what do i do when im craving really bad?

I get cravings at bed time - So I put an earphone and listen to an audio while lying on the bed (Points of Power by Rhonda Byrne) which is about 30 minutes and I fall asleep with the cravings being much less intense.

When small fantasies or little bad thoughts pop up, I ignore them and continue with my good thoughts. Rather than fight or resist them by trying to stop thinking about bad thoughts. When I continue with good thoughts the bad ones go away. Positive overcomes the negative.

I hope it's useful

 

Honestly? Anything but sexual stuff. Something happy, something sad, something crazy, something normal, something big, something small, as long as you like it and know for a fact it will distract you (for me it's listening to music, watching youtube, playing video games, which may not be the best for others but they work wonders for me), do it. Anything. Anything that's not PMO. Heck, if it's really bad, and you won't be putting yourself in danger doing it (you tend to do or think about unsavory things), you can purposefully make yourself sad with something heartfelt and emotional, like songs that tug at just the right cord in your heart every single time, because emotion, especially intense ones, feel more 'intelligent" than sex. Sex is a basic primal thing. Emotions are primal too, but... higher on the chart, so to speak.

Chin up! Get back up and keep trudging.

 

Have you seen any of the threads about sexual transmutation? I think a lot of people are turned off by it because they think it's spiritual, but its really not. There are even athiests doing it.

Basically the idea is that the body generates this sexual energy all the time and it must be managed. You can manage it by circulating it around in the body or by directly using it as in working out. The sexual energy can even get you high if you can move it up to the brain. Being horny is a byproduct of the sexual energy stagnating near the sex organs.

So distracting yourself from being horny isn't the way to go, you can actually eliminate the horniness by getting high off of that energy.

Use the search perameter "sexual transmutation" to learn more.

It's very important to learn body awareness if you are going to do this work. That's when you shift your awareness away from the mind and into the body. The easiest way to do that is to breath carefully and slowly. When our awareness is fully in the body the energy tends to balance out on its own. Some people vaguely refer to this concept as loving themselves.

When you look around there are so many people who's bodies are totally neglected. They live in the mind and so they starve their bodies of the most valuable product of the human being, our attention.

 

Hey, there's definitely a few tips I can give you. When I feel an urge I think to myself, did I feel better after I gave in to the urges? No. After those 10 seconds I felt like s***. Complete garbage. Like a total failure. When I didn't give in I felt awesome! Like I really accomplished something and I knew I was in control. I was winning in this fight of defeating PMO. I'm blessed that I'm still winning, and I'm hoping I continue. Another tip, get off of the Internet/social media when you have those urges. Also, if you feel a strong urge before bed, go sleep on the couch or out of your room or keep the door open or something. That helps me control the urges cause I know I'm "not in 'private' anymore". I don't have a magic cure, but I hope I was able to give you some good tips. Relapses suck, I know from many experiences. But if you keep trying some of these tips we all can give you, you'll succeed and you'll begin to feel awesome. I have faith in you, man. Keep fighting!

 

Horse Stance training. I can do ten minutes now, or three minutes while holding 40lbs weights (20lbs in each hand). When I started one minute was murder. For me it really did a great job diffusing the sexual desire. It's like taking a cold shower times 10 and you get a lot stronger from doing this.

Another one is watching Kung Fury.

 

I LOL'd at this. Well played

 

just start playing online chess on chess.com. from my past experiences i realized that after porn my chess performance starts to decline and it takes almost 3-4 days to regain my score. i take my chess score as a indicator for my brain health. its nothing special but it helps me to stay motivated. if you r going to try this start by no more than 5 min challenge and play minimum 20 games continuously without any brake.trust me after some time you dont wanna loose in chess and love your score and always try to beat your previous score.

 

Small steps work. When you get too ahead of yourself, it becomes like it could be too hard. It seems though like you got the right mindset!

 

Just listen to that part of you that wants to walk away, remind yourself why you're doing NoFap and why you want to live this lifestyle. Take it one day at a time man and you should do well. Take some deep breaths too to calm yourself down in those situations. Hope your journey goes well!

 

I like to read. It is time consuming and takes commitment but there really is nothing like getting stuck into a good novel. Recently I resolved to focus only on the things that are important or interesting to me- no more social media, no more meaningless news or talk back radio. The more I ponder on it the more I realize how we are surrounded by cultural norms that tend to dictate what we should and should not do- thus the reason, in my view, so many people are on social media. Or fashions, language, memes etc. But I find the best insurance against relapse is coming on here and reading the success stories section to see the pioneers who have gone through the tough times to come out better for it on the other side. Take heart from their success and realize this thing can and will be beaten.

