day off, which is what I tried to do yesterday (and we see what happened...). It's weird, it's like I'm stuck in a work-spiral, but I'm unable to find anything else for myself or relax quietly for a single day without getting "ambush
I totally get you wolfman, sometimes when you are triggered it is difficult to stop it. But you have to remember how many days you have been working to be free of PMO, the bad sides, how good it feels when you no longer depend on that. I felt super tempted a few days ago but iI closed the web pages when I started to feel this burn, this urge, this overwhelming sensation that only wants you to end up masterbating, but i have been free for more than 80 days so i do not want to throw out my progress and I definitely do not want to have a chick in front of me wanting me and me not being able to perform, leaving her cold and unwanted, I felt miserable when that happened to me because i developed PIED. Remember why you are doing this, work hard and harder everytime and don't let yourself go, keep fighting, the benefits of a life without PMO or at least without P excel everything not only sexually but in every area of your life. You can do it my friend!
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Hey Wolfman,

What you said in your previous post about "growth and development" is exactly right.

I saw this video today in which legendary Italian goalskeeper Gigi Buffon talks openly about his battle against depression. it is one of the greatest videos about recovery, growth, development that I've ever seen. I thought I'd share.


Thanks for this @forceisstrong2 ! I watched it and it made me think of how certain symptoms can trick us into thinking things are better than they are (the guy in the video was feeling tired and unmotived, and it's only once it's gone several days that he figures something deeper is wrong). I also think the need of new impulses is really crucial; definitely need more of that. [I had to mute the sound though because I did not like the sentimental music trying to impose itself on me, heh]

@zackergeet thanks for your support, dude! I wish the amount of progress as streaks would itself act as a deterrent to break it, but having had year-long and months-long streaks, I've come to need something stronger and active. I let an app do the counting for me and I try to keep my focus on just doing stuff with life.

Times are just superintense now that I'm coming to the end of a degree. There is a lot of pressure and I can feel my head really taking a beating. But none of this was the case until that relapse: that thing just opened up lots of volatility (somethings I find breathing to be heavy, or just sudden small moments of panic) and I haven't quite regained footing since then. Even though I pray and I tell myself what my problems are and how I they are not as bad as I imagine them to be--I still feel emotionally distraught. I've had some good conversations with some friends, but I feel it's not enough. Maybe I just need time to regain the "balance". Every day seems to get a little better.

Yesterday or the day before (man my memory is in shambles because of everything that's going on), I went to the park and it was a nice day. It was cloudy but there were some blue spots where the sun occasionally blazed through. I remembered I had my headphones with me so I sat down on a bench and just listened to some good tunes. And that--just sitting there and enjoying the flash rainfall reflecting a million times through beams of sunlight with music surging through my mind--gave me some serious serenity. I thought then that I did not have enough beauty in my life and that I must make efforts to bring in. Concerts and stuff have all been shut down due to the pandemic, but things are opening up again, but with things shut down I can make an effort to just listen to music, live recordings, operas, or what have you. Whatever can inspire the soul to bathe in its own freely self-made cathartic bliss.

Cheers, thanks for reading!
 

Phineas 808

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Staff member
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I wish the amount of progress as streaks would itself act as a deterrent to break it, but having had year-long and months-long streaks, I've come to need something stronger and active.

I certainly relate to this! I'm there now, and I've been here before. Lengthy streaks are important to help break the cycle of this addiction, or to disrupt and even change habituated behaviors, but for longer and lasting change, something deeper needs to occur within myself.

Well put, and wishing you well, Wolfman!
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Relapse. Real bad this time.

After about thirty seconds of surfing pure bliss, my thoughts first turned to how many times I've been here, how I'm still failing, how I'm unable to stop. Bliss was replaced with a paradoxical sense of wrath and weakness and I got out of bed only to fall to my knees and pummel my fists to the floor. My hands exploded with pain. I felt like punishing someone and be punished. The whole thing was irrational and instinctual. But there was a strange senes of relief as the pain from my hands subsided. I'll give the whole thing some time before I come back and write my reflections.
 

Pra

Member
Don't forget that the main thing is, we're trying!

Imagine your old self, "relapsing" much, much more often than you currently do, I'm guessing. I think the only time we should feel bad about our addiction is if we get into a habit of relapsing as often as we used to. But easier said than done of course.
 

