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The Lord of the Rings Challenge

Discussion in 'Events & Challenges' started by RiseToGreatness, Sep 22, 2019.

Should the Thread Title be extended?

Poll closed Jun 21, 2020.
  1. No, leave like that: "The Lord of the Rings Challenge"

    18 vote(s)
    54.5%
  2. Yes. "The Lord of the Rings Challenge: The Fellowship of Nofap"

    15 vote(s)
    45.5%
  3. Yes. "The Lord of the Rings Challenge: Rising Fellowship of Eärendil"

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  4. Yes. "The Lord of the Rings Challenge: The Journey to Mount Doom"

    5 vote(s)
    15.2%
  5. Yes. "The Lord of the Rings Challenge: The Quest of the Ring-bearer"

    6 vote(s)
    18.2%
Multiple votes are allowed.
  1. I can only give my personal view on this, the furthest I've gotten is 125 days PM free and it worked better for me to not have porn blockers than it ever did with.

    Like you it felt as if I gave over a bit of the responsibility to the blockers. And ti was kind of llike "whatever isn't picked up by the blocker should be ok".

    When I instead focused entirely on staying busy with other things and had no blockers the responsibility was on me.

    Now however, I am on day 1 again like you
     
  2. Anew2019

    Anew2019 Fapstronaut

    5 days. Tired this morning. Was kept up with loud foot steps above me. Gonna have to be careful todah. Good thing I am going golfing right after work with some friends from work. Straight from golfing to bed tonight.
     
  3. ksie

    ksie Fapstronaut

    85
    817
    83
  4. modern milarepa

    modern milarepa Fapstronaut

    289 beyond the stairs of Cirith Ungol
    364 days no PMO, semen retention
     
  5. MyGodandMyAll27

    MyGodandMyAll27 Fapstronaut

    Day 8. Meditation and prayer are being really great weapons on my recovery.
     
  6. eagle rising

    eagle rising Fapstronaut

    Perhaps you can reanalyze what it is you're fighting. I mean to say, what is the mechanism you are fighting against? Because, although it is enticing to view P as the enemy, it doesn't really help, if that's what you're doing. You are gripping something that cannot be gripped. It can only be guided like water bending (or air or fire, and maybe earth). The more control you have the less control you have. You have to be in a fluid state with these urges. A rigid object can be fractured with a blow and a burst of urges is akin to such a blow. You have to be malleable, that doesn't mean you can bend all the back to PMOing, but malleable in your inner existence (thoughts, emotions, memories, etc.).

    As far as the P blockers are concerned, "all signs point to not using them", based on your reflection of their usage. So, I agree with what you say in reflection about using P-blockers. It is an opportunity for the mind to operate in the "I am searching for P" mode, still a source of dopamine, which is tied to P.

    There's my two cents. You can get through this, man!
     
  7. eagle rising

    eagle rising Fapstronaut

    Day 246.

    I am going "Monk Mode". I've had a pretty awakening experience these past couple of days. What happened was troublesome for me, but I decided to respond appropriately. The details are in my journal (of my problems and my personal Monk Mode rules), if you'd like to see (link in my signature).

    The brain and the environment.

    The brain is on all the time, it never stops. It goes on recording everything that you do. Even the most subtle of actions and thoughts that you conjure is recorded. It has the capacity to "injest" everything that is around you, but you are not conscious of everything. So, your environment is a huge factor in getting out of this addiction.

    If you put yourself in a triggering environment you are reinforcing those P pathways in more ways than you can imagine. If you put yourself in a more "wholesome" environment your brain will start recording it. But, the hard and frustrating part is that, because dopamine is essential to the human life, your brain will continue to get dopamine from thoughts, emotions, and memories. A change in the environment is stressful, so the brain is looking to feed the human something that makes it easier to handle the new environment. Again, the easiest thing for the addict is the P-scenes (dopamine provides motivation). So there is an adjustment period that cannot be avoided. This adjustment period can last many, many months, even years, depending on your level of commitment and/or how often you relapse.

    So, fortunately or unfortunately your brain is just trying to help you adapt to the new environment (by providing dopamine). But, you have to keep reminding yourself (and your brain), "we must figure a new way to get motivation". When changing the environment, it is essential to keep bringing yourself into a stable energy system. If you're scared and stressed and whatnot you are not going to function optimally. So, remember there is an adjustment period and it is going to take time. Prepare yourselves for this period.

    With that, keep on growing brothers and sisters!
     
