You cannot think your way out of an addiction that takes place in the mind

True, in part.

Although if you manage to not act on your thoughts (i.e. not touch yourself) rather than ban the thoughts completely, you can still be effective. I think about nude women all the time, but still feel like I've got everything under control and am progressing well with my reboot.

 

"You start thinking about fapping or watching porn which will cause the relapse. This is why for some of you, spending time on a forum such as this is BAD."

I disagree, or I think it works different. Thinking about P in general is something different than thinking about specific content of P. I come here to think about the addiction on P, and that works, so far at least.

 

It actually helps me when I have strong urges to think about the addiction and what it does to my brain and body. Browsing this forum during these hard times is helpful, too because it reveals the bad side of pornography and masturbation.

 

A thought that I recently had, was not to think nothing at all, but to just ignore porn in a very conscious way. What I see a lot on here is that people take on a fighting attitude but I think with such a strong defensive attitude, the urges also get harder, because extreme defensive thoughts trigger extreme aggressive thoughts. I lately try to have milder feelings like plain disinterest to porn, so I do not get agressive gravings as punishments for an agressive defense.

 

The problem is, that our culture is so focused on our heads. Education and everything is always based on your brain. People don't live in their bodies like they used to.

When you start living more in your body, which is an extension to your brain, you start to express more openly and become more healthy in general. That's why I think excercise is good in NoFap. It takes our focus back to our bodies and so forth we ain't thinking 'bout the addiction. This is also the same reason, why I think meditation is good for you.

My problem has always been over-thinking, which tends to make things worse and it can create problems out of nowhere. Also, your brain is what does all the rationalizing, when you're thinking 'bout relapsing. Then I learned to be more aligned with my body and my whole self. This is beyond beneficial to doing this challenge.

Do more things with your body and live. Your brain is just a tool and if you're nothing but your brain, then you're a tool.

 

I don't think we can really control a sexy thought appearing, but we can give it a green, yellow or red light. The red light is the hardest to give, but once you really believe that it is good and beneficial to stop the big scary PMO truck from plowing thur all your other traffic, the easier it gets.
It's you who's in charge of the road, not the biggest vehicle on it. And waiving thru other traffic just buys you time IMO - you still always need to face PMO alone and tell it that it can't pass

 

I guess if you really think it is your head going against what you want, then you can use the rest of your body to fight it. It sounds like something Elliot Hulse would say, but your brain is your entire body. Only a small part of who you are is in your head, and a large part of your thought comes from the rest of your body. There is a mind like the autonomic nervous system that drives your heartbeat, your breathing, that knows how to to grow from a sperm cell into the body you now have. You didn't do all this with your head. The brain in other parts of your body did, and you are only accessing a small part of your ability to fight your addiction if you are using only your head...

 

You are totally right.

 

I am making this up, but I would say to listen to how your entire body feels as you stop masturbating. Maybe your body will say to masturbate at first because that may be how it has been trained for so long, sort of like muscle memory, but I think that given enough reprogramming the body will recognize that it has more energy and feels better than before masturbating, but maybe this won't happen and maybe nofap is not for everyone, but I think it's an experiment worth trying for everyone because I've heard about some marvelous results and people having more energy than ever before.

 

I'm glad you said this. I was just thinking that two days ago. It's ben going well and I just made it to 5 days without PMO, but every time I came on to post on my journal or read some posts, I felt a bit of the urge. Reading other people's threads/posts was not helping. So I would leave immediately without posting and go workout, read, put on a podcast, play guitar or something just to get away from it.

Today I couldn't help coming on cause I wanted to look at my progress meter. But besides that, I rather be away and only come on if I need encouragement or have to post in my journal to settle my mind.

 

Personally i think initially this place is fantastic. It really helps people to focus and get support however in the long term everyone is really looking for a fulfilled life where porn, fantasy doesn't exist, just real life pleasures (sexual and non sexual).

Ultimately no one wants to have to rely on a forum to achieve this but one would hope that with the support from the forum, people can get this and move on without actively thinking about it.

So, on balance, whilst the constant "thinking" of our addiction can be a hindrance in the long term, initially i feel its beneficial. Also, just people realising that they are not alone and what is happening is just a human reaction really takes a load off the mind!