EarthWalker

Respected Member
Wolfman, use that anger as a motivator toward a renewed resolve.
Phineas, respect brother but I'd advise against using a negative thing for a positive outcome. It is an energetic anti-pattern. Negative actions always bring about negative results. If not in the very short term then in the long term for sure.

Relapse. Real bad this time.
Wolfman, sorry to hear about your relapse, not a big deal in the big picture, hope you are kind to yourself. Apologies if I missed it, but have you considered therapy? If you are seeing someone maybe try someone else?

Much love everyone
EW
 

zackergeet

Active Member
Relapse. Real bad this time.

After about thirty seconds of surfing pure bliss, my thoughts first turned to how many times I've been here, how I'm still failing, how I'm unable to stop. Bliss was replaced with a paradoxical sense of wrath and weakness and I got out of bed only to fall to my knees and pummel my fists to the floor. My hands exploded with pain. I felt like punishing someone and be punished. The whole thing was irrational and instinctual. But there was a strange senes of relief as the pain from my hands subsided. I'll give the whole thing some time before I come back and write my reflections.
@Wolfman come back soon man, don’t let this small defeat decide the whole war outcome. I know what it feels like to relapse after doing it pretty well for a while and it is devastating. Do not get complacent be cause you think you are starting from zero, you are not starting from scratch.you have walked a long way and next you time you won’t fall again. Best of my luck my friend! We can do it!
 

Phineas 808

Moderator
Staff member
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Phineas, respect brother but I'd advise against using a negative thing for a positive outcome. It is an energetic anti-pattern. Negative actions always bring about negative results. If not in the very short term then in the long term for sure.

In this fight we use whatever tools and weapons at our disposal, nothing is neglected.

Of course in our overall approach we need to be overwhelmingly compassionate and positive toward ourselves. But there's an untrue version of our selves, an illusory- or even delusive version of ourselves that a little negatively charged bolt could prove to be dispelling and awakening. Think of it as a slap from a Zen master.

Again, there's a little negativity even in the positive, as there is a little positivity even in the negative. ;)

Wolfman will know what is meant in using whatever energy at our disposal, and how to redirect the negative toward a positive end.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Relapse. First one since last time two weeks ago. This was borne more out of tiredness (a slight hangover from some festivities yesterday, which was actually really good) and a lack of direction.

Guys, thank you so much for your support.

Work has been utterly insane these past months which has probably brought my psyche to its breaking point. I finished the last paper for my degree, however, so things have since slowly been easing up. I am at my most vulnerable when I don't have anything to do; whenever I have some time off, that's when I'm most prone to relapse.

I moved to a new country, so figuring out the health system and just finding help has seemed like just another admin task among a thousand others. But I have made steps towards it, I just need to keep going.

I feel like I'm in a strange in-between space; trying to remember my goals, what I wanted to do.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
I feel my confidence over the past few weeks eroded and shattered, especially yesterday. It feels like I'm living dimly, not really there with myself. Today I'm feeling better - I get the senes that I'm slowly waking up from a bad dream.

One thing in particular that's bothered me a lot is just how fiercely I struggle with myself. I've taken on a third-person perspective in order to try to make sense of this, and try to think how is it a mind can be so engaged in fighting against itself? Why would a mind actively impede, sabotage, make things more difficult for itself? It's like its in a war against itself, and it will win if its loses and lose if it wins (and so the "best" outcome is no outcome but simply to perpetuate the tension, which is not attractive at all). (I did think about, if not being tempted to, bash my fists against the wall or the floor to bring out the pain, but a voice kept saying to me that this body is me and if I damage myself I effectively make myself less capable of dealing with any issue, let alone this issue. You cannot sacrifice precious strength.)

Another thing I've been thinking about is how I need to be in some regimented and planned routine. All my no-porn defenses are built when I navigate compressed and difficult patterns of the day. But when I have a sudden gap of free time - an open horizon - that's when I lose myself. Maybe I should avoid having such free spaces, such open fields. It is very paradoxical, because I feel exhausted from working and doing so much regimented stuff that I crave this openness of leisure, this space of pure "freedom". Who knew that winning the fight is the last thing you need?

