Kevin thought he was addicted to pornography. “I must be. I’ve tried so hard to stop. I’ve worked for the last five years at it, and yet I still can’t kick the habit completely.” When I talked to him about his approach, it sounded like he was doing almost everything right. He had opened up to his family about the problem and would talk to them about lapses. He had sought the help of his bishop and met with him regularly. He was participating in the Church’s addiction recovery program and regularly attended their 12-step group meetings. He maintained a habit of regular prayer and scripture study.
It sounded to me like Kevin was doing everything right except for one thing: he was still in the habit of locking horns with the devil. Terry Warner said, “Satan does not need to overpower us in order to win the war. He only needs to get us to adopt his way of fighting it.” On a typical day, Kevin might be going through his routine, doing well and feeling good. However, if temptation hit, he’d start to brace himself, focus real hard on doing well, and redouble his efforts to avoid a problem. Sometimes his approach “worked” and he avoided giving in that day. Too often, despite all the effort and energy he exerted, he failed. Sure, he may fight for a while. But later that day or sometime the next day—occasionally his fight lasted several days—Kevin almost always eventually gave in once an intense battle got going.
I shared with Kevin my opinion: that it was not the initial trigger, not the temptation itself, but his way of dealing with it, that was the beginning of his downfall. So what, exactly, is the problem with fighting temptation with all our might, as we may feel compelled to do when a strong urge or craving hits? To answer that question, let’s consider our reaction on four dimensions:

• Attitude: When we fight temptation, we do so with a sense of urgency. This certainly makes sense: it’s a threat to our spirituality, our sense of confidence and well-being, and perhaps even our success in life. The problem couldn’t be much more important than it is.
• Body: When we brace against temptation, our bodies react by tensing up. We become physiologically aroused in order to deal with the threat. We’re on alert and ready to “fight or flee.”
• Mind: Our consciousness narrows and we become very focused—sometimes even fixated. Mentally we know what the problem is and know that it’s a challenge we haven’t yet figured out how to overcome. Our mind is primed and ready to devote significant mental voltage to the threat.
• Behavior: We feel driven to take action against temptation. We feel like we “can’t” give in and “have to” resist urges. We vacillate between that and feeling like we “have to” give in and “can’t” resist anymore.

In the 121st section of The Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord describes two different approaches to the exercise of power and influence. The Lord labels the first “unrighteous dominion.” It is characterized by the attempt to exert control by way of dominion or compulsion (v. 37). In our efforts to get what we want from other people, every one of us has at least experimented with this approach. I can tell you from experience, we never become more influential by being coercive. Of course, it may work great for getting our way in the moment, but people end up resenting our pushiness. Any influence we have evaporates once we walk out of the room.
Whenever I get pushy—whether it’s with my kids, with another driver on the road, or with a customer service representative on the telephone—I end up feeling less powerful. Not only that, I end up being less powerful. People simply do not respond well to coercion. Instead of cooperating, quite often they rebel. The driver I tailgate slows down. If I tell my three-year-old, “You can’t watch TV any more, you have to go to bed,” I’ll be peeling little fingers off stair railings and door frames all the way up to his bedroom.
As human beings, everything inside of us yearns to remain free and stay in charge of our own lives. David O. McKay has said that “next to the bestowal of life itself, the right to direct that life is God’s greatest gift to man” (Gospel Ideals, 1993, p. 299). Even if the driver in front of me doesn’t believe in God, even though my three-year-old doesn’t understand the Plan of Salvation, they, like all of us, instinctively value their agency and will fight fiercely to retain it. Every one of us is determined to maintain independence, especially if we sense that someone is trying to force us to do something.
If a coercive approach fails miserably when it comes to influencing other people, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that things don’t go well when we adopt it in an attempt to change our own behavior. If our Father in Heaven wouldn’t allow Satan to tell us we can’t sin and have to obey, do we really believe that he might bless our efforts when we adopt to the same mentality or methods on ourselves?
Fortunately, there is a second form of influence described in D&C 121. It’s quite unlike unrighteous dominion both in terms of the way it operates and the effect it has. It is characterized by persuasion, long suffering, gentleness, meekness, love unfeigned, kindness, pure knowledge (which is described as “greatly enlarging the soul”), and a lack of hypocrisy or guile (vv. 41-42).
I’m reminded of this gentle, easygoing approach when I talk with those who have established a solid, long-term recovery from a formerly compulsive behavior. When I talk with people who are two years, five years, or twelve years beyond their last relapse, not one has ever said, “I still fight the same battle every day, it’s just that now I always win.” Instead they say, “It’s hardly a struggle at all anymore.”
Consider the way they approach the problem across the four dimensions we introduced earlier:

