Dealing with an out of control behavior with porn, sex or masturbation can be tough and it definitely affects your life in negative ways.

I know many men who follow Porn Addiction Recovery Reboot have been trying to quit for a long time- there are moments when you are doing very well and times when you’re just deep in it binging, feeling shame, guilt, and loss of control.

But this does not mean that your life should fall apart. In fact, the main reason I do this is to help men realize their dreams and potential. And I don’t mean potential in some sort of bullshit motivational way. I mean- you have goals- there are things you want in life- in your career, your finances, your relationships, your health and much more. You are only here because pornography is holding you back.

When I quit porn over a decade ago, I literally entered a new reality.I took advantage of it to create the life that I wanted and I am determined in my small way to help you get there.

Pornography robs us of productivity and if you are an ambitious man, today I’m going to share with you 10 steps to increase your productivity while struggling with quitting porn.

While I struggled with porn and masturbation, I was still able to maintain very high levels of productivity in TWO careers simultaneously. This is how I accomplished that.

Step 1: Look in the mirror

Realize that as a man and as a man struggling a with a porn, sex or masturbation problem, while there may be people who support you, you are the only one who can change your life. No rehab, no counselor, no coach, no guru can impact your life the way you can. When men get on the phone with me- I always say- I just want to help you become an expert at yourself. You control your time. You may not be able to control your sexual urges as much you’d like to- YET, but the remaining hours of the day are very much in your hands-even if you feel fatigued and demotivated after hours of watching porn. Nothing is physically stopping you from doing the work.
So look in the mirror and tell yourself. “No one is coming to save me. I must save myself.” I take responsibility for my life. This one of the most empowering things you can do for yourself.

Step 2: Keep track of your time

One of the biggest time wasters for men is social media. Personally, I believe that if you are not running a business or your career does not involve social media, you really don’t need to be on it . Especially when you are recovering from porn addiction. Spend a day recording how you spend your time. Find out how much time you spend on checking email, commenting, participating, sharing, being entertained on social media. Once you find out that you’re spending hours on tasks which are not related to your number 1 goal, move them to the least important part of your day

Step 3: Fix your inbox

Many of us have a habit of making our email inbox a to-do list. You had your plans for the day, but the moment you logged into your email, suddenly random people are dictating your day. So here are some things you can do to avoid this situation.
1) Don’t check your email first thing in the morning. I don’t remember where this quote is from, but it says “The fastest way to time travel to 2 pm is to check inbox first thing in the morning”

2) Turn off all alerts on your computer. No facebook alerts, no nothing.

3) Put your phone in silent mode when working. Personally, my phone is on silent and in another room when I am writing or mentoring a client or running group sessions . Now, I do have long term clients who sign up 24 hour accountability. I never take more than 3 of these a year, so I let them know that for a certain block of time I will be unavailable.

4) The next thing is unsubscribe from anyone or anything in your inbox that you are not actively using. Be very aggressive with this .Everyday there people trying to sell you something- a product, a service or an idea. You only have so much energy to devote to these people. Not to be a hypocrite-myself included. If you are not opening every email from this person. If you are not excited to see their name in your inbox because they bring value to your life- unsubscribe. This includes me. Many of you know that I start off many of my emails with a big unsubscribe statement. Only deal with people who are engaged and invested in you.

Step 4: Create Gates

In your professional life, set up walls, gates or boundaries for certain projects. I break my years year down into 4 periods of 90 days. I have set goals for every 90 days. If during that period someone reaches out to me to collaborate on something, or speak at an event, or coach them. My staff will review the request and if its accepted- we will let them know that we will check back with them in 90 Days. If the offer expires within that time, thats o.k. The point is, I am protecting my number one goal and priority during any given 90 Day period. No distractions.I suggest you do the same. You may only have three or four major things to accomplish this year, but if you create boundaries around these periods of times, you will achive A LOT by the end of the year.

Step 5: Say “No”

Learn how to say no to people. Learn how to say no to things that take away from your time.

For instance, everyday when I open my inbox , there will be dozens and dozens of emails from men and women asking for help or feedback tor guidance with a porn, sex or masturbation related issue. Now, when someone has the courage to reach out for help with an issue like this, it usually mean that they have hit rock bottom and nothing is working. However, 9 of 10 times, the answer to their specific question is in a video or is in one of my free courses. So I send them to that resource. Sometimes, people don’t want that resource-they want someone to give them the solution or the answer-sometimes they want me to speak to me or email back and forth about the subject. If that’s the case, they are redirected to an application page to fill out an application and set up an appointment to speak to me based on my availability. Unfortunately, some people don’t want to go through any of that and demand an answer right away. At that point I say NO.

