NEED ADVICE (From those who live with winter weather)

I must agree with ZenAF because he is right with what he is saying. Once you are self-aware of what is working and what not is quite easy to handle it. You are only struggling when your body and mind thinks they are missing something they need. Surely you don't' need porn. So therefore, there is no struggling cause Porn is something you don't need at all. Most people are aiming way to high thus they are failing constantly cause they pressure themselves to much.

Is better to run 5km then 20km. You will fail at 20km most likely if you are not trained. Set small goals and achieve them and then go to the next difficulty. Don't start with the highest difficulty!! Of course, some people will succeed trying the first time the highest difficulty. But the majority will not.

Here what I did:
· Focus on a small goal like no P anymore
· Make your own rules and make sure you stick to them
· Gather as much information as you can and write it down like guides, Youtube, inspirational post (not only at nofap), motivational pictures. Write down the benefits, mistakes from other people.
· Install some Porn blocking SW.
· Team up with someone else.


I hope that makes sense

EDIT: Check this out!: https://sites.google.com/site/SPAM REMOVED (spam code #001) - REPORT TO MODERATION/

 

Here's my problem with this line of thinking: What are you actually trying to say by that? We don't use words and ideas like "brain chemistry affecting us" just because they're true. It is true, our brain chemistry is badly affected by porn no matter what we think and believe. But what are you doing with that information now exactly is my question. Because as I see it, all you can use it for is as an excuse. Either the concept helps you to make things easier and get rid of your addiction faster or it's a scapegoat for your relapses and hardship.

We don't perceive our inner world as a bunch of neurons with an addiction cluster, even if it ends up being that from a scientific point of view. We don't see it like that because we're not machines, we're humans. We perceive reality as a set of tools and characters that play in stories. An idea like "brain chemistry pushes my porn urges" is a tool, nothing more nothing less. I doubt the utility of that tool. I think it's overrated and pretty useless. The only implication that comes from that particular tool is "just abstain from all the bad triggers as long as possible and you'll get better all on your own" (which is delusional) and what's even worse is it makes space for a nihilistic sort of worldview where you as an individual are being victimized by your own brain.
The problem is it's true, of course we're victims! Not just by our brain chemistry, but by our DNA, by the mistakes of our parents, by our imperfect health, by the rotten parts of society, etc.
But we're more than that. We are the agents that have the power to turn potential into reality. To dream of something better and then become it through the power of will and determination. That's the angle that improves our lives because no matter how dire our situation might be, we know we have what it takes to make it better.
The deterministic angle doesn't offer that at all. Science says you're addicted aka. you're weaker than you think aka. you're prone to relapses. Science tells you to flee from your addiction so your porn-synapses can slowly start to deteriorate. It removes you as a free agent out of the equation. Religion on the other hand tells you you should make the right choice and you'll reduce the suffering in the world. (I don't belong to any faith fyi)

You can judge me for seeing things that black and white, but I've tried the deterministic angle for a while and it didn't help at all. Porn addiction is a serious problem with the potential to wreck lives so I don't go easy on pathways that I deem to be nothing but a waste of time. Time that you and others might not have.

 

The cold showers I heard are good for dopamine as well..

 

I need to research it more myself, but I’ve been taking snow baths recently and they have at times produced states of euphoria in me.

I recommend singing. Seems to make a difference

 

I generally agree with ZenAF, as I already said multiple times before. But I wouldn't say that such a statement is necessarily true. That's why I can't win too much of the whole concept. Sure, it makes things a little lighter. But as soon as the chemical reactions go crazy (and they will at some point), things will become hard. That's the nature of addiction.

No, not at all. It's nowhere near an excuse. I never said that and never wanted to say that, because I don't think it is correct. Chemistry is an explanation.

I feel irritated some days, especially after a certain amount of sobriety from porn. When I know why I feel that way, I personally find it much easier to control my urges and stay clean. I don't know if it is like this for all people, but from what I heard it helps a majority of them as well. Only if I understand what is happening in my brain on a chemical level, I can take control over my emotion and urges. Some people might tend to use it as an excuse ("The chemistry made me relapse", etc.), but I find that cheap as well. I'm sure, you'd agree.

My problem with your concept of free will, is this: One symptom of basically every addiction is hypofrontality, as you probably know. This physical change of your brain weakens the parts of your brain, which are necessary for decision making and controling behaviour. And sadly these parts become weaker, no matter how determined you might be. This weakness alone makes it hard to act on your thoughts and ideas. So, when you get triggered by anything, you have to act on your thought "I don't want to use porn". And you can, but it can be a struggle.