• Attitude: These folks exhibit an easygoing mentality and are not easily perturbed by temptation. The problem remains an important one to them, but less urgent: they know that it’s not one they can annihilate “once and for all” with sudden efforts of Herculean proportions.
• Body: Physiologically they stay calm and relaxed. They stay in a mode they can maintain over the long haul, not one in which their efforts will of necessity diminish over time as a result of depletion and burn-out.
• Mind: They remain perceptive and observant. They’re big-picture-oriented. They’re not as vigilant against temptation itself, but remain on-the-lookout for its precursors. By remaining observant over time they have learned what puts them at risk and they keep trying to respond to those concerns in a proactive way. They reach out when they’re struggling or in-need so that their emotions don’t build to the point that they fuel self-defeating urges.
• Behavior: They don’t “have to” do anything—they remain free. They keep choosing their response, rather than giving in or fighting based on which compulsion is strongest at the time. If one response doesn’t take them in the direction they want, they’re free to change course. They keep experimenting until they find what works.

If you’ve been in the habit of fighting temptation and forcefully trying to keep yourself on track, how can you switch over to this other, more relaxed and effective approach?

Change Your Attitude: Next time temptation hits, adopt a more easygoing mentality. Don’t think, “Oh no, here we go again! I’m never going to be free of this!” Instead, Remember what the apostle Paul said: “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man” (1 Corinthians 10:13). In fact, instead of “Oh no!” think to yourself, “Oh, good! Now I have the chance to practice a different way of approaching this problem.” The more chances you get to practice, the better you’ll get at doing things differently. Plus, something else happens when you think, “Oh, good!” The devil is, by nature, contrary and oppositional. Once you, like a Judo master, start to use the force behind his blows against him, he will probably pick fewer fights with you.
Relax Your Body: Take a few nice, full breaths. This helps relax the body and ease it down from a hyperaroused state. Instead of bracing yourself against temptation, loosen up. Oxygenate your brain and body so that you can approach the problem with all of your usual resourcefulness and intelligence still intact.
Open Your Mind: Broaden your attention. Don’t fixate and obsess. Encourage your mind to maintain objectivity by turning your attention to something concrete like a sight, sound, or touch. I encourage clients to alternate this kind of noticing with the breathing just mentioned. “Breathing and noticing” three or four times in a row can help the mind free itself. For instance: Take a nice, full breath and notice: “There’s a poplar tree way down the street.” Focus intently on it for a moment. Then breathe again and notice: “There’s the sound of a car engine.” Hold that focus…. Breathe and notice: “There’s the hard sidewalk beneath my feet.” Feel it. Feel it. Feel it with each step. As simple as this technique sounds, it can help us stay rooted in reality here-and-now, where we can see more of our options.
Choose Your Behavior: With more of our options in view, we’re prepared to take action, and to do so in different ways than we have been in the habit of doing. Whenever we refuse to do what it feels like we “have to” and choose our response instead, we exercise our freedom in a powerful way. Even if the behavior we choose this time doesn’t end up taking us where we want to go, at least it was different than the well beaten trails we’re in the habit of treading. We can always choose a second new path next time, and a third after that, until we find one that does work better than our usual.

