Assalam, post Ramadan motivated!

Assalam, hope everyone is well, its been a while since I've last posted.

- sorry for any waffle, I've written this off the top of my head

-probably should've wrote this in the journal bit, I might start one?

In the past few years my longest streak MO free has been about a year, the rest of the streaks have been considerably less. I'm currently on a 30 day streak of no PMO. The reason I wanted to make a post is to help others and hopefully myself too, of course. This post is just to reiterate what some others have said. The last time I was on this site I was very focused on maintaining my streak. It became a bit of a numbers game, however I have realised, especially during the past month of reflection and fasting that as individuals we must look to the root of the problem to truly let go of this addiction rather than just trying to go cold turkey. When you have a really good reason to stop, stopping becomes that much easier. Moreover a phrase I had heard " the heart is like a vessel, whatever you fill it with is what you become" (or something to that effect) really resonated with me. So here are a few points off the top of my head that I'd like to think about, and also see what others think:

- Time is finite, meaning we don't live forever, eventually we grow old and pass away in most circumstances. How do we fill a typical day: wake up , go to school/ work/ look after the kids etc, come home get comfortable and waste hours on technology and eat something that probably isn't as healthy it could be (this is the case with me) anyway. Then go sleep (probably late). Inter spruced in the spare time you may go gym/ shopping etc.... My point is the spare time I have typically would go towards entertainment, and gorging in junk food etc. These things are driven by impulse (relax and enjoy yourself) especially if you are living on a half decent wage. From what I can remember watching porn leads to decreased frontal lobe size and can also make one act on impulse a lot more so there is vicious cycle there.
My second point relates to diet. Today almist everything on TV is about food, or atleast it seems like it, everything is about convenience, my point is there is a lot of influence in regards to just consuming and his transfers to other things like the entertainment I mentioned earlier. But anyway I truly believe if you are unable to control your desire to eat certain foods then you are more likely to be unable to control yourself when it comes to sexual desires.
Another point (all these points seem obvious when I write them, but hard to take in nonetheless I guess) we often hold on to emotions too long for example anger / sadness. Being able to deal with emotions is a real skill. Not being able to forgive/ being resentful, leads to a build up of frustration and stress, in this hypersexualised world we live in, where there is an emphasis on instant gratification I feel it is almost inevitable we go to certain lengths to fulfill our sexual needs just so we have that moment of peace and we can come back to our senses. As lil Wayne says "why is it only when I cum I come back to my senses". My point is PMO is not inevitable, I feel if we build these certain coping mechanism within ourselves we can fight off these actions which are creating a whole world of weakened men.
Some practical tips:
fasting, this will help you control your desires like nothing else, you'll feel calmer and more at peace. You'll want to reserve your energy just to survive healthily. Plus your body will adapt to the new eating pattern.
Treat ANY slightly provocative image/ actual person like porn (as this what it could eventually lead you to) in other words keep yours eyes down, this will be hard at first but will eventually become second nature as you begin to see the positive benefits (don't give up).
Think that's enough of a rant for now, I've got to go. Thank you for reading! Would love some feedback, and hope I've not offended anybody.

 

The lil Wayne point I was trying to make is that just before we M we are desperate to relieve ourselves of tension thinking that M will help us but in a lot of cases having M'd I actually end up feeling worse and come back to NY senses' this can't be right, there must be a better, more humane way to control/ relieve myself of my desires.'

 

Jazak Allah, thank you bro. How are you doing?

 

Masha Allah that's really good, but keep going, I know its hard but have the mentality that Alhamdulilah I got to day 38 Insha Allah I can do better. Are you married ? If you don't mind me asking.

 

A few things I just want to add.
I feel getting married has helped me, however I did get married early and go into marriage with intention of not wanting to fall into fornication and maintain my chastity. We have had our ups and downs but we are at a good place and alhamdulilah I can see my behaviour improving steadily.

Another point is the reason I started PMO in the first place is that I was away studying, doing an intense course, with the added fitna (temptation/trial) of getting flirted with I was really struggling. The stress and the loneliness lead to the PMO because I didn't handle my emotions properly. Moreover I didn't have the right structures in place. For example I should have joined a club/ made friends. I did find a gym with people my age towards the end of university. It was located above the mosque on the top floor. But unfortunately a little late by then. Another mistake I made is I didn't really tell anyone about my problem until it had really taken over.
I probably should have researched "things to consider when moving out" but I was a little naive, "thinking ah it'll be fine, it'll make grow up".

 

Another I just remembered, I was watching a video by Alyas Karmani on dangers of P. He says one of the cures to get away from it is to convince your heart to hate it. I.e. it causes addiction, depression, breaks apart families, those involved are often trafficked. So inform yourself constantly about its negative effects and try to look into how to help those effected.