You said, that we as humans don't perceive our world this way. Might be, but I argue: It doesn't matter. Things are how they are, no matter how we perceive them. Our brain controls everything that happens in our body. If the brain is physically weak, it is a struggle.

I also want to mention something, we discussed in university a while ago: Some scientists aren't even sure anymore, if something like free will even exists. They came to that conclusion after a series of experiments. But that just as a side note. I personally don't think the experiements were interpretated correctly. Nevertheless, it's intersting to read and think about.

I again want to emphasize something: I don't think you are wrong by any means. I agree generally and have a similiar world view. I just think it's uncorrect to cut science out of the equation. It plays a major role in human life and therefore it should be respected in such a matter as well. To deny the effects of bio chemistry is not correct in my opinion. We should rather use it as an explanation. We should use it to help us understand our problems and act on them responsibly. We should add science to the equation, so to speak. I don't want to replace your way of seeing things with mine. I want to add them together.

 

Exercise at home? You don't even need weights, there are a lot of bodyweight exercises like squats, pushups, sit ups, planks, lunges etc!

 

@IR254 I appreciate the balanced and careful manner in which you've articulated your response. I also do not wish to shove my worldview down your throat. But judging by what you wrote you still don't quite get my main point, which is my fault because it's not the easiest thing in the world to explain.

Let's start with what I agree with first:

That scientific understanding is necessary to not misjudge your own state of mind as you rightly point out. But it's a double edged sword and I don't think you see the other side of it yet.

See how with your last sentence you undermined everything you wrote before? The point is you can. So why can you? Because there is no such thing as a "half will" or a "compromised will". Aside from the fact that the concept of hypofrontality is completely useless to the addict, because it doesn't empower him/her it only creates doubt, I'd be very careful on how much you read into these scientific findings. And before you make the same point as before; saying that an addicted brain will send you impulses every once in a while which helps you understand yourself better is something quite different than thinking that your decision making capabilities are compromised.
This also concerns your point you make later where scientists are not sure if such a thing as free will exists. See nobody on this good earth understands consciousness. We just don't. We're not even close to it. We don't know in which brain area it spawns, we don't know what it's role is from a scientific perspective, we don't know when and why it was born, we don't know if it exists in animals, we're completely clueless. And to then suggest that we can know whether we have free will or not is impossible. Because we're missing very very large chunks of data. Data we don't even know if we'll ever be able to collect.

What we do know for sure tho is that determinism creates nihilism which creates depression. Because in a deterministic universe where you are nothing but a chemical reaction, nothing you do matters. And when you deprive a human being from his/her sense of meaning in the world you kill his/her most basic most powerful driving force.
However only very few people actually adapt a deterministic world view to their core. Most people including you believe in free will. It doesn't matter what they say, what matters is what they act out. And the fact is that if you think about your addiction you might doubt the existence of free will but if someone on the street kicks in you in the balls you'll get angry at him, not at the universe. See what I'm saying?
In fact we've arranged our whole society including the justice system on the basis of free will. And here's the killer: It works! We live in prosperous stable societies. So from an evolutionary perspective we're definitely supposed to believe in free will.

So it might all be an illusion at the end of the day, we don't know. What we do know for sure is that if you act like it's real things work properly and when you act like it's not real things fall apart. (Act! Not think!) So you might as well believe that it's real.

Here's the thing and the main problem with your side of the argument: It creates doubt within yourself. When you're not sure and build logical constructs that undermine your ability to see yourself as a free agent you'll fail. You have to be convinced of your power to decide what you want through and through.

Physically weak by what metric exactly? This paragraph in particular shows me that you don't see the effects that concepts like that have on your psyche. It's not about turning a blind eye towards science and pretending like everything is fine. It's about recognizing the absolute power your will has. Nothing can force your hand no matter how much grey matter your neocortex supposedly lost.

I try to summarize: This is about having the best mindset possible to regain control over our lives. Installing the fastest, most efficient, most stable and bugfree software to run on our hardware.
Ideas that we believe shift our focus. They either strengthen or weaken our position.
Believing that you have mild degrees of hypofrontality makes you weak. Whether you want it or not.
Believing that you have full control over what you do in each moment and to some extend even over how you feel (!) makes you strong. Your whole perception of pain/impulses/urges etc. shifts when you do that. The cross to bear becomes much lighter.