  8. Ciceron

    Ciceron Fapstronaut

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    Checking in.

    St. Thomas Aquinas, pray for us!
     
  9. RiseToGreatness

    RiseToGreatness Fapstronaut

    5,927
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    ma man, so good to have you back!!! :) Welcome back!!! :)

    "You´re most welcome"

    [​IMG]
     
  10. RiseToGreatness

    RiseToGreatness Fapstronaut

    5,927
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    i feel you bro. urges come up on their own, but they can also rise as a consequence of some stimulation that we have been exposed to (thoughts, images, sounds...).

    It´s also important to state that only addicts suffer urges from their objects of desire. non-addicts don´t experience that. it´s because our brain is deeply affected by the addiction that we experience urges. so you can see urges as a natural consequence of depriving yourself from the object which the brain craves for.

    so hang in there bro :), the more time passes, the easier it gets ;)
     
  11. Thancred

    Thancred Fapstronaut

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  12. RiseToGreatness

    RiseToGreatness Fapstronaut

    5,927
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    i think you should keep porn blockers in your devices. porn blockers are very effective in cutting autopilot, which is the couple of seconds you need to wake up and noticing what you´re doing.

    however no porn blocker can detect fishing, as this is a very sneaky trap that causes many people to relapse. my rule to detect and destroy fishing (one that caused me lot´s of relapses to accept) is this: if you´re searching for anything remotely sexy, then you´re fishing. and you´re going to relapse.

    it may take 1 hour, 1 day or 1 week, but in the end fishing always leads to a pmo session. because the brain doesn´t want that scared sneaky peek, it wants the full pmo experience. and he tricks you into believing you´re on the "safe side", while in reality you´re moving steady towards a cliff.

    so, the sooner you detect fishing, the sooner you can cut the connection and snap out of it ;). and once you get the hang of it, detecting fishing becomes simple and natural :)
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2021
  13. RiseToGreatness

    RiseToGreatness Fapstronaut

    5,927
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    good quote bro, but that is particular to Sam itself, the simplicity. See, the ring tempts everyone, but it affects people in a wide range of ways, it almost doesn´t affect him because of his characteristics, like you said "he realises all of that is to big for him". so his humility is a protective factor against the One ring ;)

    that scene with Frodo i interpret more in the eyes of concern. he sees that Frodo is very drained and weak, but still wants the ring, so that hesitation of handing it over, seems more like a friendly concern (an addicts friend concern) than an actual grasping to keep the ring to himself.

    thank you brother :). the more times passes and we are in this thread, the more i see that the One ring and the LOTR story is an excellent metaphor for an addiction and it´s recovery process :)
     
  14. Revanthegrey

    Revanthegrey Fapstronaut

    1,626
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    Day 5
    I was thinking in a little challenge in this challenge:D
    What about to counting how much urges did someone slay on the day?
    As the challenge who did Legolas to Gimli.
    [​IMG]
    What do you think ? @RiseToGreatness
    It will help to control how much urges have one in a day and see with the time if going up or down.
    It is not obligatory to put it of course.
     
  15. Thomas3

    Thomas3 Fapstronaut

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  16. LuckyMan

    LuckyMan Fapstronaut

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    Fellowship, I fell again. Reseting counter to 0. My weakness is stress coupled with mental and emotional fatigue. I will try to come up with better strategies. I am not giving up.
     
  17. RiseToGreatness

    RiseToGreatness Fapstronaut

    5,927
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    Checking in Fellowship!!! :)

    I´ve been at home today, with sick flu, but never considered in dwelling in anything sexy. being in flatline also helps though :D

    Let´s welcome our new brother @Draconid

    And our returned brother @Gandalf the White . Mithrandir!!! So good to have you back :). Let´s do this!!!

    The following members are going strong on their paths. Congratulations!!! :)

    @Ciceron - Weathertop / Eriador
    dia 25 - amon sûl.png

    @ksie - Pass of Caradhras / Misty Mountains
    dia 40 - pass of caradhras (3).gif


    More brothers are joining the semen retention club so i´m very happy about it :). Continuing this rising trend, here´s chapter 5 from the Coiled Serpent - the deadlock in human evolution ;)

    Have a great day my brothers and sisters!!! :) Checking out.


    THE DEADLOCK IN HUMAN EVOLUTION

    "The strength of the sexual appetite
    . . . is unquestionably the great
    obstacle to the improvement of the
    race." — Newton, The Better Way.

