Great post. I looked at different translations, and some of the more paraphrase versions simply say do not want what your neighbor has. Living Bible says Envy. I like to use envy because it part of the 7 deadly sins, and connotates in modern terms the desire as insidious. Anyway, your point about it being more about the object of your desire and not desire itself is right on. We can desire to have a wife, a nice house, or have a strong body. But when we desire someone else's wife, property, or their body that is where the sin lies. This desire so quickly leads to blatant sins, but in this case the desire itself is a sin. This is why we find in recovery that freedom is only possible when we get our thought life in control.
Step 3 in Recovery is: We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him. Here is some of my work Step 3: How has relying on your understanding caused problems in your life: My own understanding is warped by sin and emotions. In addition, I can not see eternity or even the outcome of the next few years. I really have no idea how God might be using my current struggles for his glory, or how my current failures and compromises are cursing and harming my life and those around me. I have fallen into sin and reaped months and even years of mental emotional and physical setbacks and sometimes even permanent harm such as acting harshly toward my family, damaging my brain and dopamine receptors, wasting hours, days and even months of repeated binging falling deeper into bondage, harming my body, mind and spirit, abandoning personal and professional goals and irreplaceable family time. What is repentance: Repent, to turn from, make a u turn. It means to resist temptation, run away from it. Turn away from all dark, demonic, and unwholesome thoughts and stimuli. Turn to Christ, replacing these bad inputs with Godly input. It means guarding my mind, but also guarding my strength, and not surrendering it to satan. It means to submit myself to God and resist the devil. What does New Life in Christ mean to you: It means a fresh start, forgiveness, cleansing, restoration to the Father. It also means restored fellowship with family, other men, society. It means coming out of isolation and into the light of day. How has your understanding of will power changed since recovery: Willpower is never enough, I need my Higher Power, I need accountability, and I need the testimony of those who have overcome. What is holding you back from turning you will over to Christ? I feel I have little choice in the matter. If I don’t turn these things over, I know I will end up wrecking them. Step 4: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?threads/ulysses-resists-ongoing-journal.356154/page-3#post-3735985
This is a very interesting observation, thank you! I often like to consider why God gives us certain commandments, i.e. to meditate on the fact that anything He commands ultimately has some purpose in honouring Him, and/or to benefit others or ourselves. Somehow I hadn't considered this with "do not envy". @Wilderness Wanderer your thoughts have helped me here too, thank you!
This is from my Spartan Challenge post: Day 30: Top of Recruits. I'm feeling good about my sobriety. It struck me today how I've been very clear minded and a lot more quick mentally. The brain fog is gone, I'm sleeping better, workouts are great, and I'm losing some weight. Also my wife has been out of town for 9 days, and I didn't masturbate at all. This is the longest in years I've stayed this clean and especially mentally clean. I have 0 tolerance for edging, fantasy, or recalling past images and fetishes. When the idea pops in my head I resists and fight it out with a fantasy of me overcoming. I don't want to go back.
I was having a discussion at this thread about BD_SM: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?t...-in-femdom-and-recovered.356771/#post-3735983 Step 5: "Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs." My response was from some of my Step 4 inventory: My negative core beliefs was that I was made to be abused. Abuse = affection. Enduring abuse makes me strong. I think there was even a feeling that my abusers cared about me (big lie). Yes, I didn't feel I deserved nice things, kind people, or respect. I was constantly living with a poverty mindset. What I came to realize: The damage by all the bullies in my life is untold. It has literally robbed me of my strength, will, and masculinity. It created a strong fetish in me to be further sexually exploited by the same bullies. I see now, it’s all the same evil spirit. There are no friends with that, or compromises that will not also rob me. The mentality and spirit of someone who wants to dominate is basically someone who wants to rob you of your very humanity to boost their own monstrous ego. This is the same bullying attitude and sociopathic mentality of all the bullies I’ve encountered as a kid and adult. These people want nothing more than to dominate, control, harm and make them selves feel powerful or in control by making you weak and controlling you. They aim to to ultimately destroy the lives and family of others. I need to stand my ground with all bullies, even when they are my boss. I need to tell them plainly; you will not have power over me. I am not your play thing that you can dominate in order to boost your perverse ego. Other Step 4 post: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?threads/ulysses-resists-ongoing-journal.356154/#post-3723250 Step 6 post: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?threads/ulysses-resists-ongoing-journal.356154/page-4#post-3751861 Recovery Testimony Part 1: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?threads/ulysses-resists-ongoing-journal.356154/page-3#post-3740472