Kevin knew that “trying harder” had never worked for him over the long haul, so he was excited to try something different. He went home from our first session with a resolution unlike the dozens of others he had made in the past. He was ready to practice a new way. Here’s what he reported when he came back the following week:
“I was determined to think, ‘Oh, good!’ when I was tempted and then to practice breathing, noticing, and experimenting. However, I really didn’t think I’d be able to do it every time I was tempted. After all, it had seemed to me that some days were filled to overflowing with sexual triggers and urges and cravings. It seemed to me that if I really tried to do it every time temptation hit, some days would be consumed by this new little ordeal.
“However, once I was on the lookout for temptation in a good way, prepared to practice my new skills, I was surprised that the topic of sex seemed to rear its head less and less. Even when it did, sometimes I’d check in with myself to see if I was tempted only to discover that I wasn’t. Now that I was prepared to cope with it and eager to take it in a better direction, those triggers seemed less threatening. The emotional charge of many of my everyday triggers seemed to be neutralized.
“But then, Thursday night, I came face-to-face with a real test. I had played basketball until late, and once I finally got home everything was dark and quiet. As I started down the stairs, I got panicky: ‘I’m headed down to shower. It’s late at night. Oh, no! This has often been a problem for me in the past! I’m headed right into the lion’s den. I could so easily have a problem while I’m showering. All of the progress I’ve made would be washed away. Three weeks of success would be down the drain. Then the countdown for turning in my mission papers would have to start over again. This could be disastrous. It’s so important! I need to focus real hard on staying clean and redouble my efforts right now!’
“Then I caught myself. ‘Hold on a minute. That’s my reflex, but I can do it differently. I don’t have to lock horns with the devil. In fact, I can look at this as a good thing—an opportunity. Yes, I’ll go back to my fire drill: “Oh, good—another great chance. Let me breathe… and notice the texture on the sloped ceiling in front of me as I walk down the stairs. Breathe… and notice the feeling of the banister in my hand all the way down. Breathe… and notice the musty smell of the basement. Experiment… Experiment… What could I do differently?’ I was pondering that as I grabbed onto the doorknob of the bathroom door. That was when it hit me: I always lock the bathroom door when I shower, but I don’t ‘have to.’ I am free to leave the door unlocked. It was late at night. Most of my family was asleep. There was very little chance that any of them would even come downstairs, and almost no chance that they would walk in on me when I was showering. Still, if I left the door unlocked, it seemed to me at that moment that there was no way I was going to masturbate in the shower.”
At that point, I didn’t need to hear anymore. I didn’t cut him off—we continued that session and continued for several more after that as well. Nonetheless, there was something defining about that moment. I hadn’t even heard whether Kevin’s experiment (leaving the bathroom door unlocked) had worked (it turns out that it did). It’s just that I’d seen enough clients like Kevin to know how this was going to go. Even if that experiment had failed, Kevin was succeeding. He had not yet succeeded in completely overcoming his sexual struggles, but he was successfully changing the way he approached them. He was adopting a new, easygoing attitude. He was learning to relax instead of bracing against temptation. He’d been able to see, even in the heat of the moment, that he had options besides the two he’d always fixated on before: fighting and succumbing to temptation. He’d taken one of those options and acted on it. I knew that as time went on and he continued to exercise his freedom along all four dimensions, Kevin would overcome his problem. He’d keep relaxing and exploring and experimenting in a more easygoing way until he kicked his destructive habit once and for all.

Alcohol is a bit easier for people to understand when it comes to analyzing an addiction. Its simple right, you’re putting a substance in the body that is unhealthy. Typically, anything that is unhealthy physically is also unhealthy mentally as you are not feeling the best you could. So how is pornography or masturbation similar to this?

If you agree that porn or masturbation can be addictive then you agree that they are not right for your mental and physical health. In other words they are foreign to a healthy lifestyle in general and cause more pain than excitement. Anything introduced to the mind is introduced to the body. When you engage in mentally unhealthy activities you will experience both mental and physical consequences. These consequences are usually in the form of some level of depression or lethargy.