    Human evolution has been at a standstill for many
    thousands of years. As far as we can look back into history
    and compare ourselves with the human elements of ancient
    civilizations, no evolutionary progress is noticeable. Our
    bodies have, if anything, deteriorated. Human qualities
    have not improved. Character, emotions, and motives for
    action have remained very much the same. "Our materials
    for knowledge have increased, but not our intellectual
    capacity."1 The intellectual power of our brainiest con
    temporaries does not surpass that of a Homer or a Hermes,
    or of purported Atlantean illuminati. Of any thing beyond
    intellect there still occurs only sporadically no more than an
    almost negligible indication.

    Since we can trace no noticeable advance in human
    evolution within a measurable period, it may well be pre
    sumed that at some time in the past a seemingly insurmoun
    table obstacle has been erected which has checked our
    evolution. Some powerful factor must have prevented the
    life force from rising to new and higher outlets.

    Even a cursory survey of the progress of the expression
    of life energy in pre-human as well as in human vehicles
    will help to discover the nature and the cause of the obstruc
    tion in the path of our evolution.

    A fundamental difference between various stages of
    evolutionary growth lies in the ways in which the life force
    is being utilized. In all organisms, from the simplest to the
    most complicated, the action of the life force is sustained
    by nutrition (which in a wider sense includes respiration).
    All functions other than nutrition, instead of sustaining,
    consume some of the available life energy.

    In the smallest and simplest creatures, such as uni
    cellular bacteria, life's energy is utilized in but a single way :
    in fast multiplication. "A bacterium is all germ-plasm, all
    reproductive material." Under favorable conditions hun
    dreds of billions of specimens can descend from a single one
    in a twenty-four hour period.'
    Out of the unicellular beings nature has gradually
    evolved the multicellular and complex creatures in which
    groups of cells are differentiated for special purposes. In the
    jellyfish, for instance, parts of the body's surface have
    protruded and grown into grasping and feeling extensions.

    Other cells of the skin have become receptive to impressions
    of light, preparing what later becomes an eye. And so with
    other rudimental organs of the senses. Within the body
    an incipient muscular and ' a still diffuse nervous system
    have begun to take shape. Body-growth, muscular exertion,
    and the nascent faculty of perception of the external world
    require a goodly share of the life energy which in the lowest
    forms was monopolized by reproduction. At the stage of the
    jellyfish reproduction is still profuse, though not comparable
    with that of bacteria. Fast multiplication remains neces
    sary wherever destructive factors cause a high rate of
    accidental deaths; but as a rule this need diminishes as
    evolution of the form proceeds, and new and higher facul
    ties are being developed.

    At the more elaborately organized stage of the reptiles
    the most striking functional change that by then stands out
    as having been accomplished is the centralization of the
    nervous system. The spinal cord has been definitely estab
    lished ; and at the head-end of the cord the cerebellum is
    ready to register impressions. Its functioning and that of
    the entire improved nervous system required an additional
    amount of nervous energy. The new demand for this
    specialized form of the life force — which again had to be
    taken from what at earlier stages would have remained
    available for the reproductive system — necessarily caused
    reproduction to be slowed down.

    Ascending the scale of being to the mammals, we find
    the cerebrum or fore-brain developed to a certain extent.
    As above stated, the reptiles had the cerebellum or hindbrain;
    but "its activities are considered as not entering
    consciousness." Provided with a be it only slightly active
    cerebrum, the mammals become conscious of sense-impres
    sions, and therewith capable of more strongly sensed emo
    tional responses to impressions from the outside. Again, with
    the introduction of these newer functions life energy is
    transferred from the reproductive organs to the brain ; and
    reproduction is considerably diminished.
    Between the evolutionary stage of the highest developed
    animal and that of man there is a gap so far as scientific
    knowledge about it is concerned — an unfathomable dark
    cleft. It looks as though evolution at this point, quite
    against its customary gradual procedure, had taken a sud
    den and bold leap. Before following it in that hypothetical
    jump across the canyon of 'missing links' a critical look
    back over the covered ground may well be taken.

    The point that stands out prominently is that originally
    the entire flow of life's energy was directed toward reproduc
    tion. Inherently, from that time on, the reproductive prin
    ciple has held a first claim on the life force. Every new
    function of the evolving organisms could be introduced only
    at the cost of reduced reproduction. The energy needed for
    each new evolutionary acquisition had to be diverted from
    the earlier established reproductive tendency, and to be
    transformed into other modes of expression. The life force
    had to be used more and more for inward instead of for
    outward purposes.

