I fall too often

Do you still listen to and watch a lot of secular music and movies that blaspheme the Lord's name or have any content that is opposed to the 10 commandments?

How is your prayer life? Are you making time for vocal prayer and mental prayer?

How often are you frequenting the sacraments like confession and communion? When you have time off are you making Mass your priority and scheduling your day around it?

 

I know exactly how you feel. I have struggled with this for 5 decades! Slowly, far too slowly, I recognized three causes that were always present whenever I failed in an attempt to quit. I hope these are helpful to you.
(1) I became lazy in my commitment to daily heartfelt prayer. Not prayer by route but true prayer from my heart each and every day. In my case, it helps to structure my prayers by the acronym ACTS. Adoration, Contrition, Thanks, Supplication. Rushing to supplication as the first step doesn't produce the same effect for me. (2) I relaxed my commitment to curb my eyes and thoughts immediately upon seeing an alluring image. It only takes an instant of dwelling on a temptation for it to take root in my mind. At times this can be difficult but freedom is worth any price (3) I allowed myself to feel self-pity. Whether it was work related stress or something else that didn't go the way I wanted it to, I felt sorry for myself and then I justified self comfort through PMO.

Learning to recognize these causes and to intervene has been an important aid to me. Your causes may be the same or different but time spent discerning what they are is time well spent.

 

For me, fear of going to Hell is enough to dissuade me from masturbating. I've been as close to Hell as one can get without leaving this earth. It's a horrible, horrible place and somewhere you will go unless you sincerely repent.

Here's the key to stopping:
1) Make a commitment to never watch porn again. This will deprive your mind of the oxygen the fire of lust needs to keep burning.
2) When you're ready, make a commitment to not masturbate.
3) Go to confession.
4) Receive communion. Always try and remember how good it feels to be able to receive communion.

If you slip up down the road, go back to confession.

 

FALL FORWARD! That is, learn from the experience - let it be for your ultimate good - and you will be making progress nonetheless. Sobriety can have both horizontal length and vertical depth. One can be sober a long time, yet remain unchanged in the ways of the heart. A "dry drunk" can be a most bitter, prideful thing, and not fit for the peace of God. To go deep into recovery means letting go of flaws that become apparent as we keep falling flat on our faces: impatience, selfishness, fear, doubt, anxiety, rage, and unforgiving heart.

DON'T GIVE UP! Recovery is according to God's time table, seen from the eternal perspective, not hours. To some He grants the grace to make an overnight transition. Others He let's stumble along the way, perhaps to prevent another flaw - pride - from taking over. Trust the goodness of your creator. You may think that all you are experiencing is doom and gloom, yet, as is put so beautiful in "Hound of Heaven" -- "Is my gloom, after all, Shade of His hand, outstretched caressingly?" How my life would be different if I learned this lesson!

After hating the sacraments for sometime, today I desire to go back to confession after over a year of not doing so. God is patient, He plays the long game. There is a path of sanctifying grace before you. Do not give up, and you will find it.

Pray for me! I let this addiction rob me of my identity lots of times, and remain stuck in a prideful rut. God's Mercy is so powerful, and I have often spurned it. Letting me live in this madness and experiencing its consequences is helping me turn once again towards God. Some run towards Heaven, others step slowly and reluctantly away from Hell. Whatever it takes!

Keep falling forward with God's grace, and He will never abandon you. Onward unto Heaven's Embrace!

The Saints love you and are praying for you. Some of them fell flat on their face to the end of their lives... and yet they finished the race. Just look at St. Mark Ji Tianxiang! He loves you and is praying for you. I'll be praying for you as well.

Pax!

 

This is from an article on New Advent regarding the three "stages" of the spiritual life (which are, in fact, intertwined) that I found very consoling when I couldn't figure out why, despite my best (and not so best) efforts, I appeared to be making little to no progress:

"According to the usual manner of advancement, the majority of souls are gradually raised to the state of perfect union after passing through the states of purification and illumination. But this rule is by no means absolute, and a miraculous intervention of an extraordinary grace may bring a soul suddenly from the lowest depths of moral abjection to the most sublime heights of charity, as may be seen in the case of St. Mary Magdalen and other celebrated penitent saints. On the other hand we may find saints in whom the purgative state may predominate even to the end of their lives, and God sometimes withholds the favors of the unitive way from many faithful and fervent souls who have advanced generously in the degrees of the purgative and illuminative ways, and who have all along preserved the fervour of holy charity, which is the essence and crown of perfection."

It's so easy for me to reduce the quality of my relationship with Christ down to the number of days I've been sober... Sobriety is certainly important. Yet for me the picture has to be much bigger, since sobriety without recovery is devoid of happiness, and recovery without holiness is devoid of everlasting joy.

Onward unto God!

Pax

 

Please do not compare your days of success to others, particularly mine. I pray everyone here is more successful than I have been because it took me 50 years to reach this point. Fifty years to find the means to quit this sin is nothing other than a pathetic record of one failure after another. I am no genius but I have been blessed with a reasonably good intellect. My parents loved me and gave me faith from my earliest days. Why did it take me so long to learn? I have no acceptable excuses.

You are struggling now but please consider that the only day that counts is today. Stay the course. Do not let the evil one leverage his tool of discouragement within you. The mere fact that you are striving for purity demonstrates that God has chosen you as one of His own. Let Him wrap you in His arms and give you comfort and as you feel His unconditional love, return it to Him by continuing your struggle to do His will. If you fall, get back up and don't follow my pathetic example of 50 years of sin.

