Great Improvements, but not there Yet

In this post ill try to summarise not only my experience of my current 1 month streak, but also my experience of being connected and committed to NoFap for around 5 months, since I started in August, so this post will be long. Buckle up your seats since it’s a long post. My title summarises in many ways what I feel about this journey so far.

A little about myself and my background
Im a 31 year old man who got into the habit of PMO since my early teens. We were probably the first generation who got mass exposure to high speed internet Porn. Similarly I discovered M at around the same age. Im a Muslim and because I was raised in a religious home, not strict though, my conscience always blamed me for the PMO. So there was always a fight going on inside me between my desire to PMO and my desire to get out of it. Because of the religious upbringing and attraction towards spirituality I from that same early age also started praying, studying religion, morals and spirituality and trying to achieve nearness to God. These things helped me immensely in life. And because of these things I always had a great sense of contentment and peace of mind in life. I never had any great addictions or demons to fight……. Other than the addiction of PMO. And this addiction really started bothering me more and more the older I got. In my late twenties I had the feeling, and I still have it, that I need to get rid of this addiction, since I started to realise that it was preventing me from really becoming the person I always wanted to be and to achieve the things I always wanted to achieve. My longest streaks without PM before NoFap were around 5-7 weeks a couple of times.

Discovering NoFap
During these days I discovered NoFap by searching for solutions on the internet. At that time I was probably in the toughest trial in my life so far, which was making my mind have more and more negative thoughts and similarly I was indulging in PMO often, because of this state of mind. My daily routine was bad. I used to waste time on playing iPad games in my bed all night (I live alone by the way) and then sleep in the morning and get up in the afternoon. I was not giving enough time and energy to studies and other important projects. I was basically feeling miserable. The only positive thing I had started a couple of months before that was to eat healthy and play basketball regularly, and that had already taken away the worst of the depressive state I was in (it wasn’t diagnosed depression, as in the disease depression, but I was just feeling very bad and miserable), but I still needed a lot more help, and NoFap gave me that help.

I connected to a couple of APs, Fap5Freddy and Krtvdw. Im mentioning them, because I just want to say that you guys rock and I wish you all the best in the future too. My happiness will be doubled if I along myself see you guys beat PMO and achieve your goals.

Similarly I started a No PMO hard mode reboot. It lasted around a month, but it pretty much turned the tide big time for me. After that I have had several streaks of 3 weeks or less, but I stayed committed to NoFap and it payed off in many ways. Its important to note, that my improvements were not just because of not indulging in PMO, but because I also put a lot of emphasis on improving in other areas of my life. I achieved the following results in that month and in the period afterwards until now.

1. My sleeping routine and sleep quality improved almost immediately.
   
2. My day routine improved a lot. I would now get up in the morning and start studies and projects around 9 in the morning. This has improved even more after that. Now I get up early, pray, meditate, read a book, listen to motivational speeches, stay away from electronics before 8 and start my studies, work or other projects at around 8-8.30. this improved my productiveness immensely and it keeps me occupied with positive activity throughout most of the day, which is essential for recovery and improvement.
   
3. I kept on exercising and eating healthy. This has again gone down lately.
   
4. My mind went from depressive, negative and pessimistic about life to positive and optimistic about life. This has kept improving since then, and I can honestly say that Im mentally a different person compared to what I had become when I first started NoFap.
   
5. I started feeling a removal of a mind fog and things around me started to feel more pleasant, beautiful and vibrant. Im not talking about magic, but just slightly, but still enough to be able to notice a difference. This change lasts only as long as you don’t relapse. I started to feel it again during my current streak after I passed 3 weeks, but probably not as vividly as during the first streak. I used to get up in the morning miserable about life, but now I was getting up happy, grateful and excited about life.
   
6. Women started to become way more attractive. In other words I got my natural level of sexual energy back, as we are naturally supposed to have it. I also don’t want to just go have sex with someone now that I have this greater sex drive, like some people do. That’s not my purpose. My purpose is self-improvement, and Im far from fully recovered yet. So I need to get a grip of this addiction and be able to control my sexuality, and then in the near future channel that in the direction of a true loving relationship and marriage. Now I almost never have fantasies about porn, which I used to once, but its almost entirely good looking and attractive real-life women I see that make the trigger in my mind. Although this is more natural I still want to get rid of this too, since I feel these fantasies are a way for the PMO brain to find a way to please itself, since it cant do it through PMO. We have to learn and study the way our brain works and treat it accordingly.
   Some people on this forum say that you get more attractive to women when retaining your sexual energy through No PMO. Im not sure about this, but It might be slightly true for some unexplained reason. I felt women being attracted to me before reboot too, but sometimes its almost like there is a slight increase in this attraction. But then again, I can’t say for sure. But even if it is, this wasn’t the reason I started with NoFap.
   
7. Last but not least I went from indulging in PMO excessively to very rarely (when I relapsed or binged by M after a relapse).

As you can see these are not “superpowers”, but still huge changes compared to where I was when I started NoFap, and Im very gratefull to God that I found NoFap.

