Monk Mode / Nun Mode Standard Criteria

Did you read this? https://nofap.com/rebooting/

 

I get you. I do remember a thread about this ages ago. I'll see if I can find it

Here's the post, does that help? https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?t...mode-hard-mode-monk-mode.229794/#post-2026342

 

Fasting is good, because you get the ability to have power over natural basis that is food. You gain some control, some power of you.
Because you have control and power on a basis need. So you can have the control on other basis that is bad. PMO for exemple.

 

I second the fasting.
It really helped me in my first couple weeks.

 

Nice list you develop here. Mine is a bit more simplistic but still very similar:

• No M, MO, PMO or sex (obvious)
• No television, PC use strictly for work learning and NoFap only (prebooked 2 recovery and 1 work related channel on YT. That's all of social media I use)
• exercise 1-3 hour a day
• meditate/pray at least 15 minutes a day (I do Wim Hof breathing technic and pranayama every day but am not so strict on cold showers anymore, because it's getting cold here and I do cycle/run every day in cold conditions adding cold showers to that routine was a bit too stressful for my body during cold days (I noticed getting headaches and colds).
• read at least one book a month (I ended up reading 3-4 books a month on average)
• Diet: drink only water and tea, eat only unprocessed food with no added sugar
• No alcohol, no smoking and no drugs is a no brainer of course

 

Don't be too harsh on yourself. Getting rid of addiction is very hard work by itself. I found that self-guilt and self-shaming have no place in recovery. We're all just humans, perfectly imperfect. All we can do is strive to improve and be kind to ourselves and others. Self-discipline is learned virtue and it takes time to develop. No one can just snap with fingers and become disciplined person over night. You can't rush it. It takes a lot of patience and practice to master. I believe that long hardmode, especially when one was addicted, is the key to develop discipline in general. If you can overcome addiction you can achieve almost anything if you focus on it.

 

What is the point of monk mode?

Seems to me that quiting pmo healing your body and rebooting in order to enjoy your life with your partner is the ultimate goal?

Unless you really are a monk or have some religious belief (which is fine every person can choose what they want to do with their life) I really see no purpose of this extreme life journey.

 

Tell me what is extra for the "Supermonk mode". Is the point of this to "toughen you up"? Because if it is then that makes good sense in that case.

And if you are going for this ascetic mode I have some extra suggestions:

* Do planks once per day for however many minutes you can hold it
* Always take the stairs instead of the elevator and RUN up or down the stairs.
* RUN or jog to everywhere you go such as the supermarket parking lot. Park as far as possible.
* Dont turn on air conditioner/heater until you can NO LONGER bear the discomfort.
* Eat your food with no salt or seasonings
* Stick 1 tsp of baking soda in your mouth along with the toothpaste
* Ice cold showers and Navy shower (That means turn on the water to wet yourself then turn it immediately off, lather up and turn on water to rinse off. FAST SHOWER like on the Navy boat Use less than 1 total gallon)
* No ice in your beverages and no sugar
* Grow out your beard
* When at computer set a timer every 60 minutes and do 10 jumping jacks and 10 squats
* When pooping (put the seat up) and squat down with bare feet on the rim and poop like a caveman

 

It's hard to explain what happens when you start living such minimalistic lifestyle. You have to experience it by yourself. I started practicing this mode quite unintentionally. I was noticing that I've started to develop cross addictions when being in hardmode. Drinking too much alcohol, started eating way too much sugar (couldn't resist chocolate/ice cream anymore), indulging in long unselective social media/news browsing sessions… Cross addictions are typical withdrawal symptom. When your brain becomes dopamine deficient (when you stop with PMO binges in our case), it starts to seek dopamine wherever it can get it (for me it was alcohol, sugar, web browsing). It's very hard to control that while fighting prime addiction so the easiest way is to abandon it altogether for a while. The funny thing is I started to like this lifestyle over time. My mind has become calmer, more focused and observant. I can be alone with my thoughts again. No need to check my phone to distract myself when being alone or in a public place anymore. I have more time because I don't waste it on phone, social media, television, movies etc. so I can do more productive things like exercising, meditating, socializing, hiking, reading books… I learned more about myself and life in general in the last 10 months then I did in the last 10 years. I stopped craving for material objects at some point during recovery which resulted in buying less and less things. I try to find joy in nature, reading, yoga/meditation/prayer and human interactions instead. It's not about becoming a robot, far from it, it's more about taking control over your own mind so you can make more conscious decisions and stop being ruled by your cravings. NoFap is great because it teaches us exactly what is needed to do that: determination, self-discipline and patience plus acceptance of unavoidable pain and suffering. I'd go as far as to say that anyone who beats severe addiction has basically conquered (regained control) over his own mind which is a huge deal. All Fapstronauts are monks in a sense.

 

I completely understand you and i do understand many people do relapse by using social media watching TV etc.

Luckily this is not my case so I cannot speak about it

What worries me about people going the monk mode route is jumping into another extreme behaviour type and sure you stop PMO but you distance yourself from other regular pleasures of life.

Addiction is actually just over doing something. Is monk mode not over doing the nofap?

This again only applies if you able to abstain without it going monk mode.

 

I agree, if I could maintain hard mode without jumping from one harmful/distracting highly dopamine rewarding behavior to another I probably wouldn't do "the monk mode". But then again once you remove most of modern distractions/stimulations out of your life, you realize that most of them do you no good in the first place. You become more in tune with your real needs and desires when not being constantly bombarded with highly dopamine rewarding stimulations all the time. For example, once I stopped eating food with added sugar, fruits started to taste good again. When I started salting food only minimally I started noticing how different food actually tastes like. The same is true with alcohol. I have no need to consume it anymore, it only wreak havoc on the body. The downside to it is that you have to fight with friends who want to drink with you, but I learned how to say no. I became a party breaker in their eyes but who cares. And can constant bombardment with commercials, news, movies, games, social media triggers really be called "regular pleasures of life"? The answer came to me when I went hiking with friends off grid without any electronic devices in nature for 3 weeks last year. Once I reentered "civilization" even television playing in the corner of a bar seemed very annoying. Then I was dragged to near airports' mega shopping centre in Milan and literally got sick from all the sensory over-stimulation in the mall. It made me think how modern electronic devices influence our brains without us even realizing it. I accustomed back to "normal life soon after but never stopped longing for the off-grid experience hike has given me. For some reason it was surprisingly effortlessly to give up all of these distractions once I overcame PMO cravings (around 5 months into current reboot). It could have been side effect of anhedonia, I don't know. But I'm at the point where gaming/movies/social media give me no pleasure anymore, on the contrary, either they bore or annoy me, so I have no problems in avoiding them. The only thing that I can say I didn't conquer yet is web browsing, that's why I implemented rule demanding I ask myself first 1) what do you want to search for and 2) do you really need to know the things you want to search for. This way I can control the information flow not the other way around and avoid being pulled in mindless web browsing.