 

Reading books really does work well as @Cams mentioned. I stopped watching broadcast TV a while ago because Netflix and stuff like that was good enough and now when I see the commercials its like some kind of weird twilight zone shit. I think the way commercials break up the shows really screwes up the way our minds are supposed to work. It ruines mental discipline and focus. Facebook seems to have become infected with mainstream news. I dont know what happened. For gods sake people stop posting news on your Facebook page. With books, there are none of these issues!

 

RyanRVA,

Thank you for posting this. It was very informative!

 

Icepack on your business! Always works.

 

It's all about increasing awareness, because an urge whipped up by objectifying (as opposed to a desire based on mutual affection) is a pretty severe form of unconsciousness.
Being aware that your brain is basically on standby is the first step, using any tiny shred of consciousness to wake yourself up is next.
Simple conscious breathing does wonders for me, imagine the air molecules moving in and out of your mouth and lungs, become aware of your chest and belly and how they suck the air in. This really takes no effort. It is just a choice. Stay with this for a minute and I already notice a shift, at this point enough to know that I have my footing back and can withstand the urge. For starters give yourself 5 minutes and then take stock of your mental emotional state.
There are all kinds of other escape behaviors I typically deploy when I'm in trouble, getting on the treadmill for 30 minutes with loud music followed by a cold shower.
Just getting your ass up and walking around the block

Other tactics are to dismantling the "story" you are telling yourself

1. I tend to think some physical discomfort in my groin is unbearable and needs releasing.... but if I truly examine the discomfort it is typically tiny... my reduced mind is just lying about it as an excuse
2. I'll have some image of a scenario that having sex with person 'x' with body feature 'y' is going to be so freaking awesome it will make really happy for a long time... but what is it about body feature 'y' really that is so great.... add 10 pounds of fat and it won;t be so hot.... and I know I really won't be happy for more than a few seconds... then I'll just turn into a different kind of zombie
3. Also this person 'x' I am only interested because of feature 'y' what are the chances this person could even be my friend... would even care about me in any way.

The list goes on.... but I've done my bit for tonight
Stay strong. Be awesome.

 

Something just came to me. There is a part of the mind that can operate automatically. In psychology they call this the reptilian brain. I think they say its the part of the brain when the spinal cord meets the brain and it has the most direct access to the body (Im not a neurologist so don't quote me on this). This part of the brain takes over when a strong enough stimulus is presented. Let's say someone comes up to you and shoves you, then this part of your brain might step in and break their arm. You may regret that later.

This is a very animalistic survival tool. This part of the brain can do things you are not willing to do. It is stimulated by movement, violence and sexual opportunity. The media knows all about it and they design their programs to maximally stimulate this part of the brain, same with video game designers. When this part of the brain is activated, I feel a surge of sexual energy that is kind of addictive.

Once we truly understand this mechanism its much easier to feel the surge but not hand over control. I also find that I can't really watch broadcast TV anymore, just commercial free stuff like Netflix because the broadcast stuff just seems painfully brainwashy. Mainstream news seems like the lowest form of garbage on the planet to me. No wait, its pharmaceutical commercials.

Breathing consciously tells that part of the brain, "hey everything is fine, you don't need to take over.". If you were really in a fight or flight situation, breathing consciously would not be a priority. Eventually that side of you learns that it's not needed and it stops trying to take control. That takes about 2 weeks to master.

I find that the more we seperate ourselves (the raw observer perspective that controls attention) from everything else (mind, body, circumstances) the easier it is not to fall for the traps.

A good example of this is that my wife doesn't want to have children. She says she's known since she was a little kid that she wasn't going to have them. Her body has a strong biological urge for it, but she says "well that's just a physiological programming that humans have to perpetuate the species, therefore it's irrelevant.".

I believe that we are not our thoughts but our thoughts show us who we are becoming. Do you know what kind of person you want to be? What would happen if you started thinking the way that kind of person would think? People want to believe that their thoughts are private and inconsequential. In my experience, this has failed validation. Every thought has some effect on the world we live in and it all adds up.

People often tell me that I'm lucky and I never seem to have any conflicts in my life. I tell them that it's because I have found peace in my heart and mind. They seem to be much more comfortable with the belief that I'm just lucky. To me its never a surprise when someone with a chaotic mind lives a chaotic life.

If your mind is dwelling on the struggle for control, are you not creating a struggle for control? Try dwelling on being peacefully in control, then you will be creating that instead. Do this for two weeks and watch what happens.