Living in a very sexual promoted society

The best thing to do is avoid those triggers. Avoid is not just don't look, is based on self-control and of course you develop it as the times goes by. Another tip is to redirect your energy to something to good like practice a physical exercise, learn a new language, etc because without a good pleasure to keep yourself on the track, you will relapse

 

Thanks for sharing.

 

Trying to redirect those urges at my wife, not pixels on a screen.

 

I hear you.

 

Great advice. ☕

 

Hello,
I think we have to recognize that we have shifted our focus to something less gratifying. Women were only ever desired, but now we have opened up to the possibility of knowing them and growing alongside them.
Let them be themselves and continue your process.

 

I think society thinks it is a sex positive culture but it actually doesn't promote sex in a healthy way. It promotes it in a way of meeting your own needs, rather than truly loving someone else.

The advice on avoiding triggers is helpful in the early stages, but we cannot live life under a rock. We are designed to live life in its fulness. The more freedom we get the more we don't desire those things any more. Building cravings for good stuff in our lives is so important. I used to find high school students a trigger. That definitely crossed over from my porn use into real life. I can't avoid driving past them in the morning, but I've practiced various things and now it's only an ocassional temptation, and i've noticed it's usually when there's other stuff going on in my life.
So freedom is also about managing the other stresses and reasons you seek out porn and finding healthier ways of handling them.

 

You don't have to give up tv and movies entirely but maybe switch to PG13 content for a few weeks until you have a better handle on your impulses. You won't entirely avoid triggers but at least you won't accidentally come across nudity or something that will trigger a relapse. Your willpower is a muscle and you cant start out benching 500 lbs, Eliminate anything triggering in the beginning and as you feel you can handle it, reintroduce parts you can't live without. You might be surprised at things your doing that will feel like a waste of time in 6 months. I quit all social media except this forum and I have found so much extra time that I'm now spending with my wife and kids doing fun stuff. I would have never had time to do Mad-libs with the family yet I got much more enjoyment laughing with them.

 

In my experience triggers decrease when I stay off porn...also, I try to remind myself that it's a trigger and think about where it's coming from rather than responding.

 

I've had this issue occasionally. I don't watch TV, but I do watch Netflix. And when a Netflix show becomes a bit triggering, I switch to a different show. I've stopped watching The Good Place and Beef as I get triggered when watching it.

Good thing is that there is so much to choose from on Netflix. If it's not The Good Place, it can be The Last Kingdom or whatever. Feel for yourself what feels good to you and the process you're in and do something about it.

 

If it was me, I'd cancel your subscription or use a website locker for a prolonged period of time. Some may not want to do that which is fine but I had such a hard addiction that even self-growth wouldn't help. Kind of a Two face deal.

 

Quoted for truth. Can’t improve on that, I have nothing to add.

Watch me.

Yeah I get that. I did finish “The Good Place” while on a long streak, and it didn’t bother me much, but I can see how it could. The whack philosophy was a perfect distraction, honestly.

In retrospect, claiming there was nothing wrong with porn was a dead giveaway

Spoiler: The Good Place, season 1

that they were really in Hell

, though the way pop culture treats it, I’m still not sure if the writers think porn really is inconsistent with good morals. That’s a digression though.

Yeah. Spend the first 30 days of a streak under that rock. Put down the screens. If it’s an issue with family and friends, tell them you’re on a tech cleanse. Don’t even use NoFap, if it becomes a time sink. Just unplug. Go on walks, or runs. Read from a paper book. Something nonfiction, like “The 48 Laws of Power” or “A Hunter Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century.” Doodle, write, be a human with your mind in the real world for a while, not a cyborg with your head in the cloud. Then, slowly and carefully and only if you want, reintegrate those screens with potential triggers. Hopefully, you’ll find you’re a little more resilient.

 

I live a reclusive life which is pretty much the same as living under a rock. This being said I'm not sure if I still have unhealthy views on relationships and sex.

