365 days without porn

Hi all, I haven't been very active here lately, but this forum always gives me more motivation to keep fighting my addictions. Much appreciation.

Today I hit a whole year without watching porn. I have masturbated occasionally, the current "No M" streak is 160 days, and I did have one 120 day streak during this year as well. I have had no major relapse streaks, where I would have fapped several days in a row, as I used to. This is the biggest Nofap achievement I have had during the 2,5 years I've been doing it, so take it from me: this fight takes a lot of time, of course depending on the severity of your addiction, but for me it was pretty extreme, and I feel like I'm still not completely healed, even though I rarely get cravings.

I can't even begin to describe the ways my life is different from before. My world has collapsed and been brought back to life several times during this year. It's like things keep happening more quickly and in more and more surprising ways (makes no sense, I know ). I can't say my life is all better, but it's definitely more full and more interesting. It feels like I'm still living in hell in some ways, but slowly things are improving.

Reasons for success

Honestly, there was only one thing that made me succeed in quitting porn for a whole year: my breakup from a 9-year-long serious relationship (also exactly a year ago), which had turned toxic, harmful and unloving. If anyone here has had this happen, you probaby know that it feels like you are torn from one life to another, and are forced to be born again. It was impossible for me to imagine single life after being this long with someone. In some ways I felt like a helpless baby without her, because I had been sharing my life, my interests, my home and everything in that one, closely intimate relationship.

After the breakup I knew that if I didn't stop wasting my life and energy on porn, fapping and marijuana, I would not be able to build up a new life from the ashes of the old one (ohhh the cliches...) I needed to become a new man and do new things with my life; change everything I was and go for my dreams (which I did, more on the topic later). I also knew that I was headed for hell, and it was terrifying, but I still did it. I think it was Winston Churchill that said: "If you find yourself going through hell, keep going". This resonates with me on a deep level: the only way to beat overwhelming challenges is to face them head on and win. You can't run away from your problems, you have to deal with them one-by-one.

After the breakup I had a pretty long period with heavy drinking and smoking. But even during that time I managed to nofap. During this time my life was fully chaotic, and I'm happy that I managed to pull myself out of that hole.

Marijuana

I've also managed to cut back on weed a lot. I never meant to quit it altogether, but my usage is now on healthy levels, whereas before I used to smoke everyday 3–4 times or even more. My advice as an ex-hardcore-stoner concerning weed: use it once per month, and even then only a little bit to relax and unwind, don't binge, and if possible, do it in good company and in the daytime, because it messes with your sleep cycles. Of course, to each their own, but I feel like the negative effects of this drug are heavily downplayed. I don't want to be preachy or judge anyone. If it's not harming your motivation, drive and manliness like it did for me, then there's probably no problem.

One thing to note on weed is that every time I relapsed to fapping during this year, was when I had a long streak going and smoked a bowl of weed alone at home. It destroys my willpower and long-term focus.

Relationships

I am in a new toxic relationship (yay), which I'm trying to make work, but I'm skeptical. I feel like we have a deep connection on some level, but she is not honest and has many issues that I would not like to have to deal with. She's not a bad person, just troubled and has a messed-up history (drugs, stripping, crime, etc.). I tried to date some other interesting women before this relationship, but my wrecked emotions, bad self-esteem, sexual shame and lack of confidence made it sure that nothing ever happened between us. I feel like my breakup destroyed a big part of me, and healing it has barely just started.

I have learned from my new experiences with women, that you really do find the person that is right for you, if you are honest in your actions. I am a hot mess with no confidence or self-esteem right now, and found the same in a woman

I have no superpowers with women, and did not have them at any point. This is fine, but many people here are really obsessed about them, so I thought I'd mention my experience.

Other than romantic relationship, I have been connecting a little bit more with other close (or not so close) people in my life, and even made new acquaintances. I'm certain that if I hadn't changed my habits with porn/fapping, I would not have been able to do this.

I also feel like I'm more aggressive in some ways. There's a coworker that tries to challenge me constantly in my work, and nowadays I'm completely ruthless, when it comes to fighting her. I actually enjoy it on some level, but on another, the expression of aggression easily leads to prolonged hate, which hurts only myself, so I need to be careful with this.

Sexual health

During these long streaks, I have noticed good and bad developments concerning my dick and sexual stamina:

1. During long streaks with no porn, no fapping, no edging, no tobacco, no weed and minimal alcohol, I get ROCK-FRIGGING-HARD morning wood that's actually hard as wood and lasts for minutes after waking up sometimes, and I'm almost in my 30s.
2. During long streaks, my sexual stamina is awful, if I'm not having a lot of sex. Usually after busting one nut I can go longer afterwards, but it's still not as good as in my fapping days. Sensitivity is through the roof.
   
3. During long streaks I used to get weekly wet-dreams, which many people here say is a good thing, but for me it was just frustrating. But I found a solution that reduced wet dreams to a once-per-month occurrence: natural grounding, look it up, I'm not going to go deeper into it, but for me it worked really well. Also helps me with my emotional issues a little bit, I think, and it's definitely made me more relaxed around women. Meditation in general is good.
4. As I mentioned in a previous post, my varicocele has almost completely disappeared after reducing masturbation to a minimum. Also, my balls are huge

Changes in personal habits

Todoist: use it. This tool (any similar one will work), has helped me to organize my life better than ever before.

I rarely procrastinate, because by using a task manager I can visualize everything that I have to do, dissect it into manageable tasks and schedule them. This reduces stress, and generally makes life easier. Give it a try.

I also exercise more, and manage to keep it regular, which of course helps everything else. Good health is key. Someone here said that when you lift regularlt, it's like living with cheat-codes on, which is completely true

Creativity

This is a really significant improvement for me, and it's lead me to a semi-spiritual awakening as well. During this long streak with minimal fapping I have had crazy creativity. 6 months ago I started working with 3 bands, for each of which I write my own material. The music now just flows out of me effortlessly, whereas previously the stuff I made was stupid and uninspired.

I really do believe that sexual energy has a divine property that can be expressed through different things. I'm a fairly skillful musician, so it's natural for me to express my emotions and experience through composition and jamming. For other people it could be exercise and sports, visual arts, writing, or anything they use to express themselves honestly.

I feel like sex doesn't hinder my creativity that much, probably because it has the element of human connection, but it still does diminish it in some ways.

Conclusion

Wow that was a pretty random rant that covered only a tiny part of the changes in my life during this turbulent year. But in a nutshell: quitting porn definitely made my life more interesting, lead to many eye-opening experiences and a more profound way of handling myself. Thank you so much NoFap community for helping me with this fight and for constantly providing motivation and support.