Scheduled MOs for avoiding binge mode

I plan to change of MO addiction treatment - here's how:

I am carrying this thought already for a while with me:
I want to experiment with another approach to my unhealthy MO behaviour. Up to now my way of dealing with it is counting days and running streaks for as long as feasible and eventually relapse. Then start again.
While many others here appear to follow a similar approach and it seemed to have worked out for me as well in that sense that I made a lot of awesome discoveries I'd still like to try something new.

IMO the drawback of my current approach lies on focusing on the MO action by seeing it as something harmful (and I'm convinced many here would exactly sign this) and postponing it as long as possible. Consequently this usually makes me switch into binge mode where I manage to escape after a while of bluster. This leads to stigmatizing the MO act per se which I am not sure if it is really the right thing for me.

As of now I am single, and having talked to some men who apparently (i.e. in my and their own opinion) do not have issues with MO or PMO had made me wish for a healthier approach to MO altogether.

Meanwhile I see it like this:
The motivation WHY I decide to MO is as crucial as the motivation WHY someone decides to drink a beer or WHY someone decides to smoke a cigarette or WHY someone decides to eat a piece of cake.
Of course it is always debatable whether or whether not smoking/eating candy/drinking alcohol/masturbation is healthy per se.

Also an alcoholic would not be able to drink responsibly he has to be sober the rest of his/her life. But does it apply to eating, for instance?
So...does it apply for MO in my case? I do not know the answer...

I just DO know that smoking e.g. smoking a cigarette every once in a while will probably not make lung cancer my most likely death cause or a drink once in a while will not kill my livers (or make me fall back to drinking as I am no alcoholic).

And I just DO feel that while I could still work on increasing the duration of my streaks I will never get rid of MO entirely and eventually do it - and I DO like the thought of never ever doing it again AS LITTLE as I like the thought of crawling back to binge mode every time OR doing it while using P or Psubs. It simply makes me feel as if I enslaved myself just because I do not possess enough will power to deal with it responsively.
It boils down to the decision whether I dislike MO altogether (consequently ban it from life) or like it but just out of the right motives.

Okay, that was a long detailed introduction. So what is my idea?

Procedure:

• I will allow myself to schedule a date&time to MO. It has to be AT LEAST three days in advance.
• When the scheduled day&time comes up, I decide, if I want or don't want to follow my schedule.
• YES: I will not feel guilty about it because I decided upon free will to do it hence allowing myself to experience the act itself as pleasure. IMMEDIATELY after that, I am free to schedule a next time AT LEAST three days in advance.
• NO: I can think of something else I want to do instead. I am free to schedule a next time AT LEAST three days in advance.

Conditions

• I WILL NOT MO spontaneously (giving in to urges, covers up to now 100% of my relapses)
• I WILL not make use of P or Psubs
• I WILL allow myself to take the time and to enjoy it
• I WILL increase the number of days I need to wait
• I WILL take note on how I feel afterwards
• UPDATE: I WILL NOT deliberately use fantasies

Please, dear members of our community, I am sure your opinions about my proposal differ. Please give me some feedback, in either direction.
I will be happy about comments, critics and basically any form of feedback...

 

You know, honestly, if it works for you, I'm not sure I see anything wrong with this. It is a personal decision. I would say to try it out, BUT to be honest with yourself. If it gets to be too much of a problem and you feel like it's "wrong," then you should stop and reassess and don't be afraid to admit that maybe it wasn't the best decision.

I've had a couple MOs recently in which I didn't fantasize at all (which I, personally, think should be a condition for you as well... fantasizing about porn is not much different than watching, so you don't want to be giving yourself too much allowance based on a technicality). After these two times, separate occasions, of MOing, without fantasy (or at least very very little), just for the physical release, I honestly didn't feel guilty at all. Even one of my APs and my husband agreed that it wasn't something to be concerned about and shouldn't count as a "relapse."

So anyway... I think if if works for you, give it a shot. I also think, as much as I love this community, you should be careful about asking for everyone's opinions, because people are definitely going to disagree with you, but that doesn't mean you're wrong. This is a personal battle and everyone needs to handle it differently, so don't make any apologizes for choosing your own path. I hope it all works out for you.

