Is a porn blocker necessary

A porn blocker is no way necessary. There are plenty of guys, who never used any of them and still recovered. However, I would argue they can help.

Generally, the views on porn blockers are mixed: Some say they send a subconcious message to yourself, that you are too weak. Some say there is always a workaround anyways, so there is no benefit of a blocker. Some say it's not good to rely on porn blockers, because it doesn't train you to stay away from porn out of intrinsic motivation. Some also say, it helped them greatly to withstand porn in times of emergency. Some say, porn blockers helped them to not even search for porn because they knew they couldn't access it anyways.

I personally didn't use porn blockers in the past and never really had much success with it, because I always peaked at a semi-erotic site, which made me spiral down the porn hole. Then a few weeks ago, I setup a very effective porn blocker for me (Until now I never found a workaround) and since I can't access this semi-erotic site, I don't go to porn sites either. So, I'm certain that a porn blocker was (and is) a great choice for me.

Some of the arguments against blockers may or may not be true. I don't know. But I thought of it in an analogy, which made it clear to me: My addiction is like a wild beast, which can never be killed fully. It can only be tamed to a degree, where it is harmless. It would be the best solution, if you could tame it all by your power of will and exercising your mind. But I wasn't able to tame it this way for the last three years. The beast always jumped in my face and attacked me. So, I decided to put the beast into a cage and let it weaken. While the beast gets weaker, I train to become stronger. And maybe one day, when I am stronger and the beast is weaker, I don't need the cage anymore in order to beat it. But until that day, I prefer to have the beast caged up rather than getting eaten every couple of days.

However, it's important to keep in mind: A porn blocker is only an assistance, not a solution. Don't rely on it. Look at it more like a emergency kit in moments of weakness. If you don't want to overcome this addiction, a porn blocker won't help you.

That's just my two cents. Take what you like and leave the rest. Everybody here is different.

 

Well my friend, I wouldn’t have got to day 365 without it. Set content restrictions on your phone because willpower alone won’t help you after a while. You have to reboot through studying!

 

I know how much we all love reading success stories, I am on 365 days of Nofap today and I have been reading soaring eagles book, on rebooting as the best remedy to PMO. I hope all brothers and sisters on this website can benefit from rebooting material and articles written by other forum users and authors. I would like to share with you an excerpt from the book slightly reworded, hoping that it will help you grow stronger and move forward. I found it to be very mentally beneficial, motivating, uplifting.

Here goes,

Increasing brainpower, avoiding wet dreams, cultivating health, regular reading and studying.

Due to PMO and or wet dreams the brain Decreases in power. PMO or wet dreams Injures brain power. in traditional Chinese medicine pmo injures the kidneys and damages brainpower. The main areas that are affected are our memory, comprehension, concentration, and thinking abilities. All these are significantly affected. They all take a downturn in varying degrees. Producing the following symptoms in a person , Stupid, slow to react, lacking impatience, restlessness, easily angered and agitated.

When the brain power is low, chores and tasks become difficult. The reduction of brainpower is especially disastrous for students involved with PMO.

Under normal circumstances, recovering from PMO is relatively difficult. It would appear that it requires half a year of rebooting and health cultivation. It’s a gradual process which requires the following, controlling wet dreams, stop sexual fantasies, actively exercising, silent meditation, brain nourishing food moderate intake and maintenance.

When these points have been thoroughly applied, brainpower will enjoy a substantial recovery. When brainpower is increased, a person will refresh. Difficult topics will become easier to understand, meaning easier comprehension and determination , Concentration, memory and comprehension will increase.

Rebooting Has the ability to raise the level of wisdom in a person. Once the brain power has been recovered a change in destiny can be a achieved. One brain power is good things you did previously which were poor, in all becomes easier. Your destiny will change accordingly. Brainpower is important, cut out PMO.

Improve on the speed on advancement of your realisation.

The thought process. First step is to reform the thoughts, give the awareness of Rebooting t through studying . To reboot, the thoughts must be transformed. Through study rebooting Will become easier. Through understanding other peoples experiences your own awareness will increase and when confronting various reporting issues you will then have a reliable answer. If you don’t study you will have a hard time rebooting. A little each day is making progress. thoughts must be transformed. Once study mentality kicks in, awareness will increase by leaps and bounds. The more regular and thorough your thoughts rewire, the easier it is to reboot .

On a final note it is important to maintain daily vigilance. After thoughts have been rewired you will notice you are out of tune with the people around you. Because you have fully understood the truth of PMO. You have seen it for what it really is. most people are on the road to self-destruction completely oblivious to the approaching symptoms.

Society today has been polluted by pornography ideology and sexual debauchery. In addition to the harmlessness theories promoted by doctors and Alike, therefore the vast majority of people are bound to not see the truth clearly.

This precisely confirms the saying, truth is controlled by a few people.

We are bound to be a minority who knows the truth and what we need to do is find the proper timing and method to help our brothers and sisters, help our former selves, and in the process help ourselves.