I think I wrote in an earlier post that life isn't about solving problems but moving from boring, unhealthy and mentally detrimental problems to interseting, life-affirming and mentally enriching "problems". I hate that I'm still stuck in the porn problem, but I suspect that it just means it goes so deep that I have to change so much in order to burn out its roots properly. At some point Phineas808 wrote about porn as anti-mystery: I wonder if too many things in my life are "anti-mysterious", which have made relapse to porn more likely. Perhaps this means a general measure or benchmark needs to be established: things either move towards mystery or away from it. This is a very black and white picture, but this is only a measure to make sense of things even if the things themselves are neither purely one or the other. Perhaps this could be a useful exercise: what can I do today that constributes towards living, affirming and appreciating life's mystery? Off the top of my head: physical exercise (a jog, a swim or the gym - perhaps swim since there one is immersed in the element of water), writing (journaling, writing letters to friends, poetry), prayer (self-presence), reading, going for a walk. I had the idea recently of maybe do something with my hands, a craft of some sort, maybe painting or something, but just something that engages my hands.

One day at a time. Thank you for reading.

PS (edit): I did schedule an appointment with someone from the health system yesterday, and I'll ask about how I can get help with regards to quitting porn. It brings me shame to do this because it feels like I can't control myself; that I am not I. But the third-person perspective tells me that I need to use every available resource now and try what hasn't been tried, and, who knows, I might learn something. It must be done.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Relapse. I'm in a really bad place.

Yesterday I had technical issues with my computer and amidst all the other pressure, this thing really pulled me down. So much time spent on this stupid technology and it won't function. I need this thing for work, so it's essential, but now it's weekend and I can't get it repaired even if I wanted to. I'm so, so very tired of having to deal with this mess.

I went to bed last night with a headache of anger and doubt. It was there when I woke up and while I tried to fix things and stay rational about my situation, the nagging doubt and pressure wouldn't let go. I got tunnel vision and resorted to PMO to just make the nagging stop. Once. It didn't work. Second time. I started feeling shame and like I wanted to cry. I then fantasized about hurting myself but I wouldn't act on it. Then I had the spontaneous idea of taking a cold shower--so I dashed down and put the thing on as cold as it could get and jumped in and silently shrieked in freezing anguish. Something gutteral came out of my voice (I didn't notice until later that my throat had been under strain, like when you speak loudly for long periods of time) but it felt refreshing despite the shock.

When I got out to coam my hair I noticed something. Nothing. My mind was calm, serene even, and it was like everything had been shut down, rebooted, like a killswitch. There were no concerns bouncing up. The nagging voices were gone. There was just peace.

I cannot remember the last I felt such simple calm. Is this what people feel when they medidate? Maybe I should do something to cultivate this, to bring it out of me (preferably without the use of cold showers, although not the worst idea).

We struggle on.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
I watched a video today by a channel called Better Ideas titled How to stop being unconfident. I try to keep an open mind to these self-help things but also guard myself from just watching for the sake of watching with no effect, but there were some good points raised and I thought as an exercise that I would write the questions that were posed in the video down and see what answers I come up with.

What kind of person do you want to be in this world?
Good - is what first comes to mind. But then I think couragous, truthful, self-controlled... and free. Is being free the most important thing, or is it being good? If you are good, are you also not free?

How can I live my life in a way that I would be proud of?

Being good to others. This leads me to think that maybe I've had too much of a focus on me. But how can I not have this focus when I'm so stressed and unhappy? I would be proud this ideal self if he would just be open to a bit more interaction, trying new things, put the looking glass on to others. But again I'm feeling that this overly optimistic and perhaps even too ideal--how can one not be concerned about oneself? Let's try this again.

Living faithfully. Life throws all sorts of curveballs and a true test of intellect and power is how well one can navigate through different terrains. I have recently had the faith in my profession rattled to its bones, so much so I find I've wasted life on this education. If I do not have faith in this thing; what more is there? Again, I'm just finding problems ... Let's try again.

Being happy. If I imagine a good friend of mine--or I imagine being the parent of a child--then I would want them to be happy. This ephemeral term strikes perhaps the deepest chord, only because I've actually paid so little attention to it.

Honestly, I don't really know. I don't know what my ideals are anymore.

What kind of habits does my ideal self have?