 

Wow, I have just joined this Roman Catholic group (and nofap a couple days ago) and am amazed at the depth and sincerity of the conversations going on here. What a blessing this forum is. It helps me "re-sanitize" my use of the internet -- I have always used social media as an excuse to find pictures to lust over. Here is a "social medium" where true connection with others can be found.

It was also really cool to discover St. Mark Ji Tianxiang through one of these posts. I really honestly never thought a dyed-in-the-wool addict could ever become a saint. (I know about St. Augustine, but the addiction aspect of the struggle looks even more obvious and dramatic in St. Mark Ji Tianxiang!) The secret really seems to be to renew our commitment each and every day, never give up, and hope in the Lord.

 

Yes, the key is never to give up. People, especially addicted believers are impatient. I had been impatient for many years. I thought God could do some magic after one prayer or two and set me free of this addiction. But God knew better than me that if He had set me free after one prayer or two I would have been free of this addiction but I would have remained very selfish with lots of vices. The key is to be changing all life, starting from prayer but not ending at prayer but doing what God says to do, what His church says to do.... and never give up, If I had given up after 30 years of my addiction I would still be a pmo addict. Never give up. We don't know when the day of setting free comes. It depends on us when it comes, on us being ready to accept what God says through His church and us being ready to pray constantly and honestly try to do what He says to us.

 

That's a really interesting thought. I am definitely a compulsive and impatient person. Part of me wants to be free of PM just so I can boast to myself of being morally upright. If God freed me from this addiction right away, I would probably feel like I don't need God anymore. Perhaps God is letting this addiction continue so I can realize that I will always need Him. More than anything else, my addiction has been a "thorn in my side" that has always humbled me and forced me to come back to God despite myself, as I have been successful in most areas of my life except this one.
Another thought regarding St. Mark Ji Tianxiang: maybe I will suffer a "great martyrdom" act like him one day. Or maybe God is simply calling me to the more benign, but still difficult, martyrdom of enduring daily the small displeasures of resisting sexual urges. It is difficult, but sounds doable with God's grace. I can unite these small "crucifixions" to Christ's great suffering for all of us on the Cross.

 

That is a beautiful and insightful thought. I think I have always held a day dream where I would be called to be some sort of hero. Slowly, far too slowly, I realized this is another sinful and insidious temptation. My calling is to be a good husband, father and grandfather and to quietly but firmly resist each of my temptations through prayer and an ever growing love of God.

 

God said what He wants us to do when we experience temptations. Jesus said : ' Watch and PRAY so that you will not enter temptation.'
If we implement this above in our lives each time when pmo temptation comes then I think it can be named some sort of bloodless martyrdom but if we don't pay attention at these words of Jesus what to do when we are tempted or prevent temptation then we are only disobiedent to God's will - then this is not martydom but only neglecting His words. In my opinion the fact that somebody is addicted doesn't mean that they are automatically martyrs. They simply can be suffering sinners. God doesn't want us to be suffering sinners.
St. Mark Ji Tianxiang is a saint because he didn't agree to renounce Jesus and he was killed. This was his real martyrdom. He was not declared a saint because of his addicted life. God wants us to be holy and He said this many times. We should try to do all possible that church says to get rid of this addiction. We can't tolerate this sin. Only if we try to do all possible we know to get rid of this addiction and despite of it we still fall and after each fall we don't give up and start fighting again and again trying to do all possible church says then we could call it a form of martyrdom - the whole fight against pmo despite of falls. But if we sometimes neglect fighting against pmo then it's no martyrdom but being stuck in depression suffering and fall.

 

Hello, I never reached just almost a streak than this right now, and I think what was helping me the last months is to discipline myself in a hard way, I deleted many apps which seduced me to PMO, even it was "just" socialmedia like snapchat, Instagram (blocked also pornographic sites in my browser) etc... I also had to discipline myself in thoughts and behavor, for example when I thought about something sexual I stopped it instantly and start to pray- just few words like: "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me! Save me from falling again!" I think in some way you have to avoid everything that can lead u into falling again, even the smallest things: a look, a thought, a picture on social media... because in Matthew 18:9 it says: "And if your eye causes you to fall away, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hellfire."
and maybe especially in the beginning it is important to discipline (to help yourself) in a radical way... I`m young and every other person (including all my friends) uses social media (I just use whatsapp now) I see how true and important this verse Matt 18:9 was, and believe me doing these things was a hard sacrifice for me, but now I`m soo happy that I did it and I never regretted it!

Just my experience! But the most important thing is to pray! I pray for u and hope god will help u to become free from it

 

Wise words and actions! I assure you, you are on the right path. This insidious sin can only be conquered by removing all the temptations that you reasonably can. Modern life and media will still confront you even when you aren't seeking it but you must be prepared to immediately look away.

I found some helpful advice in this old but wise book. Spiritual Combat.

http://patrimoinechretien.com/Bibliothèque/Oeuvres/ScupoliSpiritualCombat2016en.pdf

CHAPTER XIX. page 63, Speaks to what you have observed, "THIS temptation must be dealt with in a way peculiar to itself, and unlike any other. ....... First, you must not war against this vice by confronting it, but, on the contrary, by fleeing with all your might from the thing or person that may have the least likelihood of exciting it"

 

If you are like me it is super hard to quit until you find your purpose. You can check out my thread, "Why does God want us to quit." Purpose leads to joy which leads to freedom.

 

The fervor of temptation will wax and wane but it will come. I pray you will formulate a battle plan including both spiritual and physical tactics to help you break free. Mr. Eko's Catholic Method (search this forum for the thread entitled with these words) is a great help to me. I hope it can be a help to you. Already, you are part of an elite group who recognizes the detriments of this sin and is taking steps to rid themselves of it but without action, a goal is no better than a ship lying in the dessert.