So why build the case that porn is a depressant? The reason is that you can get “stuck in a rut” and not understand why. Alcoholics continue to drink because they have a continuous feeling of depression and start to believe there is no other way to relieve said depression other than to have another drink. The same applies to porn or masturbation. You feel low shortly after acting out or the next day and return to the only source of fast acting temporary excitement you know. Drugs and alcohol are not addicting because they cause pain. They are addicting because they are a constant cycle of temporary rushes and let downs.

There is a way out of this miserable cycle. It’s certainly not easy but it’s also not as difficult as you may think. In fact I would compare it, at least for some people, to trying to motivate yourself to go to the gym every day. Not easy but once you get in the rhythm of a routine you find it easier.

Just like with alcohol or drugs there is a detox and readjustment period you need to endure before gaining freedom from strong urges to return to the drug of choice. This period of time usually seems unbearable to most and hence the biggest reason for staying in the addictive cycle. The interesting thing is the body is very adaptive and can readjust itself in a matter of days or weeks. This doesn’t mean the fight is over but perhaps easier than before. There is always the possibility of relapsing if you get lazy, similar to getting lazy with your gym routine.

One biological fact I should point that may contribute to the depression associated with viewing pornography and masturbating is that studies have shown that about 4 times more prolactin(the hormone that relaxes you after orgasm) is released during orgasm with a commited sexual partner(spouse) than when orgasm is done alone. This contribues both to the addictive factor and the discontent factor since you’re not using the body as it was designed to be used. The reason for this is emotions. Emotions, even in guys, are a huge part of a sexual bond and a “full” orgasm. Without the proper emotional connection you are missing a huge part of the equation in a truly satisfying sexual bond. You are essentially trying to fulfill a desire and void within with something that will never satisfy you. Hence the addiction cycle.

If you do not work out your emotions and thoughts then you will return to your vices. I will focus on thoughts for a moment here since everything stems from them, including emotions. I was reading an interesting article today written by Jonathan Leger titled “Think low and you will stay low”. This article highlighted the importance of overcoming mental barriers before you can overcome physical one. If you were to do this in the opposite order you would just return to what you have not worked out in your heart and mind and the cycle would repeat itself.

So you want to know how to stop porn addiction or any addiction. Start believing in yourself first because there is nothing that you cannot overcome if you believe and persevere. This is the first step and is very necessary. Stop all the negative self talk and start building yourself up with positive thoughts that cause you to believe in yourself no matter how many mistakes you have made.

1. Are you distant in your relationships with other? Try to avoid interaction or affection?

2. Are you easily provoked, meaning you get offended or angry easily?

3. Do you or the person of concern seem opposite of the norm, almost like a totally different personality

4. Are you on the Internet far too long? This may sound extreme but there are few reasons to be on the Internet all day and night.

5. Do you find it difficult to be happy or content in any circumstance?

Some of these signs of porn addiction may sound like personality disorders, that’s because when a person is not in control of a major aspect of their life then they are not in control of their character or personality. Control of personality comes with self mastery.

Yes the world can be stressful and often the news makes it more stressful than it really is.  Yet many of us choose to use the news as a true reference to how how life really is. Why am I talking about this on a sexual addiction  site? Well, addicts in general are usually looking for escape from reality as they know it. How you reference reality is up to you. Life is not as bad as the people trying to make money make it seem. Actually life is great and full of opportunities to experience joy and happiness. Yes there are upsets but the positives far outweigh those upsets. Remember, the news doesn’t make money by focusing on the positive. They make money focusing on the shocking negative things that captivate us. How in the world does this apply to porn addiction?

Which would you rather watch, a high speed police chase ending in a crash or a mayor talking about improvements in elderly care. You see its effortless to be attracted to the most stimulating and exciting thing that catches our attention. It takes work to  appreciate the finer things in life. So will you let he idle part of you win or will you expend some effort and focus on the positive.

