I am starting today

Welcome mundocorde, I just started 36 hours ago. We have some similarities. I grew up in a small town and went to a Lutheran church for elementary school with 9 kids in my class. My first orgasm was with my pillow visualizing a girl from my class who just started having big tits at about age 12-13. Tried SA, Buddhism also. WAS A TRAITOR to "my then current 1st wife!"

I look forward to hearing about both your struggles and you successes!

 

Someone told me once that in Buddhist meditation a person empties himself entirely- and that in Catholic meditation one empties himself, but in order that he may then be filled. (with the Holy Spirit?)

 

Hi mundocorde,

Today I am restarting for fourth time my journey to awesomeness. I am also in thirties, married and with a son (4 yr old). I feel miserable like you. Best of my past two streaks were 12 days each. But suddenly, it all changed and I PMOed for two days in a row. I am still figuring out what the hell went wrong.

So far my experience is that avoid going to comfort zone, running and doing exercise do helps. but meanwhile keep posting and watching videos of fabstronauts. We can buddies and keep track of our progress.

 

Hi mundocorde. Congrats on your awesome decision!

I just wanted to make one comment for what it's worth as you seem to be a fairly religious person. There is guilt that motivates us to change and there is guilt that the adversary uses to keep us down on ourselves and make us feel like we are worthless and unable to change. Do not get down on yourself. Christ did not buy us for a price because we cannot change, He did it so we can change.

True, we cannot change our past, but we can determine who we become.

 

Fear can be a useful motivator, but in my opinion an even greater motivator is love. Love for our wives, love for our children, love for our God. The question I ask myself when I am feeling particularly weak is "do I love PMO more than God, my wife and children?" To me that is stronger motivation than fear. I guess anything that motivates us to improve is useful though.

 

Welcome, glad to have you here, you dont need divine intervention or a mystical experiencie, because you have the power within yourself to take back control to get rid of vices and grow stronger every day, your ancestors watch over you and expect you to become better, so does your family and guess what, YOU DESERVE to be better for yourself, you admitted your problem and that is not easy as we all here know, your time is now, ITS OUR TIME the time to take back our lives.

 

Wow I can tell this is a real struggle. I invite you, on behalf of the new you who is screaming at you to let him free, to stay with us and keep up the posts. The best things you've done is started on NoFap. If you make a deep personal "vow" to stick with posting on NoFap until your death bed or freedom from the addiction (as I have done), then you almost certainly will beat this addiction.

It seems the second best thing you have done is find sacred Sexuality Project on Youtube. If you watch all of his videos, I can promise you that you will have 90% of the education you need to break the addiction. He is the best source of info there is.

By the way, Buddhist meditation is not a sin. Its completely compatible with Church teaching; it is just a method. It is Buddhist metaphysics (its view of there being No God, nothing at all, at the center of Being) that is contrary to Church teaching. At the end of the day, you need to find what works for you for gaining the mental strength to beat this addiction.

I used to think all those articles were dumb that said "Keeping a journal is one of the best keys to success!" As it turns out, for very complicated psychological reasons, they were correct.

Starting journaling on here was the best decision I ever made. Quitting would be the worst. You WILL succeed someday, more or less by definition, if you never give up and keep improving your strategy. Read lots of "hot threads," go to websites like NoFap academy, yourbrainonporn, yourbrainrebooted, reboot nation, and so on, and educate yourself. The best resource Ive ever found is Sacred Sexuality Project on Youtube, like I said. Watch that and watch success stories on the sidebar of youtube, like Black white guy in America, who gives really good advice. I dont know how much you want to quit, but once you see success stories where these guys list all the benefits, you will understand how life changing this will be. God bless you, you can do it! (BTW, NoFap is not religious at all. It just happens to be Christians who found your thread).

 

By the way, I suggest checking out my journal if you feel lost and need a game plan. I've shared lots of information I find to be helpful in the journey. I promise to post every time I get on NoFap on the journal of anyone who consistently posts on mine. Obviously I'm not an expert and still am learning, but I don believe I have figured out the very basic fundamentals better than some people who make it to, say, 200 days, but are STILL fighting urges and then relapse. To succeed, you need to start with the right pretense. Good luck.

 

The following is from a book called "Spiritual Combat Revisited" by Jonathon Robinson of the Oratory. I know it looks like a lot of text, so you may be inclined not to read it. If you absorb it and operate on it it will change the way you pray.


"We bring what we are, and what we are doing, to our prayer, and that is why we have to try and see our daily lives as a preparation for our prayer. St. John Cassian writes: “This activity of the heart is not inappropriately compared to millstones, which the swift rush of the waters turns with a violent revolving motion. As long as the water’s force keeps them spinning they are utterly incapable of stopping their work.” One way or another our minds seem to be working all the time. This activity may range anywhere from concentrated intellectual work to idle daydreaming. This has nothing to do with whether the ideas are good or bad but is merely to point out that the mind always seems to be working. Furthermore, we all know that we do not always seem to be entirely in control of what goes on in our minds. We may be trying to concentrate on writing an essay and find we are tempted to think about playing golf. We call this a distraction. What distracts us is not necessarily sinful, but it is something that gets in the way of what we’re trying to do. In this case, what we are trying to do is write the essay. St. John Cassian writes: “In the same way the mind cannot be free from agitating thoughts during the trials of the present life, since it is spinning around in the torrents of the trials that overwhelm it from all sides.”

The mind then, is always in motion, and we sense that it is only by quieting the mind that we will find that peace necessary for a closer communion with God. How are we going to find this peace of heart that will enable us to become the temples of the Holy Spirit? There seem to be two sorts of answers. One, which is an old one but seems popular today, is to try to stop the mind from working. Try, so we are advised, to empty the mind of all thoughts and images, and wait peacefully for God. Leaving aside any theological considerations, it can at least be said this effort to empty the mind and to keep it still just does not work. The mind, as Cassian says, is like the mill driven by water power, and “it cannot cease operation at all so long as it is driven round by the pressure of the water.” Trying to still the mind by our own efforts is to render ourselves less than human, not more than human. We have to use the water power for as long as we are driven by it. We have then to use our minds and to try to feed its ceaseless activity with thoughts that will lead to peace of heart and so help in our sanctification. The mill is not going to cease operation, but it is possible for the person in charge of it to decide whether he prefers wheat or barley or weeds to be ground… So, the lesson is clear. You cannot top the mind from working (any more than you can stop a river from flowing), so feed it with good material rather than bad. The mind will gradually become fixed on what it thinks about. If we think about good things, we will gradually obtain a taste for them. ..On the other hand, if we feed weeds into the mill, we must expect things to work out badly."

 

Catholic here, too. I completely understand what you're talking about when you say haven't prayed in a while. Lust is a powerful tool that Satan tries to use to separate us from God, and prayer is one of the first things to stop. That's because prayer is absolutely contrary to what lust is; in order for sin to take hold, prayer must be gone. Knowing that, never stop praying. God loves you just for persevering! Never stop fighting!

I also cannot recommend enough that you try to go to confession. It is such a great gift from God, and so incredibly helpful.

I'll be praying for you. I sure could use a few myself, if you don't mind.