Questions about Masturbation

Yes.... you have to read this Chinese guy
This thread is best on this site

 

I recommend you proceed with caution Ridley. There are some extremely offensive comments in what he is saying. Do not simply accept everything he proposes. I am glad to hear you will retain an open mind about this guy.

 

Yeah, all good Ridley, no judgement at all. I’m happy to try and expand further.

While the questions are different, they all contain “Masturbation” in them, and that’s why I was trying to convey replacing the physical act with the emotional feeling (self gratification) instead. For me, that helps me answer the questions for myself much easier.

From experience, I know that when I’m only thinking about my own pleasure, I miss out on the joy that interdependent relationships have. Relationships that both give and receive. If I’m focused on pleasing myself, then I’m not focused on pleasing others, nor am I as aware or receptive to someone else trying to please me. If I’ve already “taken care of myself” why waste someone else’s time and effort?

I wasn’t trying to compare masturbation to living in an internment camp, what I meant was instead of focusing on the lowest common denominator or the least amount of effort and wiggle room to hit a goal, shoot for the moon. You will be the best version of yourself by maximizing your self discipline and abstaining from all PMO.

Hope they help. All the best!

 

• Can masturbation be a part of a successful reboot? - Struggling with this myself, but I don't think so, because it's hard to separate this from the PMO behaviour. I think abstaining is necessary to help bring clarity. But at this early stage, I'm not really qualified to answer, except it feels the way forward, just finding it bloody difficult!
• Does masturbation hinder your progress in recovering from porn addiction? - see above.
• Is masturbation inherently unhealthy? - I don't believe so, I believe it is a natural and necessary part of human behaviour. I'm quite sure the cave men and women were at it! I believe it is psychologically and biologically necessary. But many things (porn, Internet) and people, religions have twisted it to something that becomes unhealthy.
• Is masturbation detrimental in a romantic relationship? - I think this depends on the relationship too, I think everybody needs some alone time sometimes, but if it becomes habitual to the point you are doing it rather than being with your partner, then yes it can be unhealthy. ( the situation I find myself in) I would rather it be part of a healthy relationship where you feel completely free to discuss it and engage in it with each other.
• Is masturbation a healthy and normal part of human life? - I think it can and should be, but we need to make it that way. These are my thoughts and beliefs. I hope if I manage to Reboot, that I can find a healthy way to still include masturbation in my life. I hope so because it does feel great but without all the detrimental effects of all the other dopamine inducing stimulants. Of which I've tried many, but that's a whole other story....Good luck with your investigations.

 

I used to believe in the possibility that the highest pleasures of masturbation could be a platform of transitioning into a higher nonphysical ecstasy, thinking that riding the plateau for a while without cumming could slip me into a yogic state of bliss or something. Complete and utter nonsense! Jerking off is like the first stage of a rocket that puts you at a certain altitude toward orbit but that second stage will never ignite (thinking that masturbation is a launching platform for obtaining profound peace, bliss and out of body adventures) and down you go and if you waste all that precious life force energy in semen just for selfish, solo-pleasure, you will crash land and go nowhere fast! How can anyone ever meditate so deeply as to go beyond bodily awareness if one is a slave to the senses through sexual pleasure addiction? People who can sit in meditation for hours can control their senses and the non-physical pleasures they experience must make the best of sexual pleasure seem laughable by comparison! At least that's what I want to believe. At least that's the kind of higher pleasure I wish to get even a taste of before I die. We're all going to leave the world anyway and drop the fleshy costume behind. I might as well get used to prepping for the non-physical state by abandoning jerking off for the rest of my life!!!!!!! I declare that selfish solo-sex is like a glue that binds us too much into bodily awareness and to the world. Either be happy being celibate and/or be happy expressing beautiful sexual love with a partner. It's a win-win situation.

 

Yes! Masturbation and Porn and self gratifying behavior has massive implications on your present and future relationships. That’s exactly what I am trying to convey. You’ve got it!

Also, regarding someone else not being there. Not the point. Use that time to read, or work out, or serve others, or just sit still and meditate. It doesn’t matter if no one else is around, don’t waste your time. You are around, and you deserve more than a single release of pleasure.

If you commit to this, you will realize all of life is pleasure, even the suffering. (I actually can’t believe I wrote that myself) but on some level I believe it.

 

I would agree, if you are talking about reaching any higher states just by masturbation alone. There is the possibility to reach a kind of trance-like state too, reasoned for example by long time edging, but if this has been fired by watching/fantasizing porn, it is diametrically to the clarity and ecstasy of any higher states.
While it is indeed possible by the sexual union and the special knowledge with a sharing partner, like in tantric practices. Because then a flow and exchange of energy between them can be established and the constant refinement of the energy by love is a possibility to reach these higher energy levels together.

Porn is the lowest and most dense visible manifestation of sexual activities, but because it´s only visual/audible, it affects first the mind, emotions and imagination, instead the body. The other senses are excluded here, in contrast to participating a real orgy/sex party.

 

Yes, that's my assumption and belief. (And there are people who believe that consciousness dies when the brain dies, resulting in nonexistence. I don't want to be judgemental; people have all the right to believe in whatever. To me, such a fatalistic attitude would force me to get all the sexual pleasure I can get even if it ruins me.) Vandermeer also replied to my post regarding establishing sublime yogic states during the sacred erotic love of Tantric practice. People who know how to do that are very special indeed! They know how far sex can go, to fantastic heights! It may be one of the greatest expressions of the fusion of sexuality and spirituality ever! I never had that kind of sex but I'd be nice to fulfill that kind of desire. Just think! To remain locked in intercourse for a long time while the awareness unfolds, with orgasmic waves without spilling a drop of semen, and having those sublime states one would have in deep meditation. Wow! Haha! Just like what I mentioned in my post...this time the second stage ignites, and then the third stage ignites until blissful orbit is reached. Haha!