When it comes to dealing with the stresses of life in a healthy way you really must exercise you freedom to choose. Meaning you choose what to let into you life and what not to allow to effect you. When you realize this control you have and actually use it to only focus on and allow positive things in your life influence you it is quite empowering. This does not mean nothing negative will happen. It does mean you will notice a “positive” difference in your life. Believe or not you are in control. Sometime, like all of us, you choose not to maintain control but instead  let the  world control you. There comes a time when you have to wake up and come to the realization that you are, in fact, in control.

When you relearn this personal control you are in a position to properly deal with the stresses of life instead of turning to addictive activities. The proper way is to be in control of your thoughts and attitude and let the negative things roll off your back like water off a duck, so to speak. With a good attitude, which you decide to have, you don’t sweat the small stuff. However, don’t let anyone, especially the media, steal you good attitude, because they will do anything and say anything to make money without care for your  personal well being.

Indeed there does come a time for the porn addict to make some tough choices. A time to decide what is most important and take the necessary steps without delay. To some these choices may seem extreme but to you they will be honorable and necessary. It will seem as if you’re willing to do what most people are not.

What am I talking about? Well, if you are addicted to porn right now and you have unrestricted(unfiltered and unmonitored) access to the Internet right now then that needs to change. The software I would recommend is called Covenant Eyes. If restricting access still isn’t enough then you need to get rid of the Internet all together. If your work requires you to use the Internet for you and that has been a big weak point for you then it may be time to consider a new occupation. Trust me, I’m well aware of the difficulty of making such decisions. I myself have had to change careers and restrict access to the internet while suffering financially. I did have to wait until I was in a financial position to do so.

Although changing the external environment was never enough to free myself from porn addiction it was necessary. I was never going to rehabilitate so long as I had easy access to my drug of choice. What would happen is I would change my thoughts and control my passions for a period of time but not change my external environment. I would have success for a week or two but then the sexual urges would return in full force as they always do for the body was designed in such a manner. At that point I was still not strong enough to be in an environment with too much temptation. I could see that the missing ingredient was a safer external environment and then I would be able to have more success. So I restricted internet access at home and changed occupations.

I cannot stress enough that changing the external environment will never be enough only part of the equation. You must change internallyas well to have true success. So take a look at your life and be honest with yourself about what needs to change for you to have real success. It will probably take some sacrifices but your reward will be a very fulfilling life in which you are in control. While comtemplating what changes you may need to make in your life it would help to pray and ask God what He thinks. Perhaps He could cause thoughts to come to your mind that you did not previously consider.

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I speak from experience on this one. Some days will seem easy. You’ll be able to easily resist temptation in a relaxed manner. These are the days you’ve desired to have for a long time, so when they come you feel relieved and happy. But you must remember that this will only be true on some days. Most days, all your life, will require work. They will require you to exert your physical and mental energies to stay clean. We must not be lured into thinking that we no longer have to work as hard as we did before. As long as you are on this earth there will be temptations.

I do no say these things to discourage but to prepare. You will get stronger with time and it will be easier to resist temptation. All I’m trying to say here is that there will rarely be a day that will not require you to work at staying clean. It takes constant and every day effort to maintain a clean happy life. Happiness will always require more work than the misery associated with bad choices.

So every day you have to wake up and decide you are willing to exert your personal powers to make the right choices all day. This will become a great habit and prepare you for the really difficult days ahead. I say this because some days will seem like “The Perfect Storm” in which every thing seems combined against you. For example, you wake up with little sleep, you’re irritated at work, your boss won’t leave you alone, the bills are stacking up, you get into an accident on the way home, you argue with your wife,you’re having a hard time controlling your thoughts, and finally you see an inappropriately dressed girl on TV. Well, in those circumstances it just seems like you can’t take it anymore and you are so tempted to give into temptation and go on a pornography binge. Believe it or not, even in these circumstances, it is still your choice to do the work to resist temptation and maintain a positive attitude.

