Congrats on 40 days! Currently going through stressful life events too and can confirm....using PMO to deal with stress is a total disaster. I'm hoping that I can use this as a watershed moment to obtain my goals related to PMO. I never want to feel this shitty again.
Checking in. I've had a good day so far. I've beefed up the porn blocking on my devices, and knowing that I would be checking in here made a big difference.
You're doing amazing @magvor, it's working so just keep at it, Not long to go until you reach that number and once you get there chuck another 90days on top! That's my plan.
So have noticed any results yet?I mean whatever, even in your perspective or your thoughts about porn addiction?
Hello all, After reading what @Juxtaposition wrote about dopamine, I've noticed over the last two days a certain let's say light "euphoric" feeling come over me. This is dopamine I believe but on a different level, it reminds me of a feeling I used to feel as a child before I knew about masturbation, a feeling of excitement, It's hard to explain the feeling though it's unlike a dopamine rush effect like you have with porn, it's like a light feel good feeling that only lasts for a few seconds. I love it and haven't felt it in years. Just wanted to add that, maybe others have experienced it? Cheers all
Yes! When I got to a 70 day streak during my early nofap days I had the same feeling. It also reminded me of how and who I was as a child. It's such a more natural feeling of happiness.
Checking in. Yesterday was great. I had a reset today. The fast version: I had a Zoom meeting with some people I work with last night, and they were, uh...saying some awful stuff among themselves. My wife overheard them and said "Why are you associated with people like this? People will see them using your work and think you're like them." I had been thinking the same thing. Walking away from that job wouldn't kill our finances by any means, but it would make things tighter, and it would mean leaving some things that are in-process unfinished, which I hate. I spent the night not sleeping and trying decide what to do, and, this morning, I was sleepy/depressed/stressed and...reset. I'm not proud of this, but the only direction to go is forward.
Sorry to hear it daryl_zero. But don't *just* go forward--you've just become more aware of three major triggers for you: tiredness, stress, and a depressive situation. Use this reset as a chance to update your strategies so next time this trifecta smacks you, you have a plan ready to implement.
I gave and i am still giving a fight against relapsing.I was so much ready for it, seeing it as a resort to get some pleasure.Suddenly everything else was looking so boring to do. But with a lot of meditation i had analyse that feeling,i was aware of that and i knew i just needed to recognise it and find a solution so i meditated with a youtube video and i feel a little more comfortable right now.I need this win and i hope i will resist tonight.
I am experiencing it the last year and a half.I think it happened after i decided to start playing video games more regurarly.I loved video games since i was very young, it is the reason i decided to study computer sciences.I stoped playing them for years though, except playing a few days every week for one hour or so exactly the same game while drinking my coffee (routine), i had very few gameplay hours. So after a while i started feeling exactly what you described.Something like nostalgia about my younger, child and teen me and progressively it became a nostalgia for myself until before addiction. Until 6-7 years back when everything turned upside-down for various reasons.But most of the time i was focused in my childhood and my early teens, with that innosense and the feeling of fulfillment with everything i was doing, the dreams i had,the dreams i was making and the people who were in my life that are not here now. I think that's what i was looking for,i was missing those feelings and somehow i was admiring my before-addiction me. It helped me realise many things and gave me more willingness but i think it also became a trap.I started playing the video games i used to play back in the 90's and reading some magazines i kept from that area.Sometimes i am having flashbacks from that age,remembering me in the car with my father, looking out of the window and thinking about how beatiful my life is going to be and dreaming about my future.I swear i can feel it, it's so fucking strange.And It's very nice but i think i was in the wrong direction all this time, those days were very good but they are never coming back. I noticed that and then i changed my direction of thoughts trying to imagine the future instead thinking about the past all the time but i guess i had to go through that experience first. This is happening to me the last months and i would pay a lot of money to start having some flashes from the future too. So from your description i guess you have those flashbacks too, we are just experiencing them in different ways.
Dude what you've written is very deep and I loved every second of it, I can relate to it, I look at my life and I never once thought it would turn out like this, I've experienced a lot of good and bad stuff in my 40 years like we all have, just never thought it would be like this unfortunatly. We've been a long similar paths i.e video games dating back to 80s Zx Spectrum, Commodore 64,Mega Drive, PlayStation then to PC. I loved my childhood, I loved everything about the 80s, the music, movies but best of all I was young and had some great friends, I would do anything to relive that time even for just a day. I remember fireworks night, 5th November we celebrate Guy Fawkes here in UK, I remember experiencing the feeling of coming home from primary school aged 7 or 8 and having this sense of super excitement like picturing how the night would unfold before it's happened and how cool it is going to be. It's a very strange feeling and for me it doesn't last long enough, lasts only 10 seconds but sometimes I can catch the feeling and prolong it for an extra few seconds more and then it's gone. Just something so cool that I haven't had for very long time. Just goes to show, porn ruins everything good. Thanks for taking time to read my post very long and boring but I appreciate it all the same.
80's and 90's....Those were the days!!! I enjoyed your comment a lot for various reasons it wasn't boring at all and most importantly it makes me feel much better because i was very sceptical about those experiences, so knowing someone else from a small group of 20 people with similar background having these too is giving me the confidence to say that i am still sane. Aside from that it was an oportunity for me to talk about this as well. My flashbacks last only for 1-2 seconds, maybe a little more if i am lucky and everytime i try to focus on them so i can prolong them i am loosing them completelly.I think meditation could help a lot on that. I gave a lot of thought on those experiences and i tried to combine everything i know from psychology while doing that.I like studying psychology as a hobby but i am not even close to be a professional just to make myself clear. I think it's happening because simply we are not happy with our lifes at the moment and our brain is trying to protect as by looking for a shelter.Maybe a psychologist would laugh with that explanation, i don't know but i think the truth is very close to that. The only problem in my case was that i thought the solution of my problems was there until very recently.Nevertheless I think it's nice to have those feelings while experiencing again these moments and we can use them as motivation just by knowing that once we were better than what we are now.We have to be careful though, if the past was that good compared to the present it can trap us and we can't live at the past that's for sure.Eventually it will start to be counter productive. In psychology constantly thinking about the past is called either introspective or rumination.In just a few words from what i know, in introspective you take lessons from the past to make a better future or at least try to do so, in rumination it's more like a sense of regret.Maybe if there is an expert here he can tell us.I think we both are in the first category but still we have to be carefull you can very easy transent from one situation to another. But those flashbacks are so tempting, aren't they? I would like to listen to your thoughts as well.Do you think this is helping you?Is it just nostalgia or motivation as well?Whatever your thoughts are i am interested to read them. This one is an interesting , reader friendly article about those situations in case you need to grab some quick information but i am sure you can find a lot of material with some googling. http://timhillpsychotherapy.com/thi...ntation,known as rumination and introspection.