Well, it is the end of my wife being gone for 2 weeks. I really wasn't sure I could handle it. She leaves every quarter and every quarter I have relapsed and acted out bad until now. The last couple of times I was using Covenant Eyes, so it was better, but I found a made for TV movie to act out with once and once I found a unprotected PC. But this time, I made no plans or attempts at it. This time, I was really invested in keeping my mind clean and not masturbating, and somehow I'm doing it. Reading and posting here has really helped. Today I also shared my full Step 4 inventory with my sponsor, sharing all the hurts and sins of my life. It was very therapeutic and cleansing. He said he could relate to most of it, even though I had so many fetishes and acting out experiences I was really ashamed of. The last 4 nights have been harder with sleep. I've been getting up an hour earlier, and getting tired as a result. One night I took Nyquil to get me through. But regardless, when I get up, I leave no room for fantasy or fondling. Also, I have not been able to get more than 7 days without an organism before but now I'm at 14. I noticed around day 9 I started getting extra horny, but I wouldn't allow myself to think about sex, I just really wanted it. It lasted for about 2-3 days, but now it has faded. The benefits: 1) Very clear minded. I find I am thinking more clearly, focused and quick. I'm attuned at work, and in my home projects. No more brain fog. 2) For the most part sleeping 80% better. I'm able to go back to sleep in the middle of the night. I'm getting up earlier, but that can be good, giving me more time to be productive. 3) I'm continuing my work outs, but usually more focused, strong, and feeling like I'm making more gains. 4) For some reason, dieting is easier. I've lost about 3-5 pounds, but more importantly able to stop eating sooner and not craving junk. 5) I have felt depressed a couple of nights, but compared to all the depression I had after relapse it was nothing. In the heat of the day, I'm much more hopeful and not discouraged about normal trials. 6) Prayer life is higher, when I pray I feel more like I'm being heard. My Bible reading (or listening) is also more meaningful. 7) I've been able to meet a lot more of my professional goals, studying and applying for new jobs. 8) I'm more attentive to my family. I'm missing them more in healthy ways. 9) I completed some monumental house projects while they were out. 10) I completed a lot of step work and kept in contact with my sponsor. 11) I've valued my recovery so much, I wouldn't allow any compromise. I also rejected all feelings of self pity and entitlement that led me to want to act out. 12) I've posted here responsibly and made every effort not to trigger others, or to search for post that were triggering. 13) I don't know if it's related to the hormone hike, but I have had a strangers at the gym approach me and just introduce himself and say "I've seen you around here. Where do you work?" or similar conversation with acquaintances at work, just interested in getting to know each other better. It seems like I could keep going. Anyway, the benefits are too good to back.
Leaving PMO behind is like emerging from a thick fog and seeing the sunlight (and the world illuminated by it clearly!) for the first time.
Today I'm a little extra temped. Had some midnight time with my wife last night, which makes me more susceptible for a couple of days. I think part of it is also the phenomenon of coming off some highs and milestones, and feeling let down after that. I had also done some Kegel exercise, which wasn't a trigger at the time, but I think hyped me up sexually, which kept me awake in the middle of the night. What I've found is if I can wait it out for 48 hours, the desires subside. From my post on Jelqing: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?threads/penis-size-and-jelqing.355220/#post-3720952
It's supposed to help strengthen your pelvic floor and help you control ejaculation. It's also supposed to help reduce the chance of prostrate enlargement, but I don't see any documented evidence for any of that. I have not noticed great improvements in Premature Ejaculation with this, but I have noticed improvements by not giving into fantasy and fetishes during sex. For me Kegels are ok with deep breathing exercise, without any self touch or visual attention. It can be both relaxing and useful to the prostrate. Anything more than that turns into edging.
Been extra temped today. Sleep was disturbed last night with 3 awakenings for urination. Had a pretty full erection during the earliest. I guess that's good and means my T is up, but found myself desiring MO often, and wanting to find triggers online. I didn't act on it, but the desire was definitely stronger. My workouts have been strong, so I'm extra sore, which also contributes to tiredness and horniness. My meditation and time with God has not been super great, so I need to prioritize that. I noticed a pattern from the past. I will abstain for a while, then after sobriety becomes the new normal, I forget what it was like to be miserable, hung over, sleep deprived, depressed, mentally controlled by perverse thoughts, and unmotivated to do anything good because of PMO acting out. Then a few days come where I'm physically or emotionally tired, a little down, I lose track of why it's important to abstain. This is usually when I relapse because I stop valuing my sobriety. I think it's important to remind yourself of the insanity and out of control lifestyle of addiction and the benefits we have under sobriety. To me that's why this site, is so important, to remind us why we're doing it. What's it's like when we fail, and how good it is to abstain and to get encouragement from our brothers.