Habits that reinforce community, health and continuous learning. I think I got the pretty good at the last two, but not so good in the first.

And if I was my ideal self, how would I interact with the people around me?

I would treat everyone with dignity and respect, and be genuinely interested in how they are.

How would I spend my time when nobody is around?

Reading, thinkng, walking, exercising (most of which I already do).

Does my ideal self make mistakes sometimes?

Probably lots, but he is wise enough to avoid the most stupid (relapsing into PMO for example).

If so, how does my ideal self respond to them?

Understanding and giving contingency its place in life. Luck plays a good portion in our lives. But he would also do his best to learn from it, avoid the mistakes when he can.

But if I imagine my ideal self having to respond to a relapse, my hard heart would say that he is not my ideal self.

Would I learn from them and encourage myself?

Probably.

Maybe the fact that there are so many uncertainties here prompts me to think that I should really just open myself to new avenues, just take a journey, explore and take a period of rest. But haven't I been saying this since forever? I think given all the stress for the past several months, what I need is calm.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Last night I started watching this (I got it from one of the journals on this forum, but I've forgotten which - I tried to find it again today but thanks to whoever posted this on their journal!):

A lot of good things in this discussion and it's definetly made me go out and get her book Dopamine Nation. I have made it ready on my e-reader.

A few things the talk made me think about:

Recovery from addiction is a neverending process. Like one of the persons mentioned, recovery isn't arriving somewhere but making sure you don't run over into the ditch: "no matter how far you drive, you're always the same distance from the ditch". And then the question was asked--isn't this anxiety inducing? You can never let your guard down? How is this not horrifying? But no - it's actually calming - as the person in question also said; so it should be seen as a form of practice, just like eating healthy, getting enough sleep and exercising, you will also always be in recovery. I don't think this means that you make it the ultimate concern (in fact, one of the signs of progression is that it isn't), but you also cannot drop as a concern. Some people have diabetes, weak muscles, or a deficiency of some sort, genetic or otherwise, and it becomes a matter of necessity to just treat it. So I compressed this into some sentences:

Hoping for the end of vigilance is war
Eternal vigilance is peace

Another thing is perhaps the burden of the future. Our minds are always thinking far into the future and that if anything is less than perfect now we're liable to jeapordize the future progress. They talked about in the podcasts how navy seals are super in tune with their immediate circumstances and just attend to whatever is at hand. Maybe I should try to do this more. Radically attend to what is around me.

Lastly, Dr. Lembke spoke of her patients as heroes and I've somewhat forgotten just how extraordinary difficult this whole thing is. What we do here really is heroic, as we're battling with nothing less than ourselves, struggling against forms of our being that have been hijacked for the purposes of turning us into something undignifying and less human. And I've been thinking of this in another way, particularly in a sense that relates to more than just pornography and addiction and that is: what good is working hard for your salary, future, career, hobbies, interests, and self-improvement if you can't control your appetites? If you can't control your pleasures, your appetites, your desires, how are you not just a vehicle for them no matter how hard you work at your job or otherwise? Even stronger: what worth are these other things if you are not in charge of yourself? I've learned from several different sources that getting rich financially is actually very simple: spend less than you earn, save that up and let it compound over time - you cannot but become rich that way over time. But exactly this simplicity is very hard because you have to master your spending, and that means mastering your wants and appetites; unless you master those things about you, trying to get higher earning jobs only exacerbates the problem because your desires will only increase with the capacity to spend. I find all this extremely motivating and liberating, because if you master yourself, you can master anything (or, put another way, nothing is as hard to master as yourself). Another great thing about this attention is that it's very concrete: we all have appetites, wants, desires, things we find entertaining, and so forth, so you cannot but get in tune with your most immediate self in this way (as opposed to flying far afield into the future).

There are many ways people have tackled this historically and culturally. One route is to negate desires altogether, try to remove yourself as much as possible from them (this is my crude understanding of Buddhism, but perhaps it's better to just call is asceticisim, which can apply to many religions). I don't think this is a good route for me. Desires are part of us but they should remain nothing more than that, parts! Not the whole! I've cut out video games since July this year and it's been no problem (I still watch commentaries on youtube but I see that more as cheap entertainment, and I plan on giving myself a binge over Christmas break, which I'm looking forward to as a fun thing but not something I feel like I need or crave), and I can fairly well cut out alcohol and coffee. But I struggle deeply with pornography. I guess this is something that in its very content is more intense and deeply wired with our animality - but this has been said multiple times already on this thread.

