Crossing the river

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one_man_canoe

Member
PMO Reset. Alas. Twice! That makes this day 2. Will start putting my day count at the bottom rather than the top because it's a little demoralising sometimes. My plan is to not give myself a hard time about this slip, but to definitely not let it turn into a long wallow in the mud.
 
Chris1986

Chris1986

Active Member
Yeah you got to live and learn and work out where things went wrong and what could of been done differently. You are not alone remember and if it was easy there would be no need for communities like this.
Know that you are being cheered on.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
Thanks @Chris1986 for the support.

I've lost my mental clarity about why I want to try living a different way. I think part of why I use P is I want to feel normal in my freakiness. But that feeling of fitting in evaporates when I O. It's like someone who says they are your friend but snubs you whenever you see them out in public.

I feel old at 36. I'm just tired of it all. I'm tired of doing what I don't want to do, and I'm tired of feeling shame afterwards. I'm so very tired of the 'this is it, this is the best thing ever' feeling before I O.

Choose life. Choose reliability. Choose a healthy life. Choose putting down the smartphone. Choose people knowing where you are and what you're doing. Choose not hiding anymore. Choose joy, and richness, choose smiling at strangers. Choose to deserve the respect of those closest to you. Choose to help build a better world. Choose to focus on the things you can do. Choose feeling good about yourself again. Choose to try again.

How do I get that mental clarity about quitting again? I want to know enough, but in the depths of P I can't know that. I always want everything, all the more. Maybe I can build clarity and drive around the word 'enough'.

Day 1.
 
TakeActionNow

TakeActionNow

Respected Member
one_man_canoe said:
Thanks @Chris1986 for the support.

I've lost my mental clarity about why I want to try living a different way. I think part of why I use P is I want to feel normal in my freakiness. But that feeling of fitting in evaporates when I O. It's like someone who says they are your friend but snubs you whenever you see them out in public.

I feel old at 36. I'm just tired of it all. I'm tired of doing what I don't want to do, and I'm tired of feeling shame afterwards. I'm so very tired of the 'this is it, this is the best thing ever' feeling before I O.

Choose life. Choose reliability. Choose a healthy life. Choose putting down the smartphone. Choose people knowing where you are and what you're doing. Choose not hiding anymore. Choose joy, and richness, choose smiling at strangers. Choose to deserve the respect of those closest to you. Choose to help build a better world. Choose to focus on the things you can do. Choose feeling good about yourself again. Choose to try again.

How do I get that mental clarity about quitting again? I want to know enough, but in the depths of P I can't know that. I always want everything, all the more. Maybe I can build clarity and drive around the word 'enough'.

Day 1.
Click to expand...
I wish it was easier but clarity only settled for me after 5 months.
And it is a bomb of a difference.
Totally night and day difference in outlook and opinion.

Addiction is dependency.
You are forever at the mercy of depending on others for everything. You lie to yourself (unintentionally) to get whatever you want. You trust others to help you.

With enough clean days (months) you lose dependency and start seeing according to needs. You trust your own judgements now.
You can see past BS immediately. What is necessary and important is immediately clear. There is little doubt. You do whatever is needed.

Invest this time to remain clean. You will truly be walking out of the cloud of delusion after reboot. PMO is the largest lie of the human race.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
Hi @Chris1986. Thanks for asking. Where did all the months go?

I was unsure whether to start a new journal or continue this one but I'll continue this one.

Not much to say really. I started a new job in late January which is going well. I've been acting out here and there with not much sobriety time. Was quite demoralised at the start of this week acting out with poppers too. Really gutter behaviour, really showed me (once again) I need to change.

I need better tools, but I also need a big picture view. Need some dedication too. And to get outside of myself. Signed up to the app Fortify, and coming back here, two changes I've made since my acting out at the start of the week.

How are you?
 
Chris1986

Chris1986

Active Member
Hi I been away from the forum for a while myself but due to being in a period of stress Feel I need the forum back in my life again.

Glad the job is going well. Being happier in work is a big help.

We can all change just got to remember to practice self compassion and keep picking ourselves back up.

Fortify is very useful. Has some great lessons/deep dives on there.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
Good to hear from you @Chris1986

I was writing a gratitude list just now and I wrote underneath: It's Never Too Late. I think I used to hope that, but now I believe it.

We start when we start and when we stop we start again when we start again. It's a big life, a big world, just got to get out of the pool and dry off. Pools are fun but no place to live.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
I haven't been counting days, but it's coming up to a week away from P. I'm doing couch to 5k at the moment and was briefly imagining myself running a marathon (or half, or 10km) in a years time. And at the same time I thought to imagine myself if I had distance from P and unhealthy sexual outlets, also. It's hard to imagine a clean break from all this stuff, like there's just too much that I an entangled in. Still, at some point in the future a year or two or five, it is possible I would be done with this stuff. I need to work towards that. Not for today or even tomorrow, but for 5 years away, for 10 years away, for my self on his deathbed.

It appears part of this work is coming back to reality and getting grounded. That's a practice I'm building into my morning routine.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
Androg said:
One day at a time.
Click to expand...

A fellow traveler on this path was on a podcast recently talking about P*rn addiction. There was a psychologist specialising in this field talking and they dispelled a lot of shame around it, made it a mundane thing: some people get addicted to this. As the iChing says: no blame.

I know I can't make a decision to stay away from it for the rest of my life. I've tried that many times and it hasn't stuck. But it's true, Androg, that I can make a decision in the here and now.

I can also recognise that there are triggers that set off parts of my brain and make it harder. I can try to avoid these and consciously arrange life to minimise them.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
Androg said:
It's definitely a challenge.