So I dismiss beliefs which do not help me on my journey, whether they're true or not. Each second we have the potential to get cancer. That's true. But we don't think about that, do we?

Also I say this: Most of the hardship you experience comes from conflicting belief systems within you. Your right hemisphere wants to adapt the new belief system where porn has no place and your left hemisphere wants to sustain the status quo. Again, that doesn't change by waiting on your neurochemistry. That only changes through active self-reflection which is powered by your free will.

 

It took me ages to formulate this following post and I'm still not happy with it. I can't seem to put into words what I'm trying to express. Maybe you still understand the gist of it:

I'll have to give that back to you as well. Your text was very well put together and made me think honestly. I took a very close look at our discussion, re-evaluated my standpoint, thought a lot about yours and came to the following conclusion: I might be wrong.

You are correct. I contradicted myself with this sentece. So I tried to come up with an answer, that fits into my argument. But I couldn't find one. You have to understand, why I argued like I did:

I thought I had decided against porn a long time ago, but I still experience stronge urges all the time. And if I had decided, but still struggle, then your concept of free will must be flawed and there must be another solution to why I struggle. I question that conclusion now after what you wrote. Maybe I didn't truely decide yet.

I took an honest look at my latest relapses and tried to remember, why did they happen? And I now believe, that there is still a part of me, which likes all the nice effects of porn I used to experience all the time while I was still using it every single day. But is that a decision against porn? I doubt it now.

Since the foundation of my argument is unstable, I try to understand myself more. So please answer me a question: Can one truely decide against porn, although he still likes how porn makes him feel? And can one still experience urges, although his decision is made? I can't put the pieces together in my mind just yet. Maybe you could help me with that, since you seem to have a deeper understanding than myself.

 

I understand you quite well because I went through the same stage. The key for me was this: I can't forget that it feels great to goon my brains out while watching porn. It's just a great feeling, nothing can change that.
What can change tho is how that feeling compares to the rest of my possible sexual experiences. Namely sex and masturbation to fantasy. Now I don't think I have to explain how real sex is infinitely better than PMO. But I've noticed that even masturbation to fantasy is, at least for me, in many ways superior to porn. My experiences are customized, I don't have to look for the right material for an hour, I can't overdo it like porn and I also don't start to get into stuff that turns me on just because it's wrong (like sissy hypno for example..). I even get 90% of the satisfaction that I'd get from watching porn. So I asked myself, do I really want to watch porn for those extra 10%? Because just as I can't forget how it's fun to PMO I also can't forget how it comes with a bag full of problems. Addiction, ED, creeping self-loathing, warped sexual desires, impaired sexual drive. All that for that little bit of extra visual stimulation. And I understood that it's not worth it. It's a shit deal, like paying 200 bucks for an apple.

Every now and then I have the impulse to look at porn because part of me remembers how fun it was and naively thinks I might get back to it (even tho I know I won't). So I open up a porn site and show myself what it is that I "want" and for the past 50 days, every time I did that I closed it after 3 minutes, because none of what I saw was worth a relapse. It's all old. They can't come up with a new type of porn that I haven't seen before. Many times I didn't even feel any arousal. It all seems so cheap to me now. Especially when I compare it to real sex, it's not even in the same world.

Essentially what I did was change the value that porn has to me. I actually don't want it anymore. It's not a matter of being addicted or being triggered, I just don't want it. Not because I couldn't have some fun when I relapse, it's just way too little fun. Especially when I think about the giant bag of shit that comes after I relapse which makes me almost vomit.

So I don't have to fight my urges to relapse because there are none. I still have an addicted brain that's why I still have the impulse to at least look at it every now and then. But I'm only allowing myself that for the first 75 days, after that I'll also stop looking. Some deeper self-reflection will be necessary to make that happen. Because I still believe that it's ok for me to enjoy the sight of hot chicks in my life. And to separate that from porn is not quite simple, but I'll manage.

I hope you see now why I have an easy time with this. I made myself properly understand what porn is, why I used to want it, what it actually offers and realize that it's not something I want. That way I aligned my whole being to the idea of a porn free life. Not just the conscientious part of me. That part was already on board two years ago, but my lust wasn't, that's why I had to "fight my urges" in the past. In reality I wasn't fighting my addicted brain, I was fighting myself because I couldn't decide what I wanted.

Maybe that sheds some light on your own situation. Anyway I'm sure you'll get there, as long as you don't give up it's just a matter of time.