Is Erotic Literature porn?

Hi Jay, porn is not just porn. Porn is any button we push to release dopamine. This is a repost:

Porn is seeing porn, it is watching it, it is thinking about it, it is imagining it, it is remembering it, it is thinking about it while MOing even if you are not actually watching it, it is PMOing, it is fantasizing, it is edging while watching or thinking about it, it is having actual sex while thinking of porn, it is porn substitutes, any hypersexualized imagery or thought of that. Porn can be strictly in the brain, or it can be in hard copy, it can be on computers, televisions, and on smart phones, as in apps. Porn is phone sex. Porn is engaging any thought of unreal sex. Porn is chat rooms. Porn is sex toys. For one guy in this forum, porn is a cock ring. Porn does not have to be visual, it can be strictly audio. Porn can be literature about sex. Porn does not have to be on porn sites, it can be found on Facebook, Craigslist, Youtube, etc. It can be found on commercial retail sites; Sears, Target, Walmart. For me, when I first started quitting, I told myself I was making progress because I moved from very hardcore stuff to Google images, where I searched vanilla nudes. Bikini pics trigger me. Lingerie models trigger me. Hooters girls trigger me. Just girls on the street trigger me if I let them, but I don't. I consciously have decided not to let hypersexualized images linger in my head. Before, I was not making progress, I was still feeding my dopamine fix. You have to avoid your triggers, not flirt with them. Let me say this again--you have to avoid your triggers, not flirt with them. Your triggers are not going to be merely the hardcore stuff you are trying to quit watching, they will be much softer stuff than can pop out on you from benign sites like Yahoo, Craigslist, Google. You have know that in advance and plan on avoiding them. You have to get your dopamine levels back down. That will take time (could be 30 days) and requires a total absence of porn in your head. If you are walking down the street in the middle of the day thinking about porn, you are using porn, so find something else to pop in your head if that situation occurs.

For addicts, especially when we first quit, and we have not brought our dopamine levels back down, our brains look for any trigger it can find, even things society does not define as porn.

Hope this helps.

Good luck on your journey.

 

I used to read online erotica to get off. The stuff I read was absolutely meant to arouse and it certainly did. In fact, the most disturbing sexual stuff I've ever seen or read was in those stories. It probably contributed more than anything else to the "downward spiral" of redefining sex in my head. So, that stuff I would consider porn.

As for what you were reading, I don't know what it was and I don't really want to know, but if it has no other qualities besides being arousing, then you might want to consider it porn. Is it thought provoking, intellectual, emotional, dramatic, funny? Does it have any of those positive qualities?

Afterthought: If it leads you to masturbate, its just as bad as porn and you should stop using it.

 

Dude...reading erotic literature is not porn. Don't fall into extremes. Imagining you're having sex with someone is not porn either. You can't completely wall yourself off from anything that may or may not pump some dopamine in you.

 

Trust me, it is porn and it is just as destructive and addictive as videos. I used to heavily binge on stories, sometimes spending up to 3-4 hours looking for new stories and fapping. Always looking for the 'perfect' story that of course did not exist. Getting into weirder and more extreme stories everyday. I think it is worse than real porn in a way because it is even more detached from reality. At least video porn involves actual people, even though it's staged.

 

Fact number 1 - Porn is bad because it makes you want to M.
Fact number 2 - Erotic literature has made you M.
So, obviously you need to avoid erotic literature, whether it is porn or not.
Why would you go near anything that will make you M if that's the addiction you want to overcome?

 

Damn. I am doing 90 days PMO and after nearly successful 30 days I started reading erotic stories thinking that this is not porn and atleast I can take pleasure from this. Now you took this off from me as well (Just kidding. Thanks for letting me know )

 

As others have said, it's no bueno. I see fantasy as bad during my reboot, and erotica is detailed fantasy/fantasy written by someone else. Cheers, and good luck from here on out!

 

Sex stories, and Google images of girls have ended my streak at 12 days. Time to start again. My brain is literally addicted and it justifies looking at sexy Facebook pictures and reading stories as something other than porn. I'm cutting this stuff out now too! It's hurting my reboot

 

Yes, erotic literature is porn. I agree that porn is not just visual stimulation/titillation. Fantasy (my weakness) is the equivalent of porn. I saw one encouraging slogan on this website somewhere that said something like- "Success is when, after you've fallen down for the seventh time, you get back up for the eighth time." I encourage you to honestly examine your motives regarding the sexy stories, and forgive yourself, get back up and resume your race to freedom.

 

Yes it is textual porn and it will lead to masturbation. Just stop reading it, it will only lead to sexual stimulation. Nobody reads a erotic story for fun or education .

 

Yes and it's worse than porn videos because they take a waaaaay longer time to finish.

 

DAMN IT. LOST THE PLAY

After finishing nearly 30 days without PMO, I thought controlling P is very easy. And I thought I conquered the game already. Then came this erotic P. It screwed me. Started reading everyday since a week (thinking that I am under control). Couldn't leave it off because its of no harm (atleast I thought so). And, today here I am again reset to 0. Now have to start all over again

And the worst thing is - initial days are again tough (now that I have nothing much to lose). But no, more than my day counters, I shall also record number of failures in an year. May be to decrease that counter, let me not fail again...

Personal Advice to everyone: Erotic Literature is as dangerous as Normal P if not more. Stay away from it or get screwed just like me.

 

Did you MO to it too or just edge hard?

 

MO

 

Then unfortunately I would consider it as porn. On YBOP, they say it's not so much porn alone is the issue, it's any artificial stimuli. So even though I've been going hardmode on no pmo, I started monk mode and going no artificial stimuli mo. Hopefully this will weed out any temptation, and thoughts.

 

So what's the conclusion?
Reading erotic literature is harmful or not.

I think as long as you don't M, it's OK. Currently, Im reading about female anatomy and sexualty so I'm curious. Hope it's not a relapse

 

Yes, erotic stories are a form of pornography as it's defined on Wikipedia.

However, what's really amazing is how people here aimlessly demonize all forms of eroticism in their life. They got so desperate on their quest to quit their porn addiction that it leads to stigmatizing all forms of sexuality, sometimes even real normal sex, which ultimately deep down takes on a form of self-hatred. Because they hate the part within themselves that seeks out eroticism because it got them into so much trouble in the past. But when you get to this point...:

... let me tell you you lost the plot! You didn't come on this website to find out how to rob yourself from all forms of eroticism, you came because you found that you spend way too much time watching one video after the other beating your meat and you couldn't quit. As you find out how hard it is to quit you start buying into the extremists around here. Try to avoid extreme viewpoints. Stay focused on what actually bothered you when you started and solve that. There's a price to pay for blindly distancing yourself from all forms of sexual indulgence. You ain't gonna live forever and you have no guarantee that your pursuit of living like a monk in a monastery will give you the type of life you're actually looking for.

Like this:

or this

assumes that masturbation is an issue. Well maybe it is for them. Maybe it is for you too, but are you sure? Are you sure you can't have a healthy normal relationship and masturbate every now and then or are you just trying to get rid of your porn addiction as hard as you can and you believe peoples views here without question?

Generally the problem is that we users come here with very unique and personal problems yet when we talk about them we generalize too much, we project our own issues on to others and recommend the same remedies as if it's a universal truth.

 

Anything that arouses you and is it not real is considered imo porn.