 

Dear @TakingTheSteps thanks a lot for your feedback!
I asked for everyones opinion no matter to what extend they'd agree/disagree simply because I've made that decision already to try it out but I am still open to change the procedure in case it does not feel all well.
And to try new things and change them in case something could work better is what I do and what I will do for sure.

You have a valid point when it comes to fantasizing while MOing - actually I have had a very similar experience with MO. No fantasies, no P/Psubs, and I felt no guilt after it. That's why I want to write down how I feel after.
(It also seems to be important how I feel directly before)
The bad thing is, however, that I usually just manage to drive in that mode the first time I MO after a streak, and then the chance of binging is rather high which does not work without fantasies and craves for maximizing pleasure. This is addictive behaviour IMO.

 

Yeah, absolutely, I concur! And yes, I think your feelings and intentions directly before are important as well. Whether it's a physical thing or something related to triggers or specific people or whatever. All of that could make a difference in whether or not it feels "wrong."

I commend you for searching to find what is right for you and sticking to that even if it's not a popular decision. More people need to have the confidence and resolve to do that, I think.

 

Thanks for your various comments, @TakingTheSteps @nightm4re and @Chef Boy !

I see MO as my main issue, not P. P is merely a multiplier in my case without which I feel most of time comfortable. Cold turkey is very exhausting for me and although I made great steps during my long streaks it eventually leads me into exhaustion -> repression -> relapse -> binge.
I seek for equilibrium instead of relying on super powers due to withheld semen, in order to keep reserves to tackle some other issues of mine.
Well, as often, this is a test and there's always room for change and improvement.

All the best to the community

 

Believe me that's exactly what I was telling myself when the idea first came up in my mind.

Not sure if the effect will be that MOing is not pleasurable any longer as soon as it gets scheduled. This computer thing however sounds like a cool device. What exactly was it that he was using there?

BTW, there's another story my shrink told me: He once had a patient who would be obsessed by taking showers.
He would get late to basically any appointment and screw his whole daily life because he felt forced to take 2-3 times a day showers for at least 2-3 hours. It was not just causing a tremendous monthly bill - it was unhealthy for the skin and made him socially suffer a lot from the side effects that he didn't have much time left.
Nothing seemed to help - the patient wasn't able to reduce the time he spent in the shower.
Hence the shrink advised him to do the opposite: force himself to stay even longer in the shower. So he set a timer to take 4hrs showers, and suddenly he started to suffer and dislike it to such extent that he was not able to go on.
After four weeks the patient had developed a normal shower pattern.

I loled when I first heard this story but its logic appeals to me somehow!

 

Update 2016/02/25

I do not know what is on my mind lately...scheduled MOs???....MUAAAHAHAAHA!
As the scheduled event approaches my doubts about my idea started growing rapidly.
When I explained my plan in detail I received quite some feed back from you and it seems others are interested in testing other approaches as well...

So here's what I've experienced ever since I posted that thread:

• looking fwd to the MO event, therefore imaginary MO-ing, mostly using no or very abstract fantasies - never having a particular girl/woman in mind
  
• rapid increase in sexual urges, especially around sleeping time
• the impression of delaying/repressing by telling myself "just wait it is just two days left...one day left..." and so on
• a mental focus on the whole MO thing - I got reminded of it like 100x a day whereas there are good days during my streaks I do not waste a single thought on it

So, needless to say, this seriously taught me to doubt the usefulness of my whole idea.
As of now, I can't even say whether or whether not to stick to the original plan. I will have to decide at 11pm.

There's however another crazy discovery:

I found a sense of GUILT and SHAME doing something bad already even without MOing just by following this idea of mine! Which lets me seriously DOUBT also the ADEQUACY of my feelings / emotions.

I mean, hey, gimme a break! SERIOUSLY WTF? If I tell this to ordinary people they'd think I am totally nuts:
Feeling like shit for planning to MO once, fantasizing a bit, and EVEN BEFORE actually MOing.... ???
Well, I'm just glad that you people of the NOFAP community will probably understand this!

