Its one of the most exhilarating and pleasurable experiences we can have as human beings. I’m sure there is a mental equivalent with drugs, but orgasm comes without any side effects a precisely for that reason, there is nothing that competes with it.
I always laugh when I hear people who are anti-drug or anti-alcohol, preach against these things, yet they are addicted to releasing a chemical cocktail in their brains several times a day.

When you have access to something that feels so good, that satisfies you on such a deep level, there is a tendency to go back to it over and over again. The problem is, you are not considering the consequences of your decision to chase orgasms over and over again. Many times, men who struggle with porn addiction problems and sex addiction tell themselves that they are going to masturbate, but they are not going to orgasm…but what happens when you get to the critical decision making point? Well, you choose orgasm, because you want it NOW.

There have been several studies done which show that children who don’t have much self-control frequently grow up to lead less successful lives as adults. However, you CAN control your immediate gratification. You can learn how to put off short-term gratification, for long-term benefits. The short-term benefit is almost always smaller than the long-term benefit. This immediate gratification habit from orgasm also extends into other areas of your life such at your eating habits, your financial habits, your sleeping habits, your internet browsing and entertainment habits and much more. It’s a very powerful thing.
So what are some of the long-term benefits of not having an orgasm right now:
You are able to work on other areas of your life such as developing intimate relationships. An addiction to orgasms before you have developed intimate sexual relationships not only puts that relationship at risk but makes it less likely that you will even enter one. For those of you having casual sex, an immediate gratification problem with orgasms can lead to you making bad decisions, expose you STDs, as well as emotionally unstable individuals whom you should not be having sex with.

You’ll spend less money and time chasing orgasms. Less money on cam sites, less money on escorts and less time on porn. From personal experience, I can tell you that the amount of time that was freed up from watching porn was has allowed me to accomplish so much more in my life.

You’ll also avoid drama with your friends family and you’ll avoid breaking the law. All of this creates incredible amounts of stress- the secrets, the risky behavior, the guilt, and the fear of being found out.
This is not just for an orgasm. This is done all the time. People hold back on eating out, buying clothes, gadgets and entertainment in order to save money to buy a home. Others avoid eating sugar and carbs in order to lose weight. To put myself through college, I drove a junky 1990 ford Taurus and sold books door to every summer with no weekends off for many years.It took me a long time to graduate, but I didn’t want to graduate with debt.

So how do we fix instant gratification?

There is only step to this.
Separate the emotional part of the orgasm process from the rational.
I’m going to give you an exercise that will help you to do this, but before that, let me give you an example from my life.
When I was in college, I had the choice to take out a student and pay for summer classes, or take the summer off like many college students and enjoy myself. Everyone else was doing the same thing. Instead of focusing on all the fun I could have in the summer, I instead chose to focus on what my life would be like in the Fall and after I graduated. I wanted real-world experience through an internship or a job, and I didn’t want to be broke as a college student. That intense focus on the things I wanted in the long term caused me to put off having fun till later. As a result, all through college years getting multiple degrees, I never had Spring Break, a summer break or a fall break. I was either doing an internship, selling door to door or building a business. If I only focused on the pleasurable things- video games, going on trips, getting high and drunk, I would have given in to it.
Don’t get me wrong, the temptation was there, and I wasn’t perfect, but I learned through that process that you can become adapted to seeking long-term gratification as opposed to short-term pleasure.

Here’s the Exercise:
Write out your immediate sexual gratification problem with orgasm:
It could be:
The need to watch porn and masturbate immediately
The need to have an orgasm through sex, so you call or visit an escort. There are also men who need the gratification so much that they will seek orgasm with another man or a transgender individual when they cannot find a woman…and those who identify as straight men, but they have become opportunistic with orgasms.
It could be the need to get on a cam site and watch someone live in order to orgasm.
It could be cruising, driving around, spending time on dating apps or going to a club to pick someone up to have sex with immediately
Whatever your instant gratification problem is, write it out.

Then write out the Pleasurable Emotional aspects of it and the Rational Aspects of it.

For example, you may have the desire to pay for sex with a prostitute. The emotional aspects could be the physical feeling of penetrating another human being, it could be certain sounds, maybe you get high when to do it and that increases how pleasurable the experience is. All those are emotional and may even cause physical reactions when you write them down.

On the other side of the page, write out the rational aspects. One could be that you would be spending money that was budgeted for something else- like paying your rent. And because of that, you would be short on your rent by the end of the month and have to go through the embarrassment of borrowing money as a grown ass man from your parents in order to pay rent. Another could be that you run the risk of contracting an STD from having sex with a prostitute. You could also consider the fact that this time its a police sting or you’re in a shady situation paying for sex and get robbed.

The more you practice this, the better you’ll get at it. Now, this exercise is not meant to be done when you feel an urge- if you can do it then, that great too, but its to be done now, right after watching this and perhaps every morning and evening. Instead of using your willpower, you simply use your minds ability to think about thinking. That’s what separates you from every other creature on earth. You can think about thinking. And you have that ability precisely to improve your condition as a human being.
Use it.

The post How To Fix Immediate Gratification 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.