Saving the Soul

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Hello!

I am new to the forum but I have been aware of this addiction for many years now. My goal is to keep a positive mentality around this and search for direct results while also understanding that I need to be patient and consistent.

I am happy and thankful to have found this forum and community which seems to be focused only in recovery and does not has other distractions around :)
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
My view is that overanalyzing the psychological reasons and the life circumstances that have led to my addiction can be a bit counterproductive. I do not say with this that one shouldn't have a serious understanding behind the causes of the addiction and the way it affects us...I just mean that one can sink in overthinking too much and forget that life is about taking actions and living. I do not want to spend my entire life analyzing the causes for the issues I might encounter but I would rather search for direct results.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Therefore I will set some simple direct objectives for myself:

-To fully quit pornography and masturbation.

-To be free of distractions and use my time in highly productive ways.

-To fix my sleep routine and overall habit accomplishments.

-Become more socially active and externally driven.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
It interesting to see how many triggers there are, so many black holes of the addiction. It feels like I am addicted generally to pleasure and anything that promises pleasure, especially if it is sexual, it attracts me. And I seek it. I guess the objective is to learn to live without the intense and constant pleasure infusion. And hopefully to that in calmness see some sort of inner benefits. I assume it is related to mental strength...
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
I edged, not proud of it. Anyways I will just keep going, instead of fully giving up and relapsing. I recognized that I was making a mistake, stopped, and focused on continuing with the journey. But I have to be honest about stepbacks so that I why I post it.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
AND I relapsed. Well I tried.

Ok so now I start again. I have the confidence that I will win I just haven't done it yet. And it is a bit frustrating because I have the brain, mind and life of an addict so I do not really know how to exactly get rid of it. If feels as if I need some sort of superhuman strength. It just feels like that. I feel like this I have to open an acorn and I do not have a clue of how to do it. I feel uncapable to do it. And I am not even depressed as a cause of this, like I wrote I am confident but completely lost at how to solve this.
 
Glad to hear you're picking yourself up and starting again, good luck!

I know that feeling of wanting to stop but being at a loss as to where to start or how to go about it. What is proving helpful for me this reboot is clearly knowing why I want to change and learning more about the neuroscience of addiction. I found that reading Your Brain on Porn's summaries of research into porn addiction really fueled my desire to quit. I found it helped make the issue less about me and my failings and more about the brain and its nature.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Glad to hear you're picking yourself up and starting again, good luck!

I know that feeling of wanting to stop but being at a loss as to where to start or how to go about it. What is proving helpful for me this reboot is clearly knowing why I want to change and learning more about the neuroscience of addiction. I found that reading Your Brain on Porn's summaries of research into porn addiction really fueled my desire to quit. I found it helped make the issue less about me and my failings and more about the brain and its nature.
Thank you! So it is important to have a solid clarity and focus as to towards where one is heading to and where one is at. I probably need to work on that. Oh that makes sense...in the end there is causality to reality and making it about ourselves with an ego approach could not work because the real problem might lay elsewhere (brain, nature, sociocultural conditions). I hope I get it right, I will dig deep on this issue.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
I decide that I will do some analysis even though I said I would not and only focus on direct results. But if my analysis is goal-oriented and aiming at finding direction then it could be very helpful. As long as I don't get lost doing the analysis then I will survive it. Therefore I begin to do it now, it will probably wont be finished on this post but it is a start.

  1. The Ego and Desire. I have a constructed set of psychological structures and pathways that are hard rooted and tested through the years. In addition to those I have my newfound novel understanding and future oriented hopes propelled by imagination.
    These are two different things; the former one being more cemented in my existence than the latter one, the former the solid root and seed of my history. This is how I perceive it in my brain. It seems as if the peripheral areas of the prefrontal cortex are taking charge in the creative novel processes while some more biologically ancient part of my brain (likely Basal ganglia) is darkened and stunned. This is just an analysis based on what I perceive in my brain so I went to find out what relation could the Basal ganglia have with this issue and I found the following (wikipedia):
    The basal ganglia are of major importance for normal brain function and behaviour. Their dysfunction results in a wide range of neurological conditions including disorders of behaviour control and movement, as well as cognitive deficits that are similar to those that result from damage to the prefrontal cortex.[11] Those of behaviour include Tourette syndrome, obsessive–compulsive disorder, and addiction. Movement disorders include, most notably Parkinson's disease, which involves degeneration of the dopamine-producing cells in the substantia nigra; Huntington's disease, which primarily involves damage to the striatum;[2][4] dystonia; and more rarely hemiballismus. The basal ganglia have a limbic sector whose components are assigned distinct names: the nucleus accumbens, ventral pallidum, and ventral tegmental area (VTA). There is considerable evidence that this limbic part plays a central role in reward learning as well as cognition and frontal lobe functioning, via the mesolimbic pathway from the VTA to the nucleus accumbens that uses the neurotransmitter dopamine, and the mesocortical pathway. A number of highly addictive drugs, including cocaine, amphetamine, and nicotine, are thought to work by increasing the efficacy of this dopamine signal. There is also evidence implicating overactivity of the VTA dopaminergic projection in schizophrenia.[12]
The fact that I could find this just by physically sensing my brain and looking for the damaged area and then searching for a brain map image in the internet to know what that area was called and then to search what its role was speaks volumes for how real my addiction is and how it has affected me to the point that I can sense it.
 
