I'll make this short and to the point. I think theres a big difference "quit porn" mindset and "no pmo" mindset. And I think this is the key of true reboot too. "Quit porn" mindset is, where you mark porn or m as a "disgusting thing" and have a commitment not to go back to those thing forever, no matter what happen. This mindset will help you go through your streak. While a "no porn" mindset is, where you don't watch porn or masturbate for 3 month, and yeah, only 3 month. People often not realize this, that they might be thinking I will do no pmo untill I recover, NO, that's wrong, you need to QUIT it, not "not doing" it. And for example, people might be having a 3 month streak, but theyre not fully recovered yet, and overtime, they will think "when the hell will I recover", and their streak will just be filled with stress of waiting to fully recover. What you should do, is, QUIT it. Don't even think about fully recovering, just go on with your life as you leave pmo behind your back. Don't worry, your body will do its own thing. So yeah, basically "quit pmo/porn" is a mindset of a true reboot imo, please note that this is an opinion, you can freely disagree or agree with this. Cheers.
Thank you, that brought some clarity into thoughts I wasn't able to catch. I agree much with you. I'd like to add the following: there's a no porn and a quit porn mindset, also there is a no masturbation and a quit masturbation mindset. How are they connected? Is it possible to connect no masturbation (while in a reboot) with quit porn, or does one to have quit both in order to be successful? I'm not sure...
Exactly. What's the point of quitting an addiction if you want to go running back to it after 90 days right? As if the human brain and or personality is changed that easily.
If you want to truly heal your brain's reward center and neurotransmitter receptors and such, you'll need to quit all sexual fantasy. Masturbation is just a cheap surrogate for real sex. In the head it doesn't necessarily seem that way but masturbation is simply having sex with oneself. As sexual beings that is just not our purpose. The real goal should be to have sex with another human being or to have no sex at all.
There are good points in your answer, but one thing I don't really find plausible. If it is so, the connection between sex and the reward center, why then not stop having sex at all? Besides, for me masturbation is not a surrogate, rather a supplent to real sex. So either you stop all kinds of sex, or you can do masturbation as well as real sex.
I agree with your point on supplementing sex with masturbation because porn is used give us the reward of having sex I feel like and it's the reward we seek. If I seek reward after the 90 days then it should be real sex.
Real sex is much different from masturbation, particularly on the energetic levels. Hormones are very differently affected when one masturbates as opposed to when two humans have sex. This is rather hard to prove since there's not a lot of scientific data about this but if you think about it, you do not nearly feel as depressed after you've had real sex as opposed to the way you do after having masturbated. Quite the contrary actually. Real sex feels like a real achievement. Masturbation doesn't. Thus the reward circuitry will be differently affected. It is said that pheromones play a big role in sex between humans. Energy that is lost after masturbation is exchanged during sex according to some sources. That is, if you believe in chakra's, aura's, etc...
Hm, I do not accept a thought as proven only because it sounds plausible. If there's no scientific evidence, then it shouldn't be supposed. I never felt depressed, neither after real sex nor after masturbation. I think it's rather a consequence of your mindset. If you are convinced that masturbation is a bad thing, then you surely are depressed afterwards. If you are longing for real sex and do masturbation only to get rid of your urges, then okay, I agree, it's only a cheep surrogate. I don't see that masturbation should be bad for you. You can still stop it for a reboot for not getting into danger to relapse to PMO because it's your free will to stop
I would agree that masturbation without porn is far better than masturbation with porn, however, I don't see how it could ever be beneficial to one's life. These are some random thoughts about masturbation vs real sex from the web: "it is known that having sex will increase ur free non aromatised testosterone levels in the blood trigering muscle building and fat loss and better health on the other hand masturbation will increase ur testosterone level;s but they will be aromatised turned into eoustrogene and eventually loss of muscle mass and increasein fat tissue ." forum.bodybuilding.com "What scientists found was that, after orgasm from sexual intercourse, the increase in blood prolactin levels is 4 times higher in both sexes compared with the levels after orgasm from masturbation" news.softpedia.com "Researchers' theory: The duration of the effect, and the fact that you get more of it from penile-vaginal intercourse than from other sex, suggests the benefit comes not from orgasm but from oxytocin, a pair-bonding hormone. Translation: It's not the sex; it's the love." (about blood pressure after orgasm) slate.com So it appears that at least some research has been done on this topic, and the few studies do seem to show that the body is differently affected by masturbation. It all depends on frequency and self-control I guess. Definitely not saying masturbation is destructive if it's a controlled habit, but energetically it's just not the same as real sex. It can be a gateway to porn addiction as well. So it really does depend on how the individual would handle this as you say. As someone who's been very addicted to pmo I'd never advertise masturbation as being a healthy form of release though. There are negative effects to life that are not necessarily immediately apparent.
I can imagine myself never wathcing porn again. At least that's my goal. But I cannot imagine myself never masturbating again. At least not when I'm not in a relationship. My plan is to stay away from porn forever and masturbation for at least 90 days (or more if I feel it's needed) I can't see masturbation as something unnatural. Haven't people always been doing it to some degree? (Or maybe not?). It also has some advantages as a substitute to sex (prostate cancer and so on). Real sex isn't always an option. But you should not overdo it. And you should be able to do it without fantazising about porn and unnatural sex. You should be able do to it by fantazising about real sex with real girls. Or am I wrong?
I agree people have been masturbating for a very long time in human history. I can also see myself never watching porn again. I am not sure about never masturbating again but I truly want to wait until 90 days is up. From there I will seek true human interaction for my first time back at it
Meh. It's great to be disgusted or rather pretend to be disgusted with porn at first, but it's not realistic. In my experience, and the experience of other successful rebooters, the disgust factor sets in much later, as does regret of wasting so much of their lives, and eventually the emotional wound which led to their addiction. I think that it is good (in most cases) to start out simple; no PMO for 7 days, then 14, 30, etc. I think that you simplify things a bit too much, which leads me to believe that you're new to this and haven't had a successfully long streak yet. Just try quitting for 7 days before you start philosophizing on the nature of quitting itself.