How much you are willing to work is directly tied to how much you believe in the process of change, in a better life, and your personal powers to change. If you stop working and give into temptation or fall short of your goal it is simply because you did not have enough faith and motivation. How do you get that faith and motivation? You choose to have it. Nobody can give it to you or make you have it. There are people and sources that can help you to have it but it is ultimately your choice to have enough faith and motivation to keep working no matter what the circumstances are.

Masturbation and pornography can make you feel powerless. It is true to these things bind you and restrict your freedom to choose. However,though it may feel like it, these things do not have complete control over you. You still have enough power to fight back and reclaim the lost ground in the internal battle you’ve been engaged in. It will not be instant but gradual and eventual. In fact, with perseverance success is inevitable. However, this requires work. Sometimes it will require you to exert all the energies of your soul to resist temptation, but you are not alone. Heavenly Father promises to bless you with the extra strength you need, after you have done all you can do. You will know when you’ve done all you can do because that is the time when his power kicks in and you will be victorious. He loves you enough to not do all the work for you but help you when you’ve done all you can do. Even if you are not religious, just do all you can do and you will be rewarded with success. You will feel an extra boost of power from a source beyond yourself.

Just keep working!

Ask yourself these questions with “10″ representing the most:

1. On a scale of 1 to 10 how much do I really want to overcome porn addiction or any kind of addiction?

2. On a scale of 1 to 10 how much do I believe in my power to overcome addiction?

3. On a scale of 1 to 10 how much am I willing to work every single day to overcome addiction?

Answer these questions honestly. If you are lacking in one or more of these areas then work to improve the numbers and you will have more success.

Success will not come by accident or luck. It will come because you worked for it and earned it.

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Negative Association

How to apply this to porn addiction. If you’ve been addicted to pornography or masturbation then you have been living in a fantasy world within your own mind. The addiction or prison you’ve found difficult to escape has been largely within the walls of your mind. Your mind and body try to run as effeciently as possible. Many times this means automating processes to save energy. Because you have used pornography and masturbation to feel temporary pleasure you have been associating fantasy-like thoughts with natural sexual urges of the body until the appetite of the body grows out of control. So every time your body feels a sexual urge it immediately and almost automatically associates these urges with thoughts and images of the fantasy world you have created in your mind. Of course you can get this back under control, it just takes work and time.

You need to change the way you see temptations to look at filth or masturbate. You need to start associating these actions with the real consequences and misery they bring. The moment you are tempted you must cling to reality and not let yourself be swept away into the unrealistic fantasies that have brought you into addiction. The reality is you only feel pleasure in the moment then soon after feel very low and miserable. Your imagination has very powerful effects that can be both good and bad. Use your imagination to create a negative image of the true results of looking at pornography or masturbating. Then when the temptation comes have this image ready to go to associate with the temptation. The more you do this the more your mind will remember these negative images and the power of the temptation will be decreased. Use whatever negative associations work for you. Everyone is different. Also, be patient, it will take more than a few times of doing this before it becomes habit. Just keep doing it.

Positive Association

You’ll need more than negative associations to break free of addiction. You have to learn to love your new life more than your old one. This is going to take some persistent positive associations. Here is a good example from workout guru, Pete Sisco, speaking of positive association when working out:

“Finally, take another 10 minutes at a slow pace on the treadmill to gradually cool your body down. Use this time to feel the warm afterglow and sense of well-being that intense exercise provides. Those endorphins are magic! Take a moment to associate that positive, relaxed yet invigorated feeling with going to the gym and doing your workout. For many of us this can shift our psychological focus from dreading a workout and doing it reluctantly to positively looking forward to it and to the sense of well-being it delivers.”