As far as I am aware the prostate keeps growing no matter what so eventually every man will have an enlarged prostate.
For this weeks Step work, I'm going to share parts of my recovery testimony. This is part 1 my early history: My hurts center around being the object of bullying for much of my childhood. My brother who was 4 years older, routinely tormented and bullied me. My peers followed the same pattern. I was not interested or good at sports, like most boys. I became passive. My masculinity was attracted from an early age. I was called the N word for being darker than most of my peers, I was called gay or other names for being passive. I was picked last on teams. Finding good friends was always hard. As an adolescent, I became desperate for acceptance, love, and affirmation as male. I became obsessed with proving my manhood, wanting a girlfriend, losing weight and getting fit, and wanting to show the world that I was man enough. At the same time, I maintained my faith and also wanted to be sexually pure until marriage. In adolescence, my budding hormones and this dysfunctional masculinity set me up for addiction to lust. I had no access to porn in those days, other than the occasional access to a magazine a friend might have. I did engage in compulsive masturbation which impacted my energy levels, my sleep patterns, and my outlook on sex and women. I would have sleepless nights with lustful desires that would keep me up until I gave in. Even then, my sleep would be troubled and not restful. In college, this state of mind quickly led to occasionally visiting porn shops, and buying my own magazines. I was in a conservative dorm, so I had to be very secretive about this activity, and I never kept any material after I used it. I was still technically a virgin and I believed that getting married would fix me and fulfill my sexual desires. After all, doesn’t the Bible say “It is better to marry, than to burn with lust.”? (1 Cor 7:9). I met my wife shortly after college. At first, I did maintain purity in my marriage, but eventually her ability to satisfy me was surpassed by my perpetual need for more and more sex and masculine affirmation. I would fall back to masturbation when she wasn’t available. We were married in 1995, during the first years of public Internet access. During free times, I would fall into Internet porn searches, even though it was a dial up connection, where the average image might take 30 seconds to load. At work, Internet access was unfiltered because it was so new and I would fall into image searches while on the job. No one ever caught me, but I was afraid that they would. The images I looked for became more perverse, centering around my passivity and my obsession with proving my masculinity. BDSM porn became my obsession, this led eventually to violent and homosexual themed porn. My wife would occasionally catch me, but I would hide it and cover it up in shame. Even when I thought I was hiding it, it always seemed like she knew. I was afraid it would be found out at work as well. My mind was becoming more and more perverse and my binging more and more risky. I knew I was becoming insane collecting thousands of pictures depicting my fantasy, thinking I’m going to find enough to satisfy this desire, thinking I’m going to finally be fulfilled by having these, thinking one more time will be my last, thinking I will be more masculine if I give in, and thinking I can easily stop later. Afterward I would feel dissatisfied, drained, miserable, and sleep deprived, with a brain fog that keeps me wanting more just to escape the depressed feelings that my actions caused. I would swear never to do it again, and within a few weeks, the pattern would repeat. True insanity. For Part 2 of the Testimony: https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?threads/ulysses-resists-ongoing-journal.356154/page-4#post-3749213
Thank you for sharing your story. There are parts of the childhood bullying I can identify with - for my the lack of interest in sport led to a lack of skill in the same, which in turn led to the bullying. I was mocked for my poor skill and moreso for being weak when they realised I never retaliated. I'm curious if there was a similar pattern for you? It's interesting you mention the issue of internet speed - various developments in internet speed and user experience have been cited as causes for uncontrollable addiction. Our sex drives were never intended to be exposed to such "super-normal" stimuli - for example being able to load multiple tabs of lustful content in an instant. We can even live-stream it, find and meet people sharing in our evil desires, all from the comfort of our homes with almost no delay. Just not possible in the days of dial-up internet. Recovery in the 21st century is especially hard because technology has made it so that within the space of a minute we can go from committing to never PMO again to having multiple tabs of buffered videos all lined up and ready to watch.