 

Judging by people's experiences I've read absolutely. There are many ways how to reboot. I believe so called Hard Mode where person stays away from porn as well as masturbation, or any type of intentional orgasm, is the most fastest and effective one. But other ways work too, just slower. I can't just dismiss all the experience stories of all those people who did it their way and still succeeded...

Yes, it does mine. I'm just type of person who has this "all or nothing" personality. So if I masturbate I just have more desire to watch porn on top of it. But that's me, not everybody's brain works the same.

No but I do believe excessive masturbation is, especially if it is combined with ejaculation in which case it's even worse. Ejaculation drains nutrients and it drains nerve energy. The body uses tremendous amounts of energy to produce sperm and if we just waste that it's like having a leak in a gas tank. Also excessive masturbation does the same damage as porn just to smaller extent - it does numb your dopomine receptors. It can cause hormonal imbalances which can lead to many same problems as porn. I think excessive is more than 3 times a week and that's generous, one week or less would be perfect. And that's if one is not having any sex. If one does have regular sex then there should not be any ejaculation apart from sex at all.

I guess depends from relationship? Some people might feel sad because they feel they are not enough for their partner and can not satisfy them if they know that their partner is masturbating. And I guess some people do not care. Also there is such thing as masturbation addiction which can have same damaging effects as porn addiction.

I think w are better off without it at all. But in small amounts it's probably not gonna be that bad. I would not call it healthy tho. I would call it neutral (again, in reasonable amounts). Normal? Normal is that which is common and accepted by society. So I guess in that kind of sense yes. Is it natural? No, I do not believe so. We are made to have sex with a mate to procreate and not have sex with our own hand.

 

You’re very welcome, and likewise.

To your other question, my opinion is that it is not that psychologically damaging. I think all children go through a natural phase of sexual discovery and growth. That’s part of life and nature, and I would never judge anyone for that natural process. It’s when that process becomes perverted and addicting that the psychological damage can begin. That’s always a personal boundary that every individual needs to decide for themselves. Again, no judgement.

I’m not sure of your faith, but I am a Christian, and I try to live under Grace. So I believe when I do accept God’s grace, he can even use negative actions for the positive.

 

Well, from the biological point of view, we aren't the only species who masturbate. There are many different animals that do so. They don't have the Internet as far as I'm aware. (Although my cat has a Facebook page, but there are always exceptions!) They also don't have religion telling them what they should and shouldn't do, to give them hang ups and anxieties about the whole thing. So I guess they just do it because it feels good. But for so many humans and for many different animals to do it too, leads me to believe there is some evolutionary advantage. As it turns out, I'm not the only one. This from Inverse.com:
"In 1992, British evolutionary biologists Robin Baker and Mark Bellis came up with a hypothesis explaining why masturbation is actually good for men. Their thesis rested on a single biological fact: Sperm get old.

In their study, published in Animal Behavior, they determined that masturbation gets rid of old sperm cells — they’re only viable up to a week after they’re made — to make room for new, more vigorous ones that are better at making babies. After all, with 3 million new sperm being produced each day, the testes are going to feel a bit crowded very quickly.

To test their theory, Baker and Bellis had 30 heterosexual couples collect the “flow-through” — that is, the excess sperm that spills out of the female body after sex — and subsequently measured the amount of sperm still present. In couples where the man had recently masturbated before sex, they counted low numbers, concluding that the majority of the ejaculated sperm, being new and healthy swimmers, resisted being rejected by the woman’s body. It follows that those men were more likely to father children, especially considering that early Homo sapiens females were likely to have hooked up with several males at any given time.

The “sperm competition” theory is one compelling argument for the evolutionary survival of masturbation in humans, but it doesn’t take into account the female side of the story. Women, contrary to social stereotypes and despite social stigma, actually masturbate a lot; one nationally representative study of Americans, published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine in 2010, found that 85 percent of women masturbate(compared to 94 percent of men). Doing so, public health researchers report in The Conversation, gets cervical fluid flowing through the female genitalia, thereby flushing out bacteria and other infection-causing, pregnancy-preventing substances. In addition, they report that orgasms reduce stress, blood pressure, and pain, and it increases self-esteem.

While the physiological benefits of masturbation for women may seem less specific than they are for men, they’re no less important in an evolutionary context: Males only have to worry about getting their sperm to their intended destination, but mothers-to-be have to stay holistically healthy for at least the next nine months.

Reproductive advantages to self-pleasuring aside, science often neglects the most crucial element of self-play: Masturbation just feels good. While the physiological benefits of improved well-being — less stress, a stronger immune system, and better interpersonal skills — are great on their own, there’s no biological reason why gaming the brain’s reward system to occasionally dole out higher returns isn’t good for you. Sure, too much and it could turn into a full-blown addiction, like any other brain dopamine hack, but that’s why evolution equipped most of us with a sense of discipline."

Now I'm sure if I looked hard enough, I would come across more scientific studies about the benefits of masturbation, this is just one. So why do I think it may be psychologically necessary? Well honestly I haven't found anything else that can take away my stress so quickly and easily. and without any physical detriment to my body. You may say, I'm not looking hard enough and perhaps you are right. All I can offer here is my opinions and why I have them, which is what you asked for after all.