I feel like my level of horniness has risen again. I'm also now thinking about whether I can lower this level in a healthy way. Fapstronauts usually suggest: go for a walk, have fun with someone, do a workout. I feel like this help in a short-term. Do you have any ideas? I became aware of another possible motivation for my relapse behavior. I had a problem with gay videos in past. They were mostly videos of male masturbation. I realized that I watched them for a number of reasons. Adoration of the male body (comparison), mirroring the other guy. I hope I'm not being too detailed. I need to know how to suppress or somehow stimulate these impulses in a healthy way... Any ideas?
Yes. Two fundamental things: First your effort: cut out all or as much as possible areas/sources of unwholesome thoughts and temptation. It's a process of actively avoiding situations that could trigger sexual fantasizing and relapse. Kill social media and put up porn blockers (any of them can be defeated with effort but at least you'll have to go through effort to take them down). Get rid of pics/porn collection, videos, all that. Gone. And avoid circumstances that could lead to thinking sexual thoughts. To that end, no fantasizing. Don't let your mind dwell or entertain sexual thoughts. It sounds crazy at first, but it's doable, and the best way to ensure a long term streak. This is applying effort in abandoning and avoiding areas that will cause you harm. While abandoning and avoiding areas and scenarios that are unwholesome, it's beneficial to actively seek and retain thoughts and activities which are healthy and wholesome. Embrace new hobbies and transmute that new energy to productive endeveaours. Stay connected with wholesome relationships that support you on this journey. Retain and seek positive behaviors and thoughts in place of sexual fantasies and activities. This is effort in the positive direction that will be beneficial for your journey. Second, begin meditating and developing mindfulness. This will help you determine when unwholesome states/circumstances are arising and allow you to avoid/abandon them, and also when beneficial/wholesome states arise and seek/embrace them. Keep in mind this is an overall practice too. If you slip up, just make a mental note of that and the circumstances that surrounded that as a new facet and lesson of mindfulness that you can apply to your effort moving forward
If you cannot divert the energy into something productive I would recommend Cold Showers. It is not necessarily something you want to prevent, just like WDs. Enjoy the journey it is not supposed to be a chour.