This couldn’t be more true. I’ve put this to the test myself and love going to the gym. So how do we apply this to addiction? Well, when I was struggling, I was using this technique and didn’t even know it. Here’s how. Every time I would have success, a day or two without slipping up, I would sort of meditate and ponder how great it felt to be free and have success. In my mind I would purposely associate these great feelings with abstaining from pornography or masturbation. This only increased my desire to have success. This increased desire helped me to work harder, and get up more quickly if I slipped up. I would think to myself, “I love the way I feel when I abstain from weakness, I don’t want to stay down, I will get up and try again and feel those feelings again.” You see, your mind and body want to do what feels good. You have to decide what feels good. You do this by changing the way you see things.

Go ahead and experiment with this great technique. Don’t expect perfection. Just expect a progressive change of desires. It takes time for desires and feelings to change. This is the work required to do so.

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The answers I sought and you currently seek are different for everyone. They depend on your ability to persevere through difficulties and mistakes, your faith in yourself, your faith in the process, and how much work you’re willing to put into the process. So, that being said, it could be a matter of weeks, months, or years. It all depends on you. It’s definitely not a matter of just a week or two. That’s unrealistic. Though I must admit I was guilty of expecting change in a week or two, to my detriment.

Making Mistakes

In order to keep going in the process of change you will have to accept that you will not be perfect. It is very dangerous to expect you will make no mistakes. I’m not saying use this as an excuse to make mistakes. I’m saying have realistic expectations. One realistic expectation is to expect that the mistakes will become fewer in proportion to the amount of effort you put into the process of change. If you have a problem with porn addiction and you look at it every day then you can expect that it will not be every day as you make the necessary choices to adjust your environment and follow the steps to become stronger.

Remember, the body is too stubborn to change in just a week. You cannot expect to stop liking or desiring porn in a week or two. You have to have consistent success over a long period of time for your desires to change significantly. Also, you can’t expect to like new habits at the start. If you just started exercising then it will probably take some time before you enjoy doing it. I felt this way about running. I hated it but over time learned to love it. So you see it takes a lot of work initially to change since you and your body will not like the changes at first. I will tell you that change will become a lot easier after being completely clean for about a month. After that, it gets easier and easier.

Believe in the Process

It can be a tough thing to convince yourself to keep going when you’re not seeing results. I know I would get so frustrated after only a week or two of staying clean because I would still feel really strong urges to go look at pornography or to misuse my body. I would angry at how I didn’t see my desires change much in that short time. I would get so frustrated when I would see a beautiful woman and my body would get so aroused. Instead of being patient and allowing more time for my body to balance itself out, I would obsess about the lack of change until those thoughts had control of me and I would make a mistakes again.

“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

So believing in the process is a must. Going for a week or two and getting frustrated until you quit is not defined as believing. Believing means you keep going every single day knowing that you will change in due time. It may be one month, two months, a year. Whatever it is you just continue to believe change is coming because it is. Most people give up not knowing how close they were to complete change.

Believing in Yourself

We have all had doubts in ourselves at times on our lives. Thats ok as long as you know how to move on from those doubts. Its when doubts become a habit that failure becomes a habit. We not only have to believe that the process of change works so long as we put in the effort and time, but we must also believe that we can absolutely do whatever is required in the process of change. You have to have faith in yourself otherwise you’re right, you can’t escape addiction and can’t do anything for that matter. Addiction can cause us to stop believing we can do things. Its like being a prisoner of war, eventually you start to believe you cannot escape and stop trying to escape. That’s when the enemy called addiction has you right where it wants you, feeling helpless. You have to stand up and believe in yourself. Believe you have the power to make decisions that will ultimately bring freedom in your life.

There is no one who can make you have faith in yourself or the process of change. That is a decision you must make. People can encourage you but they cannot give it to you. On a religious note I will say that developing faith in God helped me to develop faith in myself. I still had to make the decision but my religion certainly made that easier.