Overall, feeling better today. I'm thinking that the path forward should be to turn down professional commitments and spend more time on myself. Next year has full of uncertaintities, but a growing certainty is that I need to take care of myself and work on this PMO issue in a more sustainable way. Building actual simplicity in life instead of complications and living in the past or the future. This addiction literally kills.

Thanks for reading! Be well.
 

Phineas 808

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So many good words you share above, and I really like your self analysis a couple posts up. Powerful to have self-knowledge.

One thing I can say about Buddhism (though I am not a Buddhist) is that it's not desire (Pali. tanha) that they try to escape from, but rather attatchment to desire. This, I think, is a critical point to understand.

Be well.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Cheers @Phineas 808 !

Having a dark day here. Most of the day has gone by and I haven't done much, even though I have a pile of work that I need to do. My willpower has just shut down.

I'm not tempted by PMO, or at least the temptation is too low for me to hear it, which is good. Bad days happen and you've just got to let it have its day. So I sat down on the floor, with a pillow underneath my head and listened to some music for an hour. I really need to try to get some work done today, but I thought it'd be worthwhile to check in here.

As I lay listening, I couldn't help thinking that my attempt to not be driven by pleasures and desires should also be extended equally to "negative emotions". Just as I don't want to be determined by pleasure, I shouldn't also be determined by pain. This is very difficult if not undesireable. One issue I have is that I may cultivate a stance of indifference to any feelings I have, but does it have to be that way? Is there no option between being determined wholly by pleasure and pain and become wholly indifferent to them? Perhaps I should just accept that they are moments of my being and that sometimes pain may be indeed very strong so as to require a slowdown of my projects. Maybe something else is at work "under the hood", so I should just trust that given some time it'll unentangle itself "down there".

Now, let's try again. Do a bit of work, then eat, and then work some more.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
I want to qoute from the Dopamine Nation book that I'm currently reading:

Telling the truth draws people n, especially when we're willing to expose our own vulnerabilities. This is counterintuitive because we assume that unmasking the less desirable aspects of ourselves will drive people away. It logically makes sense that people would distance themselves when they learn about our character flaws and transgressions.
In fact, the opposite happens. People come closer. They see in our brokenness their own vulnerability and humanity. They are reassured that they are not alone in their doubts, fears and weaknesses.

It is funny how the mind can come to think the opposite of what is good for it; as the author writes, "it logically makes sense". Or is it perhaps that there is a deeper logic at work, a logic defined not by exclusivity and externality but by relationality and interwovenness? It is not that the good thing to do is illogical, but that the bad thing is not logical enough. But can I put this tenet into action? Can I be true to it with the way I live? Can my life be one of faith?

When I lay on the floor listening to music, I listened attentively to a particular song and its lyrics:

Daylight dims leaving cold fluorescents
Difficult to see you in this light
Please, forgive this selfish question, but
What am I to say to all these ghouls tonight?

"She never told a lie
Well, might have told a lie
But never lived one
Didn't have a life
Didn't have a life
But surely saved one"

This line about living a lie really stood out to me. I feel am living a lie. It may be this soul-gnawing secret of pornography addiction that prompts this, but I feel also cracks in relations with my family (particularly my mother) and then, standing out to me most, I struggle with finding a direction with my profession and whether or not I actually believe in it anylonger. So the lie is multi-layered.

I tried last week to speak with health services about getting counseling, but they directed me to other resources. I have looked up some things on the internet and I found like this page that lists individual counselors and psychotherapists and their hourly costs. I wonder if I should just find someone on there and give it a try (part of me worries that it's not "legit" - that I feel it should be with an "institution" rather than this direct connection, but if they have the qualifications and experience, are they not as good as anyone in an instutition? I certainly have benefitted from private tuition as well as given it to others in the past. I keep getting bogged down with work though, but I should just schedule something and just get started. ... "Start before you're ready" is the mantra.

14 days of NO PMO and NO MO. It feels strange. I have been here so many times now, but I can't help feeling this time is different. As I read in a finance book about the stock marked, it is not that we should think that "this time is different" but that "every time is different".