I'm reading the blue AA book - if you do not know it and you're interested in the 12 steps: go buy it, it's impressive!

Thanks your reading, thanks for responding, thanks for sharing using NOFAP!

 

Hi @Veritech and others, do you happen to know if there's an android app for that which can be used for MO, too?
I guess it would be way better if I had e.g. the scheduled MO appointed to a certain day but wouldn't be able to know in advance. Something like random for instance (in between 3 and 15 days).
Maybe then the fantasizing part could be eliminated....

 

I really commend you for this post, man! It takes a lot of courage to say "perhaps I was wrong," but there should be no shame in that. We're all wrong, all the time.

I'm glad to hear how much you're learning about yourself, though, even through this idea that you might not end up sticking with. Even if it ends up being a terrible idea, you learned a lot, so it was worth it!

 

Thanks @TakingTheSteps , and all others who contribute here,

I've passed on my scheduled MO. I got an unexpected visitor and we spent a good time having a really good talk about men things (women, relationships, PMO) so it was well worth the while.
I have not the slightest urges and feel great so I guess if at all that would be even a good condition to experience scheduled MO. But now I am too tired and I'll reschedule my MO for Sunday 6pm. Looking fwd to observe the further process...

 

Sure, I got that. Yet I still define my procedure otherwise. Actually I even told my pal that I had an MO scheduled but decided I would rather spend time with him.
Old behaviour would be to do it now.
New behaviour is I had to reschedule it.
I'm already curious on the next three days.
If I will be experiencing them similar than the last three days I'd rename this "mini-rebooting; the ultra hard mode"

 

Can anyone imagine doing that for MO? E.g. at work during a meeting: "Excuse me I'm off for five minutes to wank it!"
LOL...
I'd seriously cudos that dude who can claim to have done so!
In case of smoking I believe it'd be even socially acceptable (sort of).

 

Sure, and I am not saying that the approach cannot work in our cases. In fact if I had an appropriate mobile app to assist me with it - which probably exists - I might give it a try when I find the scheduled MO thing is misleading.

I admit that there's another motivation behind what I'm trying out:

I do not want to "teach" myself that MOing is necessarily something negative in my life.
Which I do in case I experience binges and fantasizing while MOing and consequently feel shame and bad consciousness (or even use P)

The fundamental question is whether I consider MO as something intrinsically flawed and bad for myself or if it is the attitude towards it.

You could compare it to two different people who decide to stop drinking coffee - where the other reduces his consumption from 3-6 cups/day to 3-4/week and the other one stops completely.
I am yet undecided for myself.
My goal is basically to feel okay with whatever road I take.

 

Scheduled MO Report

Okay, so I stuck to my scheduled MO date this time:

Right before I felt like I was in a inner unrest and a great urge to finally MO.
I did not want to undergo this experiment in this "preset" and did some things in preparation:

• shower hot/cold
• shaving, cleaning, oiling - wanted to look nice
• observe myself in the mirror saying some of my positive doctrines
• listened to my favourite meditation

Then I MOed without fantasizing/P.

How did I feel before?

• I deliberately felt well: energized, without tension, physically and psychically

How did I feel after?

• No regrets, as I deliberately had planned for MOing
  
• There was disappointment that it went so unspectacular and quickly
• There was the thought that "now that probably wasn't enough and I'd just need another round!"
• I still felt as well as before but with these thoughts in my mind

Conclusion:
It seems as if the most positive I experienced wasn't the MO but these other things I did to its preparation.
Furthermore, the MOing started to activate some tiny brain-nagging program which would kick me in binge mode easily.

The urge was not here immediately, but, as a matter of fact, maybe half an hour after while I am writing this post.
Instead of paying attention I'm scheduling the next date.
Then, I will go out for a coffee and a walk - later I've got the opportunity to go dancing.
Let's see what else comes up. It seems to be fairly important to have some plan on what to do AFTER

NB: This was THE FIRST TIME EVER I could pull myself together to post IMMEDIATELY on NOFAP after MOing - so it was worth the while already for that I'd say!