    All the way up through the animal kingdom this process
    was made easy by the absolute power of instinct, which un
    failingly guides all animals in their every activity in har
    mony with the plan of evolution." The animal is bound to
    follow that guidance because it has no faculty, no power of
    its own, with which to oppose nature's will and purpose.
    Thus it was an easy matter for the evolving animal to
    yield more and more of its reproductive energy and activity
    to the needs of higher and higher evolutionary attainments.

    Now : the human stage.
    Mind, reason, intellect, conscious self-consciousness are
    the evolutionary characteristics of the human species.
    Thanks to a far better developed brain than possessed by
    any group in the animal kingdom, these new factors can
    function in man.
    The additional brain development has been made pos
    sible by nature by instituting a long period of childhood,
    followed by years of adolescence before maturity is fully
    reached. To make the most of the evolutionary advantages
    and possibilities it is evident that in the first place youth, up
    to full maturity, should conserve all of life's energy for the
    development of body and of brain.'

    But after maturity has been reached the law of evolution
    does not cease to require more and more transmuted energy
    at every forward step. For the adult as truly as for youth,
    for the married' as truly as for the unmarried, further pro
    gress in evolution can only be attained at the cost of dimin
    ished sexual activity. In some of the higher animal species
    this had already been reduced to as little as a single act in
    the season of rut, which in many cases occurs only once a
    year. For human beings, then, a still further reduction — a
    limitation to the few occasions when propagation is con
    sciously willed — is requisite if evolution is to proceed.
    In the human body nature continues to be lavish with
    the production of seed as a storage battery of life force. But
    more insistently than ever the evolutionary law demands
    that — except for limited generative use — the force be
    kept within the body for regenerative purposes.

    For mankind this has been always a most perplexing
    problem. "Man is the first product of evolution to be ca
    pable of controlling evolutionary destiny.'" Endowed as he
    is with reasoning powers, he must independently decide up
    on his own behavior, without the compelling guidance by
    instinct. Supplied with mind, he is expected to cooperate
    consciously with nature in her further evolutionary program.
    Unfortunately humanity has arrantly failed to make a
    serious effort to promote its own further progress.

    Instead of using the power of the mind to understand the
    responsibilities which freedom from blind obedience to instinct
    entails, mankind has refused to listen whenever it was re
    minded of the requirements of the evolutionary law. It was
    so much easier to lend an ear to the promptings of desire,
    which was an unknown element up to the human stage It
    must have been very soon after the acquisition of mental
    self-consciousness and his becoming aware of stirrings of
    primitive impulses, that man began to use the mind to stimu
    late the desires of the body. In this way he has indulged the
    almost negligible sexual impulse which he inherited from the
    animal kingdom, until it has become a desire so strong that
    he has difficulty to control it.

    Overstimulated by this unnaturally strong desire of his
    own making, man has looked for arbitrary ways in which to
    gratify it. Although reducing actual reproduction, he has
    discovered ways of unreproductive sexual action. But every
    such act, whatever form it takes, is a misuse of sex and uses
    up some of the life force that should be utilized for the
    support and the development of higher faculties. "The
    record of our race progress clearly shows how our upward
    movement has been checked ... by that misuse."

    At the time when mankind became accustomed and
    addicted to sexual acts without reproductive purpose, at that
    very time it put a deadlock into the course of its evolution.
    Not until this deadlock is removed can humanity, individu
    ally and jointly, stride on toward the attainment of the
    greater faculties and powers which evolution has in store
    for man."
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2021
    rotten_tomato, Ciceron, ksie and 5 others like this.
  18. Revanthegrey

    Revanthegrey Fapstronaut

    1,626
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    You reached 27 days , maybe if you use again the strategy of that time, you can pass the 27 days again, then when that day comes, just think in something to add to that plan for go more far.
    It is works for to me, i know i reset but it was because i forget to look one weak point .
     
  19. Mathman1994

    Mathman1994 Fapstronaut

    870
    4,131
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    And once again I am back to day 0. Last night into today led to two resets, and so I am feeling kind of sick of this. How can I have such high hopes yesterday, and then resetting hours later?
     
  20. Prophet Moonstruck

    Prophet Moonstruck Fapstronaut

    359
    3,239
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    Day 11 my friends! The week-end is upon us and I just want to tell you to do the things that you have in mind so you can be proud of your weekend!
    I just gave up on trying to find the issue with the counter.
     

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