I like reading your well-measured posts bro. ^^ It's not easy to change your beliefs, but quitting becomes easy once you've done so. Fair enough. What if you've spend all that time figuring out how you work instead of how your blocker works. How your demon thinks. What makes you attached to it. Even more importantly: What makes you think that you can stay clean when you de-install your blocker one day? You say the blocker buys you time to change yourself. I'm saying it gives you an excuse not to change yourself where it really matters. It takes away some of your responsibility. If you don't figure yourself out in the next couple days, no problem! Your blocker keeps you safe. Without blockers you're under pressure to change. Very useful pressure. Oh man, I can't even begin to list all the things that are being blocked. The restricted mode isn't designed for addicts, it's designed for kids. You can't listen to certain podcasts, comedians, music etc. It's like using a bazooka to shoot a pigeon. I dunno man. I'm not into tofu, something's telling me I won't be into sugarless cakes. xD
Thanks, I feel honored. I love to learn from your post as well. True. Valid point, but it's not like you can't do both at the same time. On top of that, it didn't take long to fix the loopholes (at least if one knows what he's doing). I doubt, that one extra day would make a big difference in the change-your-believe-system-game. Great question. But it's simply like you said: Once you changed your believes, you don't need tools anymore. But since it takes more than a couple of days to change a believe system or to built a new one for that matter, I prefer to assist myself with tools. I'm sure, that there are plenty of people, who use blockers like that. That's why I try to highlight, that blockers are only tools. They can't be seen as a solution. If you think things like "I'll just block everything forever and be fine" your are doomed already. I think we agree pretty much on that one. But I argue, it is very much possible to take responsibility and use blockers to buy you time. I know, but it's really not such a big deal after all. You have Spotify (and others) for podcasts & music, and you can watch comedians on TV. And even if all of these alternative options wouldn't be available, is it really so important? Is it really so unbareable to live without podcasts and comedians until we changed our believes for good? I don't buy into that idea to be honest. Fair enough
Man, take it easy. Porn blocker is a way for people to achieve the target porn free. You may think this is not right for you but don't think that is not right for me. Everyone has different view and perspective and I always respect that. Porn blocker system is not a something that you just set it and forget it. Human nature is flawed. If you think human is superior, why so many people fail for porn and the illusion it promotes? When I find one loophole that the porn blocker fails to block, I may relapse or not. But I always do debrief session or reflection with myself to learn more about my emotion at the time of relapse and what cause it and how to prevent it from happen again. This is just very simple. We learn through failures and nobody is perfect. And I just don't believe that it can take you one night to change your situation and relationship with porn. This is a progress and you need to trust the progress and appreciate it. By the way, I use Youtube in restricted mode and I satisfy with that. There are many shady stuffs on Youtube that I don't want to waste my time on this site.
For me to further this point would require that I give examples of loopholes, but I don't want to give people here any bad ideas. So I'll just leave it. I don't know how many days it takes to change ones beliefs. For me it took around 1-2 weeks. But I had to make several experiences, like relapses, to get to that point, where I was sick and tired of being at the same spot in life over and over again. It's the key to get rid of our addiction, unfortunately it is pretty much impossible for one human to tell another one how to change their believes, because they're all connected into one big cluster-fuck and the only one that can solve that is you. How much time? How do you know when you're ready? I can tell you a solid method to find out: Open a porn site and if you can in all honesty say "I don't want this" and close it again, you did it. Of course that method is impossible with blockers. ^^
Yea, that wouldn't be a good idea. However, I'm confident that there are solutions for every potential loophole you could point out^^ Very well said. I don't know how much time. You said it took you 2 weeks, maybe it will take me 4 weeks. Maybe it will take two months. Maybe it will take 3 years. I'll just wait and observe my thoughts and believes about porn. I only know one thing for sure: I'll pass on your method. I'll never open a porn site again. Not to view porn and not to check if I'm ready. Not gonna happen. I'm rather not sure if I'm ready for the rest of my life, than to open a porn site and find out, that I wasn't ready.