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SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Day one completed. Still figuring out what I wrote on yesterday's post. Initially I assume that my Basal ganglia and my entire brain for that matter will naturally heal and strengthen itself through the recovery process but I wonder if I have to do something else about it. :unsure:
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
I want to reflect that quitting this addiction is one of the hardest choices of life. It should be simple once one understands the science behind it and is reasonable enough aware of how life has been affected by it. But it is not simple at all, it is one of the hardest choices. It is not like I will get anything from it, not immediately and not in the short term, at least. My problem has been that I experience streaks that last a few days, sometimes a few weeks and I appreciate the improvements but end up relapsing because it is as if I am like ok this was great now I will go back to my enjoyment. So short term benefits and improvements are not enough to block the eminent urges. How could I fix it, now that I am heading towards another good steak? I do not know...so working every day on logically reminding myself of the science behind the addiction and how I need to remain paying attention, that could be of use.
 
Congratulations on getting streaks of a few weeks previously, that's great. I've been trying since 2015 to quit. I initially got two weeks back then but it's only in the past year I've exceeded that. Since 2015 I've only had multiple weeks 4 or 5 times. I agree, and so does the neuroscientist Judith Grislel (whose book Never Enough I'm reading): addiction is hard.

There's a 12 step saying, 'don't quit before the miracle'. I know I've considered breaking my reboot a few times in the past few days, thankfully the lure hasn't been attractive enough. Hopefully we can continue to keep away, good luck!
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Congratulations on getting streaks of a few weeks previously, that's great. I've been trying since 2015 to quit. I initially got two weeks back then but it's only in the past year I've exceeded that. Since 2015 I've only had multiple weeks 4 or 5 times. I agree, and so does the neuroscientist Judith Grislel (whose book Never Enough I'm reading): addiction is hard.

There's a 12 step saying, 'don't quit before the miracle'. I know I've considered breaking my reboot a few times in the past few days, thankfully the lure hasn't been attractive enough. Hopefully we can continue to keep away, good luck!
Thank you, to you as well for the continued improvement.

I have been officially trying to quit since 2018. The first two years were the best of the process, then the addiction got worst but now I am regaining commitment. It is interesting because the few weeks streaks that I've had throughout this four years I remember as some of the best weeks of my life!

Yes lets keep going.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
I was thinking of that time I managed to reach my highest streak which lasted around forty days (years ago). And I am trying to remember what got me so far, because I have not only not made any new improvement on my recovery but my addiction has gotten worst. The consumption of pornography and the rate of masturbation is the same, but the mind feels more damaged than ever.

So what got me through that time? I had a self respect mentality and I accepted myself. If I was to suffer of solitude, rejection, past trauma, or any other negative psychological and emotional disturbances...then I would not give in to anger or hate. Nowadays when something important displeases me I get angry, disappointed, resentful, hateful, and sad. I do not act on those psychological and emotional negative states, but they do affect me. Back then it did not happen to me, somehow. It was because I accepted myself more than I do now. Today I am displeased at myself and my life, I do not really think I deserve anything nor that I am worthy, simply put I am disgusted at myself. I think I am a loser, to be honest. And certainly there are many colors to the rainbow and objectively it could be said that I am not, that I have a serious addiction that has negatively impacted my life, but that there are achievements to my life for me to appreciate and value. BUT I do not appreciate nor value anything. I can logically come to the conclusion that sure, the achievements were good, but emotionally I do not reach that conclusion. Emotionally I am completely feeling like a loser and I think that I have to acknowledge this before making any other step. And I feel like a loser because there are solid reasons to feel that way. I have lost and I have not been able to pick myself up and win. Logically, that is a loser.

Now that I finally stopped suppressing that feeling I can work on changing my reality. And to change it I first need to accept it. I can start through action cleaning up my mind and let it heal naturally through the course of recovery. A healed mind will hopefully not feel the emotions the way I feel them now and will be able to value life again. Moreover, a healed mind could craft winning actions.

The point is that I cannot create my new self with the blink of an eye. I will work on creating my new self or die trying.
 
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SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Things are good. I told myself that I want to prove myself that I am actually commited to doing this and I am not just faking that I want to quit or using the forum as a way to excuse myself from the guilt. That is my challenge. To truly be someone who takes this with seriousness and responsibility.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
I can change and overcome my struggles. It requires strength and power to sustain my own suffering and that is exactly what I will work on. Life can be hard and unfair but I have chosen to see reality as meritory, meaning that I have exactly what I work for and I will also begin to believe in logical karma (which doesn't has anything to do with spirituality in my view). You reap what you sow and what goes around comes around. That's the solid view I want to develop.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Things are good. Finally I developed some disgust towards porn and masturbation...not sure if it's going to last but being disgusted at it certainly helps.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
I reflect on the necessities required for quitting this addiction.

-Attention/Focus.
-Making good use of time.
-Calm, patience, love.
-Strength, determination, dominion.
 

SaveTheSoul

Active Member
Somedays the only thing that I have to keep going is hope for better days to come.

I need to focus on completely overcoming this addiction and I need to remember that I must be very patient about it.

Both negative and unreal thoughts invade my mind. It is poisonous. But realizing all of this has to be a sign of awareness.

Therefore I seek to muster my strength and keep going.
 
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