The end.
Please copy this in to your life journal and hope it helps.

 

What blocker would you recomend?

 

On Windows, I personally use a combination of a large "Hosts" file (blocking over 26.000 porn sites/Psubs sites + enforcing Safe Search) and K9 Web Protection (blocking Proxy workarounds, Search Engines except google, Pornography and Extreme sites). It's essential to have multiple sources of blockage, because only one will leave to many potential loopholes. It's also important to create a new profile (which is not an administrator), and change the password of the admin to something you can't remember. Give the password to a person you can trust, once you're done setting up the filters. If you want, you can use DNS filtering (openDNS, CleanBrowsing.org, etc) on top of that to add another layer of protection.

Although I didn't find any workaround for my filters, they probably exist. But that is not important as long as I don't find them, right? If anyone of you knows workarounds for these kinds of blocking strategies, PLEASE DO NOT post them! I'll have to emphasize again, that blockers are not a solution, they are only an assistance. Use them as a tool, not as an answer.

 

It depends on the person. I don't know where I would be today if I didn't use porn blocks.

 

Blockers will help, but you have to try and think of them as impenetrable and not try to test them!
The biggest tool besides blockers is willpower, and constantly reminding yourself that there is nothing for you by viewing porn!

 

I'd say no because you can just remove it and there's ways around it. Been there!

 

You can`t remove K9 if you use ColdTurkey Blocker.

 

Hey nice! Didn't know about ColdTurkey, if you think that will help then go for it.

 

I see my porn blocker as being a barrier - I can easily bypass it but it takes a little bit of effort during which time I hope to have snapped out of whatever urges I have had.

I use my ISP's porn blockers - they work on the main porn sites but useless with Google or Bing images.

 

Porn blocker is kind of like putting your alarm on top of the dresser instead of by your bed, when it rings in the morning, you have to get out of bed to reach it so that kind of gives you momentum to not just press the snooze button and fall asleep again.
Some people have no issues getting our of bed and some do. Same with porn blockers, the goal here is not to stop you from doing the behavior, the goal is to make you do extra things to get to the behavior so you have time to think about it.
Making something harder to get to can be a good deterrent, for mild cravings.

There is no need to guess, just start and see if you go to places you should not go to, and if you have trouble then add the blocker.

 

I don't believe in these blockers, the only blocker you need is your willpower.

 

I used to download porn all day long in my bedroom and when I feel disgusted and shameful after I've finished PMO, I would wipe my laptop to factory settings and attempt using my laptop again with the porn category blocked on my ISP.

But I would always unblock it when I felt the urge to PMO because it's in the back of my mind - the knowing that I've done something to prevent me doing something just makes me think about it and increase my desire to want it back.

A better solution is to just remove all reminders of PMO. Rearrange your room. Use your devices around family or friends instead of when alone. Minimise use of technology in general and focus on new things to do, people you can meet, which will kind of replace or rewire your thoughts if you do them consistently enough. Easier said than done, I'm only on day 4 but this is what I try to remember - I have better things to try and do with my life before I die.

 

Depends on how you learn. I for one resist and even get depressed when I try methods like this that take away my control (even though i set up the blocker.) For other guys, it works wonders. You should look at other areas of life where you've had to overcome at least somewhat similar obstacles and how you did it then duplicate

 

Instead of blocking porn sites, you could try redirecting to other sites that get your attention. I just wrote this script that redirects to informational websites about porn stuff. Although you could use it to redirect to, like, youtube or something. I don't know if it will really help, but it's been working for me for a few days.

If you want to use it, PM me and I'll send you a copy. I'd post a link, but it's my first post so the forum won't let me.

 

Willpower is not sufficient because when you start the recovery process, many porn thoughts and images will pop up. And your mind will tell you there is no harm in watching one picture. You have to have an accountability partner to help you deal with that. Blocker is very easy to bypass. However, it still serves as a reminder for you.

I employ both blocker and accountability partner. I ask my partner for help when the urges come and study how to not repeat the mistake with blocker once relapse happens. There are a lot of triggers on social media so I block them completely. Just use them for chat services. For blocker, I prefer white list solution which block all websites outside of the safe list. And I always remind myself that I am not a perfect person after a relapse happens, just move on with recovery process. I used to binge a lot after a relapse but now it does not happen anymore.

 

I see the blockers as tools. They can be helpful, but mostly I think to avoid accidental triggers. If you intentionally set out to circumvent them, which I have done multiple times, they're merely a speed-bump on the road to relapse. That said, I do use K9 and I like it, especially for the setting where you can filter URL's by keyword.

More important than a blocker though, is to have a plan for what you'll do when the urges come. If your default stress-reliever is to go instantly search P, then you need to relearn that behavior. There are many options, everything from taking a walk, doing a hard crossword puzzle, meditating, excercising, reading a book, learning a new recipe, calling a friend, practicing a musical instrument, playing a challenging videogame, etc. Whatever redirects your focus away from seeking out P.