My current streak
My current streak has been decent so far. Im gradually experiencing more benefits, but still not anything new compared to what I have already written. Maybe in a month there will be other changes. After 3 weeks it became very difficult to control the PMO brain and I got a lot of fantasies. After that I fasted for a week almost every day. Very short fasts though. It helped almost totally remove urges. Or maybe it was just a simple flatline. Now today im feeling as if that flatline is passing away, but Im still not feeling very high urges.

What I have learnt
Ive learnt that the following things have benefitted me a lot, and should be used on the NoFap journey:

• Going to sleep early and getting up early.
  
  
• Having good and healthy morning rituals, such as prayer/meditation, good breakfast, reading, listening to motivational speeches, exercising etc.
  
  
• Fasting once in a while or in periods of several days. It controls urges. It also has loads of other physical as well as spiritual benefits. Search the internet for intermittent fasting.
  
  
• Starting work, studies, a project early and use most of the day on that. If you don’t have a job or if you are not occupied with something, then find something. It is crucial to keep the brain away from PMO thoughts and negative thoughts, and similarly it gives us a sense of achievement, so that we feel good and positive.
  
  
• Eating healthy and exercising regularly.
  
  
• Keeping yourself and your home clean and pleasant looking, since our environment effects our state of mind. If everything around us is in order our mind will more likely be in order. Get up in the morning take a shower, put on nice and clean clothes, use some perfume etc. It really does matter, not only to others but to your own state of mind.
  
  
• Prayer and meditation. It increases mental power, faith and peace of mind among other things.
  
  
• Gaining knowledge and staying connected to a community like NoFap, which can help you and support you on your journey.
  
  
• Keep company of good and positive people who are ambitious, goal oriented, moral, spiritual, and who don’t have any of those habits that you want to get rid of. So if youre trying to get rid of alcohol, DON’T hang out with people who usually drink. If you want to get rid of PMO, DON’T hang out with people who like to watch porn with their friends etc. Similarly If you want to get in shape hang out with people who are driven to eat healthy and train hard. If you want to be successful in your professional life or studies, hang out more with people who are hard working in their studies and ambitious about their professional field, including the ones that are in your own professional field or the field you want to pursue.
  
  
• Watch motivational speeches and read motivational stuff. Keep pictures calenders etc which remind yourself of your goals and dreams daily. It would also be good to have a physical day counter somewhere, in your room for instance, which reminds you of your progress. Compared to the NoFap digital day counter this will be more beneficial, since it is in front of you most of the time or a big part of the day, and thereby it reminds you of your goal daily. I did this for the first time during this reboot, and it definitely helps.
  
  
• Install a porn blocker on ALL of your electronic devices such as computer, iPad, android, iPhone, tablet etc and install a password which you either intentionally forget or keep it at a place from where you wont bother to retrieve it if you have urges. Its not a substitute for your own will power and effort, but its still very important. Who would consider it wise for an alcoholic, who wants to get rid of his addiction, to keep liquor in his home. Same way with PMO. Get everything that hinders you from your goal OUT OF THE WAY!
  
  
• Writing a journal or diary. I did this on my first streak, and it was one of the things which gave me a strong start. Now, due to being more busy, I don’t do that anymore, but its definitely better to do so. As a substitute I write to my APs and on this success stories forum once in a while.
  
  
• Try to stay mostly away from computers and mobile phones, unless its something necessary or healthy. Get out in nature or among people. Walking in nature and contemplating and planning about life is one thing I really enjoy doing.
  
  
• Last but not least, never loose hope and keep going.

It may seem from my post that I have achieved my goals or have come very near them, but that is not at all the case. Im still struggling with urges and im still far from my ultimate goals. After one months reboot the urges are still there, but the fact that Ive reached a month keeps me from relapsing, since I don’t want to start over again. I almost never bother to watch porn. I have porn blockers on all my devices anyway. The urge to M is still there, but less. Fantasies are still challenging me, but if I keep my day filled with healthy and positive activities it works as a deterrent from this.

In the end I want to thank all of you, this NoFap community. I never liked being a member of internet communities, but being a member of NoFap was the best solution to get out of my PMO addiction, and that community is all of you.

 

No, I’m attending university classes (bachelors). I would not prefer distant or e-learning, since, like I mentioned in my post, it is very important in recovery to get out of the home daily. Even on the days that I don’t have lectures I go the the university for my self study early in the morning. This is very crucial for recovery. If you can make it a habit to sleep early and get up for morning prayer and then be out of your home to start your day at around 8 o clock daily this will work wonders for you. It did for me. Even on weekends just get out somewhere, even if it’s just for a walk. Staying at home and not being busy is a big factor for relapse.

Secondly getting ready and getting out of home early has skyrocketed my productiveness and has made my procrastination almost totally vanish. So I say that do yourself a favour and either seek admition in an actual physical class, and if that’s not possible then at least make it a habit to take your computer to the library daily early in the morning and make it a habit to do your e-classes there instead of from home.