Post Acute Withdrawal Symptoms (PAWS)

Anybody who gets addicted to anything has to go through a withdrawal stage. There is no way around it, you have to go through it. It can last anywhere from a month to 18 months depending on many things. This is called Post Acute Withdrawal Symptoms or PAWS. In other words, you will fell lethargic, bored with life, irritable, unable to concentrate or remember things. However, the amount of time these things last and the intensity can be lessened with proper diet, exercise, therapy to deal with underlying issues, and even supplements to help your chemical imbalance get back in balance.

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The Importance of a Good Diet

You are what you eat, though that doesn’t mean you will turn into a vegetable if that’s all you eat. However, eating a balanced and nutritional diet based off of the food pyramid will greatly enhance your mental and physical health. When you eat healthy you feel healthy. When you feel healthy and vibrant you can more easily focus and have the mental and physical energy to make important decisions in your daily life.

Here’s an example. On a day when I eat a a lot of meat or a high fat meal I start to feel low and slow. I’m really just not in the best mood I could be in. Physically I feel I’ve lost my energy and my edge to perform at my best. Mentally my confidence declines and my brain is not sharp and focused. In this state I become more vulnerable to temptation than I was before the meal. Perhaps I will not be able to control my thoughts as well as before. Certainly with an overall decrease in confidence I will not take full advantage of the personal power I possess to make the right decisions when things get tough.

Another thing concerning diet that people don’t consider is how the hormone levels in the body are effected. Certain foods can increase and decrease hormone levels in the body. For example, red meats increase testosterone levels in males. This could be a problem for someone trying to overcome porn addiction or masturbation addiction. The higher these levels are the stronger the sexual tension in the body. There are a number of high protein foods such as cottage cheese, yogurt, eggs, and nuts which break down into amino acids and in-turn increase dopamine levels. While normal levels of dopamine are good and healthy, increased levels could be bad. Part of the reason people look at pornography is because they are addicted to the high levels of dopamine released when they look at stimulating pictures or videos. Dopamine makes us sexually excited. The person’s body who has become trained to associate high levels of dopamine with pornography on a regular basis may find it difficult to think otherwise until retrained to think differently. Caffeine is also known to increase dopamine. Sorry coffee drinkers. Too much caffeine can make it tough to have balanced hormone levels and make it more difficult to control your sexual urges. Even when it wears off you are cranky and feeling low and not in the best mood you can be in to control yourself.

There are many foods than can effect your physical and mental health. To make it simple, just stick to the food pyramid and stay away from bad things such as coffee, alcohol, tobacco, or anything you know is not helping.

The Importance of Exercising

Have you ever gone for a run, hated it the whole time you were doing it, then felt great and proud of yourself that you did it afterwards? I know I have. Running is a great exercise but it is only one of many. I have found anything involving cardio to be very beneficial for me physically and mentally. Anytime I have woke up and felt depressed and unconfident I made myself go for a 15 minute run and whala!, I felt much better afterwards. One of the biggest benefits of doing any type of weight training, sport, or cardio workout long enough is the release of endorphins. This bio-chemical acts like a natural pain killer and makes us feel happy. This is just what a person struggling with addiction needs since their mental and physical energy have been sapped by the misuse of the body.

Exercising makes us feel confident and it even helps the body recover more quickly from any form of self-abuse. The body needs time to recover and get everything back into balance when we misuse it but this process can happen quicker if we have a moderate exercise routine. Those who have prevented or overcame illness by exercising certainly know the rejuvinating powers of exercise.

If you combine a healthy diet and regular exercise you dramatically increase your power to overcome addiction. Don’t take this to the extreme and try to work out several hours a day or have the perfect diet. Remember, moderation in all things.

Addiction steals everything good in our lives including these healthy habits. If you think about it then it makes sense. Addiction wants you to stay in addiction and it can more effectively do that by causing you to become unhealthy. And so it tightens its grips on you one area in your life at a time. So make a decision now to get out there and start your new life and new habits and break free of addiction

Popular Post –>Top Ten Books that have Helped me Overcome Addiction