 

What’s healthy, though? I have a friend, a NoFap graduate, who tried returning to regular S, tried O’less S, tried only occasional S, and finally settled on the thing we most fear and psychologists shudder from; no S. Permanent abstinence, in marriage. He’s *gasp* sex negative. And he says his wife is totally cool with it because he’s a stable, loving person, more balanced and better without it. I don’t know if he fried his brain with role playing erotic scenarios with strange “women” online, if he’s a rare case of abnormal hormonal makeup that never handled the rush of O well and never will, or if he’s stumbled on a rare truth that Christian and Buddhist monks have known for centuries. All I know is, he reports he’s completely content and better off not just without O, but without any erotic stimulation whatsoever. The vast majority of both physical and mental health professionals will say he’s nuts, and he doesn’t care because he’s tried their way and doesn’t like the way he acts and feels when he did.

I’m leaning toward his way of thinking, honestly. In retrospect, the best I’ve felt in the last two years was when I was on a streak and my marriage was in the toilet, and I hadn’t had or anticipated anything erotic in months. Then, presumably because I was doing better, S came back into my life and things got super imbalanced. I maintained my streak, but anxiety, uncertainty, lack of confidence, and depression all came back. I blamed it on the time of year, but maybe that wasn’t the whole story.

 

I think my issue is is that I am also generally sex negative as well and want a normal relationship with a woman and start a family one day. However, I also think I am the type of guy who ends up hiding his face when women call him "sweetie" "cutie" and would probably freeze up if a woman ever refereed to me as "my handsome boy." I know it is probably wrong but if I am being completely honest I honestly feel somewhat flattered when women objectify me even if I probably shouldn't. I often like to think of scenarios where my girlfriend/wife chains my wrists together sexually stimulating me yet I am not allowed to C until she says. And Won't ever let me O because at least in my belief Os are only to be enjoyed by women. Same with sex too with some exception I am not allowed to C until she says and and enjoys O while I have to be absolutely silent.

It's a duality of man thing in my opinion, I want a normal relationship... Yet I also want to be tormented and "tortured" by wife/girlfriend. So for these very reasons I am unsure if I have the healthiest views of relationships or sexuality.

 

“Sweetie,” “Cutie,” and “My handsome boy?” I don’t think those terms are used in a healthy romantic relationship. A healthy relationship is founded on mutual respect, and those terms are all patronizing. You don’t want to be with a sweetie or a cutie or a pretty girl, either, men need women. It’s a brutal world out there, you need someone who can watch your back, not one who will be your trophy. Neither one who will be your mother.

I wouldn’t entertain that fetishist sub fantasy. I don’t know of any women who are attracted to that role, it’s why it’s so hard for guys to find a good dominatrix. The role doesn’t come natural and it’s exhausting. Whatever a healthy relationship with S is, I don’t think that’s it.

 

Yep... I knew it myself, I should've already figured that my views of sex and relationships are unhealthy. I definitely don't want to be a pretty girl, and you don't have to tell me that it's a cruel world out there. I think I have admitted on certain threads that my relationship with my mother is complicated I don't think I need anyone to watch my back, I honestly do a pretty good job of watching my own. Guess one of the things that comes out of unhealthy parental relationships is being having strong self-reliance and self-preservation. Yet at the same time having unhealthy views of intimacy and relationships. On the one hand the last thing I want is a girlfriend that basically acts like my mother. Yet says all the nice things to me and constantly tells me she loves me, I can't remember the last time my mother said "I love you." I mostly got yelled at, patrolled and if my mom ever had a realization that she was in the wrong she'd either get me a toy, McDonald's or Ice Cream in hopes that'd make it better. Never said sorry or "I love you."

I was okay with it as a kid, but looking back now it's pretty messed up. And if I could vomit out all that McDonalds and Ice Cream return all those toys just for an apology or "I love you." I'd do it within half a heart beat.

 

But I don't see what difference that it makes now, She's really been at odds with me ever since I've had interest in attending Catholic masses, not only for my love of Jesus but in hopes that I can have deep motivations to get my house in order.

 

Dominatrices also may have played a role into what made me quit porn in all honesty, I've talked to a few of them and these women can't hold a basic conversation for shit pain in the ass to talk to. So I definitely don't want to get involved with one. So I just better get my act together and scrap the fetish stuff. and just try to stick with the more wholesome side of things.