Thanks for reading. Be well.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Had the first meeting with the therapist today over zoom. Felt really strange; unemotional, detached. Some questions provoked thought but nothing I didn't already know. I likely need to give this time before I start seeing results, so I'm committed to at least two more sessions before I call it quits.

I finished the book Dopamine Nation and I felt it got substantially weaker towards the end, some themes, such as workaholism only getting a few paragraphs--why bring it up if you're just going to pass over it? But the dissapointment goes deeper, because the book has a very narrow idea of the actual lived human life apart from the pain-pleasure dichotomy; I get that the book has a brain focus and that's all well, but I think there's more to human life than mere pain-pleasure management. One thing I felt was critically missing in the book was love. A lot of the patients she discusses has some fault in their lives that could likely be adequately addressed were they in a loving environment, be that friends or family. Exactly one patient thought she had a loving community in the church but discovered that they were not there for her when she really needed it, but that she found genuine support in AA meetings. One good thing about the book was that she spoke about the worth of honesty; this is a plus. But again, that love should be omitted to this degree just baffles me. Overall, it's a good read but it goes to show one needs to read many books on the subject to get a reasonable and good idea of what's what.

Otherwise, we're on for 3 weeks no PMO and no MO. Temptations come and go, but they are not as severe or alarming.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
Relapse. Had a pretty severe bout of temptation this morning. I got to looking at some images and then a short video, but I didn't act on it, but it didn't abate the desire. I held the desire for the entire day and in the evening I just went out. I was just so driven by this. I eventually had a sexual encounter but it was brutally short and utterly dissatisfying (I have been exactly here before, being led by my desires like a donkey after a carrot) - there was no warmth to it, nothing. I cycled back home through rabid rain and when I stood before the shower after taking off all my drenched clothes and I was angry with the disatisfaction and decided to look up porn and masturbate in the shower.

I kept thinking, I feel so dead, my life is just dead and these desires are the only thing truly animating me in some way. But it is not who I want to be - it is not my humanity.

In the aftermath, I feel disappointment but also renewed resolve. This is a small blip in the grand scheme of things. But nonetheless, I need to learn from this - I must change!

If desire makes me feel so alive, can I try to find other areas of finding life? I quite enjoy my exercise but it's been so goddamn busy I hardly get 2 sessions per week when I would've liked to get 3.

I have a window now to think of new things. New life projects, come!

I also have a window to think of ways to deal when the desire next hits - because it will hit. So the next time it strikes me, I can try to do one of these things:

- go for a spontaneous run
- go to this journal and write about it; just write the damn thing out
- take a cold shower

I'll keep thinking about this. At the end of the day, nothing has changed. I'm still on this mission. My life depends on it.
 

Wolfman

Active Member
There's been some porn viewing over the past weeks, but I haven't acted on it. I feel like I "get what I need" from just watching pictures or short clips, but it's already too much. Nevertheless, it's a small victory not to have acted on it.

I felt a rage some days ago where I just found the whole thing so undignifying. How this whole thing appeals to the animality within me and takes me out of the equation; I lose responsibility over myself and become livestock for the passions. But there's only one way of getting that back and that is by action, and moving towards a greater being of myself. I've done some exercises at home and man do I feel a rush of motivation and taking control when I do these things. It's seriously become a key part of my being that I push myself physically and that it gives me these tacit "messages" of 'you are doing this' 'you are taking charge' 'you are here, right now' 'this is the real you'. I have traded the physically of sexual encounters for straining my muscles for the rest of the body, and I feel nonetheless sensuous pleasure. Perhaps here is a key to outwit the cunning: porn promises sensuous pleasure, well, you can get that from cultivating a taste for fine dining or just exercise; switch out the means, but the end goal stays the same. Porn now is more clearly seen as "just a means" and can perhaps more easily be dispensed with.

The holidays at home have tended to be a very dangerous time for me. It's at this time I slipped last year and I've moved towards that this year too. But I haven't acted on it, and that is a definite improvement over last year.

Our will needs to be turned into habits, routines, and patterns; to become congealed into the physicality of our reality.

2022 will be good, I've decided.

3 weeks, 6 days of no MO or PMO. Need to work on not watching any pictures or clips though. These small breeches can spell doom.
 
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