I keep asking everyone if they've tried this free approach. I was just reminded of it recently...and over many years I've heard guys say it really helped them quit for good. If you try it, let me know. https://easypeasymethod.org/
Click to expand...

I think there's a lot to be learnt from applying insight from other addictions to this one. I gave up nicotine a few years ago and I've had slips here and there but I don't beat myself up about it. I didn't go to 12 steps for it. I did call a support line once and use patches and gum. I used some of the techniques from Alan Carr's book that easypeasy is based on: like telling myself I'm not a smoker anymore and avoiding the next cigarette.
 
EarthWalker

EarthWalker

Respected Member
Yeah, I think what makes P addiction so hard is that is has the qualities of multiple different drugs. I think P addiction, has the qualities of both being a stimulant, a depressant and a little bit of an opiat. I think this is what makes it next level hard to deal with. Next level challenge for next level personal self-development. Onwards and upwards.

Psychoactive drugs alter the way a person thinks, acts, and feels. They often fit into one or more categories, including stimulants, depressants, opiates, and hallucinogens.

  • Stimulants may cause someone to feel a sense of euphoria, excitement, or increased energy.
  • Depressants can make people feel sleepy, relaxed, or calm.
  • Opiates can cause euphoria and have a tranquilizing effect.
  • Hallucinogens can alter a person’s senses and cause them to see or hear things that are not there.
Different drugs have varying risks, but some are common among psychoactive drugs. Some of these risks include heart issues, addiction, worsening symptoms of mental illness, and death.
Click to expand...
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
It's been 10 days since my last PMO. The last three months have been ones of growth. I have had a number of slips but never let it hold me back too badly. I've been very tired the last 5-6 weeks after doing too much which has been challenging. Last night I had a strong urge to use P but I came back to this site and watched most of the 2015 YBOP video that I started watching 8 months ago or something but didn't finish.

I've been reading the forums again this morning.

~

I want to keep going though the river is wide and dark. Sometimes it feels like every time I dip the oar in I'm going to hit the back of the sleeping monster below and wake it but to keep going is the only way.

I have become a voyeur trained in the art of the one-handed scroll and critique. My natural environment is a wall of thumbnails. I excel at being shit. I am skin deep.

I am growing, I can feel it, and others have noticed it too. I'm scared because the armor is getting tighter and it feels like I will pop. I am starting to think I might live properly before I die. That I could live at least a few years as man worthy of respect.

Most days I sit on the cushion twice: once in the morning soon after waking and once at night with a meditation group online. I sit more with discomfort and pain with my own body and life and try to run away from it less. Try to be in this boredom, in the ruins of my life. I think a lot of us get to this point and so there is less judgement. I failed to live up to my standards and sometimes I wonder how hard I even really tried.

I try and be with myself as though I was with a dear beloved who is sick or dying. No good comes of bringing up past pain or unresolved conflict now. There's enough pain here to live with already, so we just sit with what is.

~

With gratitude,
omc
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
My descent was precipitated by joining a forum for gay teens. I was 13 at the time and my family had recently got online. The computer was meant for everyone in the family but it was outside my room in a large house and I was the main user of the machine. I started off looking for p sites. This was before Google and I had little success. Eventually I found IRC and began trading pictures and then videos. Thankfully this was back in the day when webcams were expensive, poor quality and not a standard item in a PC. If I had access to a camera during this period I would have fucked much, much worse. I feel for youths growing up today in a world of selfies and mobile phones. The ease at which we can objectify ourselves is terrifying.

I got stuck in this matrix for years. I would print the pictures off on our home black and white printer and then stash them in a thick pile of paper in my room and then use them to masturbate in my room.

When I think what my involvement with porn cost me, one of the most important was the time I missed spending with my dying father. I was 16 when he died of a lung infection but he was dying for a while before he passed.
 
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one_man_canoe

Member
I looked at P last week. I looked for about 20 minutes but I wasn't really desiring it and I ended up stopping. I haven't looked at P since that, though I did MO yesterday. I don't really know about M. I feel like I'd prefer not to at this stage but I listened in the YBOP 2015 video Gary Wilson talks about us needing to decide for ourselves on that. For the moment I'm avoiding it but it's not a major problem for me if I do. What I did try and do was focus on the sensations (also GW's suggestion) and no P fantasies. It was okay not to recollect P scenes, where I struggled is my mind still went into fantasy: imagining a sexual situation. Some of the sex acts in the fantasy, well, I'm not sure they're what I really want or just what I want now after 20+ years of heavy use.

I've been losing weight as I've improved my diet. I saw myself in the mirror and I could see I'd lost weight. But I look at myself and I see a joke. From inside out I sometimes feel like I'm real, have meaning, am serious. My seeing myself outside in and imagining how others see me I just saw a joke, a fragile and disconnected man, unreliable and untrustworthy. My path seems to accepting this as the present, but working to change it.

My morning routine is helping. It is: make my bed, greet Buddha, go to the toilet, make tea, drink tea and write, meditate, shower, breakfast (fruit and greek yoghurt).

As I sat today I thought about rebooting and its connection with upgrading. If your Windows machine hasn't been switched off in a long time and it's got a bunch of updates, maybe a major OS upgrade and some firmware and you finally reboot the machine. It takes so long to boot and it's got this black screen with "this may take a while" on it. You have no idea how long it will take. All you know is you should wait and hope the power doesn't cut out. Staring at the screen wondering is counterproductive. Get out and go for a walk, bake bread, play with the dogs.

This may take a while but there is hope.

peace
 
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