And you have to learn how to say no as well. Whether its to friends and family that want to hang out during your productive hours or people involved in your career who are asking for more than you can give. My natural instinct is to help everyone and I used to try to do that, but I realized that I had the most impact on helping people quit their porn and masturbation problems when I focused on a small group of committed people.

Step 6: Block Your Time

I believe it was Grant Cardone who said- “You wanna meet the devil? Show me white space on your calendar and I’ll show you the devil”. Block off times on your calendar for when you are most efficient. Some people are more productive in the day, and some are more productive in the evening. You know yourself. During that time or during those days put aside for important work, don’t schedule anything with anyone else. For almost a decade while I was running a training company- my parents, my family, AND my friends knew that I only took calls from them on Sundays unless it was a serious health or a life or death emergency. The rest of the time was spent on my work. If you have a family, or if you are in a relationship, I highly recommend blocking off time to spend with them. Don’t let anything come in the way of either time spent with your loved ones or your friends or with work.

Step 7: Focus

Do one thing at a time. Multitasking does not work. Some of you are reading a book, responding to a text thread, checking if a girl messaged you back on a dating app and looking at the number of likes you received on your last Instagram post. Each time you take your attention away from your ONE focus, it takes more energy to refocus. Eventually, you find yourself unable to complete the task or exhausted. So pick one thing, give yourself a time limit like 45 minutes or an hour and just go at it, till your timer goes off. Then set another timer to focus on other non-work related activities like responding to texts from friends or family. You’ll be amazed at how much you can accomplish.

Step 8: Take Care of Your Body

To keep it simple, how much you rest, what you eat how you exercise affects your productivity greatly. In terms of sleep-honestly, I’m hardly a role model because I’m used to 4-5 hours of sleep and have trained myself to do thrive on these hours over many years.. However, ideally during recovery while you are trying to quit porn and be productive, 7-9 hours is great. When you recover, feel free to cut down on your sleep hours if you desire. The earlier you go to bed the better. When you go to bed early, you’ll wake up earlier and that gives you time to start your day right. There is a huge difference between going to bed at 1 am and waking up at 9:00 am and going to bed at 10 pm and waking up at 5;30-6am. In the former, the morning is almost over -its difficult to generate a sense of accomplishment when you wake up that late. On the other hand, when you wake up at 6, you can get more done before 9 am than most people will in an entire day- I know I do. And that gives you momentum to have a great day.
What you eat is fuel for your body. I advocate eating as clean as possible because it allows your body to function like a clean, efficient machine. If you eat fast food or a lot of processed food, its going to slow you down not just physically, but it will slow down your thinking as well.
In terms of diet, find out what works for you. Personally, I fast and skip breakfast. My most productive time is in the morning and I find that when I eat first thing in the morning, I get slightly drowsy because a lot of the blood which should be going to my brain instead goes to my digestive system to digest my breakfast. I also workout in the morning and doing so on an empty stomach helps me burn fat and get my body ready for the day.
The important thing to remember is that getting adequate rest, eating clean and exercising daily is crucial to productivity during your recovery.

Step 9: Purge

Clear your life of everything which is unnecessary. The barometer to measure whether something should be in your life or not is whether you love it and if it brings you happiness. This applies to your office, your work and to your relationships. Once a year, I go through my offices and I get rid of everything I have not used for the past year. Random notes, ideas which I will never act on-even my books. Now I have a huge library, and if you are an ambitious growth-minded professional, you probably do as well. And it can be very hard to let go of some books.

Part of purging for books is going through your library and getting rid of books which you have never read and are older than 6 months. This includes those language books you bought when you thought you were going to learn a certain language, self improvement books which you are sure you will read “someday” , books which you bought on a whim and books which you only read once and never again referred to. Ask yourself- does the thought of this book or the knowledge I will gain from reading it bring me happiness? If it doesn’t, let the book go. It’s amazing, but when you reduce clutter, you create so much peace of mind. Its one of those things which you have to actually do to truly experience that sort of peace of mind and clarity.

The same goes for relationships. I have some of my clients at a point in their recovery, go through their phones and delete all contacts that they have nothing to do with anymore. Some professionals have thousands of contacts. Whether it’s for coworkers or employees from a past career, women whose numbers you got 10 years ago, random people you met while traveling, business contacts who are no longer working with you, acquaintances from college- delete their numbers if they are no longer relevant to your productivity and happiness.Keep the relevant ones.

