Eustress and distress, and how they can help you recover.

You may have never heard the word "eustress," but it's something you're utilizing right now for your own recovery. Eustress is when the people around you are pressuring you to do good things. If I'm trying to quit PMO and I'm around others who have done the same, they will continually coax me to press forward with my recovery and to know that it's possible. If I want to learn computer programming but know nothing of it, an excellent first step is to hang out with people who do program. Why? Because now you're in an environment where "everyone is doing it," so the fact that you're not doing your own learning and contributing to the conversation makes you feel left out, and you're much more motivated to open up that C++ book. A perfect example of this is when my friend (who I taught how to use computers several years ago) told me he figured out how to get onto deepnet (for those who don't know, it's this sort of "shadow internet" that lies below what search engines are able to pick up, but this is a very incomplete description). Having recently gotten interested in actually learning more about computers now that I'm taking up constructive interests cause quitting porn will do that, I immediately realized I should act on my long-held desire to learn Linux RIGHT NOW, so I installed Ubuntu on one of my old laptops. I haven't had time to play around with it, but it's a perfect example of eustress motivating me to take a positive action, even if it was small.

The opposite end of this is something we're likely a little more familiar, and it will absolutely kill your recovery: distress. Distress is when you're at a party and you don't want to drink that night, but everyone around you is drinking, and trying to convince you to drink, and being very persistent. You feel left out, so you want to go against your own desires for yourself and you pick up a beer. So let's bring this home to PMO, let's say you're on a good streak and you're hanging out with your friends when they bring up pictures of a hot girl and they're all drooling at it. They turn to you and want to know what you think, but you don't want to look because it may cause a trigger. They push you, and push you, and push you, and you look... and when you get home that night, you run to your bed, rip your pants off, fap and reset the counter.

So those are some key examples of how what environments and what people you hang out with while you're recovering can absolutely make or break your reboot, strength of will aside. I hope you took something out of this.

 

You're right that willpower can be maintained to stick to one's principles in such situations and that of course the decision is always yours in these situations. However, there will be many temptations and pressing you in the wrong direction, testing your will. I guess I'm implying that these are like waves of energy we can ride with to make our recovery much more effective, rather than have to fight. It's a simple concept, but nothing to dismiss.