Thanks for replying. Yes, I didn't retaliate, partly because my brother was so much bigger than me and I really had no advantage. The other part was that my childlike faith told me to always turn the other cheek. Now, I know that is not the right interpretation, but back then, I thought it was my duty to not retaliate. This also led me to the BD$M fetish. Regarding Internet speed, I got addicted before the Internet, but having limited availability did make acting out less frequent. It also caused more shame in that I usually had to buy porn in some shop. Once the Internet came along it was a game changer, making it perpetually available with little shame or other barriers to access. My particular fetishes are very specific and there really isn't that many video's out there that trigger me. But pictures were more easy to find and because it took more searching time to find it, finding it was more rewarding.
Here are some of my favorite video's, podcasts, and articles on nofap and semen retention (SR) for motivation. Podcasts How to know if you have low or high T. https://open.spotify.com/episode/7M5eSam591r7aqlNhBRapv?si=xEk7mW0yTS-aS6rjXLbquQ How to increase T. https://open.spotify.com/episode/6MViSlwg6YvExkPlqRtP8w?si=iOIESSILRNiPfraRr49RgwSR benefits https://open.spotify.com/episode/2XngVAHqolEVvO9PpPKrOl?si=6j4Z4BscSE6w4zJCZ9rwow SR 60 days: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0T1JbFz1PbZ9FmTJYHMZ1p?si=_NMdzluCQmOpTOOWJCk5rg SR 90 Days: https://open.spotify.com/episode/13a6Myonlt1ESSauCiBPLG?si=pQNhZwiuSOW3Py_IS8bZfg Man's Life Force (SR): https://open.spotify.com/episode/3XhwZjzgMYW6CQVKmeMQPe?si=Rbr7YgEwSCKzhF4T71W9vA AI Sex and Porn Issues from Orthadox perspective (If you are triggered by AI, you may want to skip): https://open.spotify.com/episode/0VIyJUvfz9NIhmYuBpH8Wv?si=DJT3kdbSR8eDoZntiH_FFA P0rnHub admits to trying to convert people. The Michael Knowles Show: PornHub EXPOSED | Undercover Reporter Arden Young on Apple Podcasts How to Increase T Part I: Hardman podcast https://open.spotify.com/episode/7cyr4ErCjXOpE35YnGjQcx?si=cCoPyXe-R9usAATD9sHruQ How to naturally increase T Part II: Hardman podcast https://open.spotify.com/episode/2kV9mHDjxJQr3rWGHesACi?si=BGUkBtoXSV6aP778BciI_g Carnivore Diet benefits: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1R0CycgPd6knhdlrHgOUpO?si=JEkfzcqaQQKFpQa9o64Zyw How to naturally raise Testosterone. (Christian men) Part 1: https://open.spotify.com/episode/7cyr4ErCjXOpE35YnGjQcx?si=OJOnMlIvR-21lcSoZt8GlA How to naturally raise Testosterone Part 2: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2kV9mHDjxJQr3rWGHesACi?si=rp7KixO8TISZt1iUmpXPkw Testosterone and food - Hardman podcast: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4BwfhEp332VTrhPHWC7Hhm?si=09zM9_NfRMKVPkS_Zck-MA Iron John Commentary - Hardman Podcast https://open.spotify.com/episode/5zJoCgck4TTsXN89uVDD8q?si=zAxUvPHGRzi_V_EAVQ3nOA Exorcist talks about sexual deliverance: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1jK7H8ejW2xqAkQjbGozY9?si=BKMEEhiRSdy5ZJHwRZhHRQ How to spot and fight demonic attack: https://open.spotify.com/episode/7wRrC2Av0D9fLu3JBVZDIE?si=u63oeJzZTJux7ybAibaVaQ Article: https://www.reddit.com/r/Semenreten...article_that_used_to_be_number_one_for_nofap/ Brain Science behind Porn Addiction https://www.yourbrainonporn.com/mis...-has-not-prepared-your-brain-for-todays-porn/ Videos Carnivore Diet: https://www.youtube.com/@VinnieTortorichNSNG/videos Body Building dos and donts https://www.youtube.com/@athleanx/videos NOFAP - SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE THAT IT WORKS (youtube.com) SEMEN RETENTION FOR 2 YEARS?! (Here's How I Did It...) - YouTube NoFap Benefits Timeline - (No Nut November Challenge) (youtube.com) Science of Semen retention (Orthodox with Dr,. Moeller Part 1: Part 2: Orthodox NNN with Dr. Moeller: I think Nofap is Fun (youtube.com) Prayers of deliverance from sexual sin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgtN410Tbe0
