this is obviously going to be incredibly anecdotal but whatever so I had a pretty hard relapse/binge session earlier this month, and noticed that many of my lifts struggled GREATLY during this episode. I've heard many people over the months speculate as to whether or not pmo affects gains at the gym, and this may at least attempt to quantify those questions Spoiler this graph shows my progress in bench press, which has been one of my focuses. the relapse was september 2nd and the binge lasted about a week. Sets were constant throughout the excersises, as well as sleep, diet, and alcohol intake. other workouts of mine have suffered similar drop offs in improvement again, super anecdotal, but I think it's obvious that there are certain physical ramifcations to pmo, especially given the sharp decrease in energy people oftentimes allude to when they reset.
I find that after a binge my motivation drops considerably. I don't think watching porn/masturbating makes you weaker. I just feel like it gives me the "I can't be bothered" attitude. So obviously lifts may suffer.
I approve of this. Obviously fapping won't DIRECTLY have any influence on your muscle mass. I do believe though, that after 10 days of no ejaculation (when semen gets 'reabsorbed' into the body so I've read) the muscles get energized and become stronger. Also, you can 'unleash' more energy when you haven't fapped. I notice this when I do my Sprint Interval Training, I notice my sprints are much less intense when I've had an orgasm recently. And that my motivation drops when I've been searching too much sexy-things so-to-speak. And then there's also the dopamine effect. Watching porn releases so much dopamine that you won't really be bothered to lift as hard as you can to get additional feelgood hormones. (<- basically what JakeWoods says)
This is what I always feel strongly too. I work out often (every day when my body feels up for it), and I really feel the difference between a week where I masturbate a bunch of times and a week when I'm trying hard not to. In the case of the former, I feel weaker (even if I am not), and have real trouble making myself start a workout, and if I do manage to start, I can't make myself give it a proper effort.
My own experience is that my lifts do go down when I've been regularly indulging in porn but not when I've been regularly having sex. Based on this, I'd assume that there's no relationship between strength levels and orgasm but rather between strength levels and feeling depressed/hopeless/disgusted with ourselves due to excessive porn use. But of course, I'm just one person, and have no real idea how these things work.
Well if you have sex with someone you gotta put some effort/energy in it to make it work and to make you feel good, same goes for weightlifting. You gotta put effort in it. Porn requires no effort whatsoever that's why it makes you lazy even on the short term
This is complete nonsense, I've posted international elite totals in powerlifting and it makes no difference. It must be all in your head, you're cutting, less sleep, technique issues etc etc one, several, all or more of what's mentioned.
"It must all be in your head..." Well, the quality of our performance at pretty much any task is greatly influenced by our mindset, so it only makes sense that lifting numbers would be improved by a positive mindset and decreased by a negative one. And since pornography puts many people in a negative place emotionally, I don't think it's much of a stretch to say that heavy use will slow down (or even reverse) progress made in lifting or any other endeavor.
NoFap is the best tool for better gains! I dont care if theres scientific evidence or not, when Im on a streak I do my exercises more easy and much faster than on PMO. And thats a fact
I don't think there's any way to say for sure. The best any of us can really say is that if PMO puts you in a negative place emotionally, it will probably have a negative effect on your lifts. If PMO has no effect on your emotions, it will probably have no effect on your lifts. We'd need some well-conducted studies to draw any further conclusions. If anybody knows of any, it would be great if they could be posted.
NoFap has zero effect on anything in my life apart from libido and erection quality. But I am very level headed and calm in general. Obviously having been an elite powerlifter helps and I've played other sports to a high standard. So I know my body very well. I think you are all letting fapping or not fapping mess with you mentally