When it comes to people in your life, the same concept applies. Are there people who are who are taking away from your schedule? If there are people in your life who are not contributing towards your growth or happiness, let them go as well. Now this sounds harsh, but remember- this is for recovering porn addicts who want to be productive. You are already struggling with quitting pornography-which is costing you a lot of time and energy. People who are in your life simply to hangout, party, entertain you, or get something for you are a waste of your precious energy. Remove them from your life and become very selective about who you bring into your life. Make sure its people who increase your happiness, are growth minded, people who are positive, people who have their own goals. Just because someone is exciting or entertaining or beautiful or “cool” does not necessarily mean that they are a positive contribution to your life.

Step 10: Positive Routines

Routines are so important to your productivity because they save you time and energy. When you have a routine, you don’t need to think. You brain is on autopilot and frees up energy for other things.
There are many things in your life which you can “automate” or make routine. For instance- your mornings. Prepare for the morning the evening before. This means, have the clothes which you are going to wear the next day laid out. Some very productive people have their meals prepped for the next day. So you wake up in the morning and you don’t need to think-you roll out of bed, put on your workout clothes and go running or go to the gym, when you come back, you shower, change, have breakfast and start the day- the same way everyday.

Compare that to waking up every morning, not knowing what you are going to do. Not knowing whether you brush your teeth first or your look at your phone first, or spending 20 minutes figuring out what to wear, sitting on the fence as to whether to go to the gym that morning or in the evening. By the time the most important tasks of your day begin, you have expended so much mental and sometimes energy on simple tasks which could been routines.
Introduce positive routines into your life.

There you go! The 10 Steps to being productive while recovering from a porn addiction!

Share this article with others if you found it helpful!

The post The Productive Porn Addict appeared first on Elevated Recovery.

Porn addiction aside, the one thing that sucks the most is relapsing. In my years of living with an addiction to internet porn, I’ve made the decision to quit more times than I choose to remember.

I vividly remember the first time I relapsed after my longest streak without porn or masturbation. At that time, it was such a challenge to even go 1 week without getting on my favorite site. This time, I had managed 2 full months.

I relapsed on Day 92.

After that relapse I felt three main things:

1) Disbelief and Confusion: “How did this happen?” “I was doing so well!”.
2) Shame
3) Less confidence in myself. I basically looked at my self as someone who couldn’t be trusted to keep his word.

If you’re reading this, there’s a good chance that you can relate quite well to all three emotions.

I’d like you to do something for yourself for a moment, though…

Think back to your last relapse- specifically, the week BEFORE your relapse.

Now honestly answer these questions:

Did you have a recovery plan?

Did you have boundaries or actions to take if you were triggered?

Were you checking in with anyone regularly?

Was there someone who helped to keep you accountable?

Were you being proactive about your recovery?

Were you being aware of the places you went, media you exposed yourself to and the thoughts you had?  

Or were you a little more “relaxed” about everything?

Did you have a self-care plan?

A support network of people who understood your problem?

Were you meditating, using affirmations, exercising, eating right, managing stressful situations, getting enough sleep or taking time off to relax?

The truth is, if you relapsed, there is bound to be a “No” or a couple of No’s in response to these questions.

All those questions above are related to something called RECOVERY.

When you are in recovery, your brain will inevitably REBOOT with time and you will be free of your compulsive behavior with pornography. It’s that simple.

Simple- but not easy.

So why aren’t most guys in recovery?

Well, I realized- after years of relapsing myself, that our way of viewing recovery is pretty skewed.

See,

“Wanting to be in recovery”, is NOT recovery
“ Installing a filter”, is NOT recovery
“ 90 Days NoFap” is NOT recovery

“Changing my habits” is NOT recovery

Those questions you answered earlier? That’s recovery.

Many of us think that a “relapse” is an event. Something that “happened”.

NO.

A relapse is not ONE event!

A relapse begins when you start missing parts of your recovery.

For instance, before your relapse:

Were you aware of your triggers?

Did you feel entitled? Like- “I’ve been doing so well without porn and masturbation. It has been a hard day, I deserve a break to watch porn.”

Were you watching Youtube videos with “sexy” content- you know, those triggering thumbnails?

Did you quit doing something that was really good for you- such as working out regularly, or eating well?

