I may have posted similar threads like this a couple of times in the past. I may need to make this one very specific so this problem can be solidified. Just to warn you there are some trigger warnings in the middle of this post. If you are sensitive to thirst traps, please proceed with caution. Throughout the early 2024 until now I’ve been struggling with these types of cravings. My mind would be running with thoughts of specific porn thoughts that I’m either missing out on and need to feel satisfied before starting my reboot, or just want to look something up just for the curiosity of it before starting my reboot These thoughts are such as -Porn scenes I’ve always been watching for a couple of years or a decade that I need to keep rewatching -Certain hottest sexual positions -Certain fetishes/genres such as Spoiler: Trigger warning sexy tongue, blow job, cumpilations, - A curiosity thought about a specific pornstar I didn’t know about such as her age, her life, etc, or checking out an old porn website not knowing if it still exists, or even about anything related to porn that I’m missing out on while rebooting. These thoughts would always pop into my mind when I’m either bored, or in bed in the process of trying to fall asleep. It Also happens when I wake up still in bed while having these thoughts. And when those thoughts pop into my mind I always say to myself “I'm gonna see this one last time before quitting I promise”. And then the next couple of days later, another different thought I’m missing out on, comes back to me, and need to indulge in that one again. I’ve wasted my entire winter from my mind rationalizing these thoughts every time. Need some professional tips on overcoming these thoughts Thank you
I realized that I was not going to break free from this addiction until I was able to demonstrate mastery over my mind. I fantasized a lot. And it's something that I didn't feel that I had much control over. So I would refrain from porn use hoping that cleaning up my outside behavior would help curtail the fantasies and cravings that I was still thinking in my mind. Nope. It's futile. I was guilty of using fantasy and lust to raise the toxicity level in my brain. I was still getting a fix. I had to accept it. Taking away the physical porn wasn't enough for I was still getting my fix from the pornographic fantasies in my head, raising my toxicity level to as high as 7. That's really hot. And no wonder that as I was heating up my brain all the time with my thoughts, I would soon gravitate to higher level behaviors, Psubs, rituals, acting out with MB and P. I take ownership of my thoughts. I do not give myself permission to allow my mind (nor eyes) to roam wherever they please with no boundaries. My method is to keep my brain's toxicity level low. If I don't think it, I'm not going to do it. I focus on saying, "No," to only one thought, the one that matters; The First One. If there isn't a first thought of fantasy, there won't be a second, or a third, or a fifth, or an eighth. Do I do this perfectly? No. But I'm winning significantly more battles than I'm losing. And I take each battle with lust and fantasy very seriously. That's why I'll win this war. I'm intrinsically motivated to do this. For I know what lust does to me. It creates a false paradigm, it leads me into a state of further deprivation, and it reinforces my toxic shame. It's taken me a long time to see and accept that lust and sexual fantasy are not my friends. And prayer helps me a lot too. My flesh is broken. My subconscious works against me. By choosing to stay connected in prayer to my master, Jesus, I'm set free from my old master, sin; a cruel, horrible, merciless master.
that's a pretty good answer @KevinesKay, that is something i recently realized, fantasizing pornography is pretty much watching it, and i am also working on curbing it, i just think a total resolve is the answer to pmo @A_glass1900 , the longest i have ever gone without pmo was around 35, 40 days, and what i remember from then was the total resolve, the flashbacks are all just chasers from your previous pmo sessions, they will eventually pass, the brains "Use it or Lose it Mechanism" will eventually get rid of it, i remember clearly how convincing my mind made it back then, but it all starts and ends there, i consider it hammering in a furnace to harden the steel, the reason i lost that streak was me being cocky, believing i was already free after just 30 days, am working on myself and i know i will get free from this, do you guys get what am saying ?
Yes sir @ArtOfOld. Fantasizing from porn is still hard to stop as well when getting back to quit POrn. Because I’m still activating the neural pathway that been made from watching porn from over the years. Because the more I fantasize to pornographic thoughts, that’s how my mind suddenly gets caught to one of these thoughts like I listed in my thread. But I still wonder if I should also quit fantasizing to real life sexual scenarios as well when quitting porn. And I’ve been on 30+ days away before. I remember having these that “I think my porn addiction is gone for good” kind of feeling. But it wasn’t true afterwards.
@KevinesKay I fantasized a lot too. My mind would fantasize to the thoughts I listed in my thread. And porn was my only fix to these thoughts and needed to accept these thoughts. I probably should get into a practice of the saying “No” to my thoughts very often. I first heard of this practice once by another user here. But I thought to my self, this practice seems pretty useless and wasn’t gonna be strong enough for me overcome these specific cravings. It seems true that you didn’t do this perfectly. And thats what I was afraid of. But the more you did it, you’ll win this war. And just like you mentioned that lust and sexual fantasy are not friends to any of us. So there’s no reason to give into these thoughts. I prayed a couple times before, but willing to do it more consistently. Definitely am staying connected with Jesus Christ.
Id like to offer a different perspective. I know people say this here sometimes, but I make a clear distinction from mental fantasy and PMO. the difference is HUGE and not to be understated. You cannot get the Coolidge Effect without P, plain and simple. P dumps new information into your retina, new pixelated bodies to release new chemicals. It pushes you deeper into the addiction and forms new pathways in your brain. not nearly the same as M fantasy, EVEN IF you are thinking about P. The key word here is "thinking." You are not subjecting your BODY to the same stimuli and neurological manipulation. Is it great to do? of course it is not the goal. But not everyone can go "cold turkey" right away after years and years of PMO addiction. My longest streaks for me started with some M, O and fantasizing without screens. Then I realized more and more what it was all doing to me and M and O became much less. Eventually reached many months of sobriety that way. Just an alternative way to think about it. For some, "hard mode" cold turkey is the only way.
...well.....you need to deprogram whaat your life style has programmed as an addict.....do the 12 steps bro..........
strictly speaking, hard mode means ZERO touching your pp. unless you pee or shower. It means NO sexual pleasure of any kind, and no orgasm. Its basically asexual for 90 days. Its funny how many people imagine they arent P addicts, and yet ask them to do this, and they will utterly fail.