Were you frustrated with a particular situation, or dealing with strong emotions-perhaps a family issue?

When you experience any of the above and don’t fix them immediately, your relapse has ALREADY BEGUN.

Again, a relapse is not an event.

It is a state of mind.

So how do tell exactly when your relapse begins if it isn’t a solitary event?

Well, here is another set of questions to help you determine if your relapse has begun.

Who did you call after you relapsed?

What was the consequence to applied to yourself due to that behavior?

Did you change anything in your environment after the relapse? For instance, if you found out that a certain site on your device wasn’t blocked by your filter, did you immediately block it?

What sort of self-care behavior did you engage in after the relapse to uplift your mind, body, and emotions?

Now if your answer to these is “ I don’t do any of those.” or you only applied one of the four suggested actions, then you are STILL RELAPSING.

By now, some of you may be realizing that you’ve been in a state of relapse for YEARS.

Write this down on a piece of paper and stick it somewhere you can see it:

Your relapse is never over till you bring someone else in.

Having an accountability partner pulls you out of the cycle of relapse and helps your process the events prior to to the relapse while taking the next steps.

As time goes on, you will be able to answer these questions on your own and within moments. Getting to this level will require bringing someone else into your life as an accountability partner.

But what if you don’t have access to an accountability partner, or you don’t know anyone who could help you with accountability?

Well, we’ve got you covered with a solution. Before I get into it, I’d like to share a quick story from a college student who took advantage of this.

Case Study:

I had a college student reach out to me, at his wits end about his repeated relapses- we’ll call him “S.P” for privacy purposes. S.P was 22 years old, had been exposed to porn at 10 years old and been using porn and masturbating daily since he was 12. However, he had educated himself on porn addiction and made some changes in his life. The biggest change he made was installing one of the best internet filters on his laptop. This had managed to keep him off porn for two months.

The main problem was his smart phone which eventually led him to slip.

S.P fully understood the need for an accountability partner and had got on a call with me to find out if I could be his accountability partner for a time. Unfortunately, at the time, I was fully booked and couldn’t keep up with any more clients in terms of accountability.

He was in a permanent state of relapse and desperately needed something to help him in the moments before and after a slip. I gave him access to what a few hundred guys who didn’t have accountability partners or a structure to their recovery had been using and received an email from him two weeks later.

Here’s an excerpt:

“It’s such a change from the person I was 14 days ago who could barely put together a sentence in front of new people to the guy now who can talk with almost anyone without thinking about it. Also,  a couple of people have been telling me I look different, I’m not sure if its the way I carry myself or something else but they said they could barely recognize me from a distance. I do feel different though. I can’t wait until day 30 to see how much more I can change. I’m not going to sit around and wait for the changes though. I’m going to live and have fun and what happens happens.”

So, what got S.P back on track?

I gave him access to our free Facebook Group. The group contains a collection of actionable step by step videos where I walk you through what do after and before a relapse or when you feel an urge.

Every video equips you with a different skill set to manage your triggers, overcome your urges and make sure that you have control over your porn and masturbation habits

 

If you don’t have control of your urges and haven’t developed the necessary skills to manage them, then this private group is the best place to begin

Get access to the Group

To recap, here are the 10 Questions to ask yourself after a relapse.

1)Were you checking in with anyone regularly? Was there someone who helped to keep you accountable?

2) Were you being proactive about your recovery? Were you being aware of the places you went, media you exposed yourself to and the thoughts you had?  Or were you a little more “relaxed” about everything?

3) Did you have a self-care plan? A support network of people who understood your problem? Were you meditating, using affirmations, exercising, eating right, managing stressful situations, getting enough sleep or taking time off to relax?

4) Did you feel entitled? Like- “I’ve been doing so well without porn and masturbation. It been a hard day, I deserve a break to watch porn.”

5) Were you watching Youtube videos with “sexy” content- you know, those triggering thumbnails?

6) Did you quit doing something that was really good for you- such as working out regularly, or eating well?

7) Were you frustrated with a particular situation, or dealing with strong emotions-perhaps a family issue?

8) Who did you call after you relapsed?

9) What was the consequence to applied to yourself due to that behavior?

10) Did you change anything in your environment after the relapse? For instance, if you found out that a certain site on your device wasn’t blocked by your filter, did you immediately block it?

And if you have a question or comment, please post below – I’m always interested in hearing from you and I love answering your questions.

The post 10 Questions To Ask Yourself After a Relapse appeared first on Elevated Recovery.