Overcoming Porn Addiction: An Alternate Approach
It’s no secret that many men struggle with porn addiction. This addiction carries deep shame for a lot of men and they often attempt to try and quit on their own before seeking help from a therapist or a twelve-step group such as Sex Addicts Anonymous. Recovery may be focused on maintaining a streak of abstinence, confessions when one has slipped up, or specific interventions to block access to porn (e.g. password protecting electronics, an accountability partner, etc). This approach may work for some men. For others, the success of these interventions are short-lived. My aim is to provide some insight into why these traditional approaches are ineffective and present six alternate approaches towards working with porn addiction. WHY TRADITIONAL APPROACHES ARE INEFFECTIVE IN THE LONG RUNMost of the traditional approaches for overcoming porn addiction only focus on symptom management, not the root cause for the addiction. This, unfortunately, is the standard of Western medicine and psychology. “Got anxiety and depression? No problem, we got pills for that! Having issues with your organs? No problem, we’ll remove it for you!” When the focus is only on symptom reduction, there will invariably be another symptom that will manifest sooner or later. A reduction in porn consumption does not necessarily mean a man is now doing better. Often times men will pick up other vices in lieu of porn. 
Another reason these approaches are short-lived is because there is too much focus placed on not doing something or not wanting a specific behavior to happen. If your mental dialogue is “don’t look at porn, don’t look at porn, don’t look at porn”… are you actually NOT thinking about porn? What this does is condition your subconscious mind to fear and avoid a specific outcome. Your subconscious mind will now fixate on this and you will have the thought of, “when is the next time I’m gonna fuck this up?” hang over you. It’s the cliché self-fulfilling prophecy: the more you DON’T want something to happen, the more likely it is to actually happen. SIX ALTERNATE APPROACHES TOWARDS WORKING WITH PORN ADDICTION1. Stay with the feeling, not the story
If you slow down enough to notice, you’ll find that it is often a feeling that catalyzes the sequence of events that leads to the choice to look at porn. From personal experience, this feeling is usually one of feeling angsty and jittery. My head will feel like it’s being compressed at the temples while my mind feels like it is spinning. And because emotions and feelings are simply energy, that energy is naturally going to seek to move and reach some form of resolution; porn, masturbation, and ejaculation accomplish that. Practiced over a period of time, you will have hardwired your subconscious mind and body to associate any unpleasant emotion or feeling needing to be resolved via porn, masturbation, and ejaculation. Instead of rushing to try and resolve and expel the feeling away, see if you can sit with it. Elongate and expand your breathing. Imagine the inhale as a flashlight that shines on the area of your body where you are feeling the emotion and tension. And then imagine with the exhale that you are releasing that tension. The focus is not on getting the feeling out and away, but on acknowledging its presence. In essence, this is the practice of mindfulness – being present and accepting of what is here right now. The initial stages of this may be difficult. This is normal; you are beginning to rewire your brain and break the habit that has been so deeply ingrained. The more consistent you are with this, even if it’s just for 5 minutes a day, the more you will notice that the feeling and tension ease up just by you placing your awareness on it. Do this anytime you find yourself feeling the urge to look at porn. Staying with the feeling is one of the first steps to begin loosening the grip on the stories you tell yourself about yourself when you look at porn. Ex. “I’m a piece of shit, that’s all I ever was. So yeah, of course I’d be looking at porn like the sick fuck and worthless piece of shit that I am.” This creates a shame cycle or a feedback loop: you feel “bad”, which you interpret as “I am bad”, and then you go to porn which makes you feel disgusted with yourself, but also is the only coping tool you know of that temporarily comforts you. Shame, self-loathing, and comfort have now all become linked together. Our minds spin stories in order to make sense of things, especially emotions and feelings that we find difficult to tolerate. If we can explain it with a story, it usually feels less threatening. Imagine how you would feel if you felt deep shame, but had no story to go with it? You’d be left to deal with just the core feeling, which might feel too much. But as you gradually practice staying with the feeling, you’ll find that it shifts on its own and becomes more tolerable over time. Through repetition, your body-mind and nervous system will have a new programming that says, “I am able to deal with difficult emotions.”2. Reflect on the Symbology of the Porn you Consume
This one is especially helpful to explore with a therapist, though you can certainly do so on your own as well. The basic idea here is that there are much deeper themes to the porn you consume than you might be aware of. Often, it isn’t about the specific porn content itself as much as it is about how it makes you feel and what it means to you. For example, let’s say a man is into porn featuring the dominatrix. He has sex with his wife, but finds himself more aroused by the dominatrix he watches in porn. Clearly, there is something about him as a man being dominated by a woman exhibiting more sadist energy that turns him on. It’s possible that this fetish of his has something to do with a core belief that he is bad and deserves to be punished. As mentioned earlier, shame and pleasure become linked. In this scenario, perhaps the symbology here is that he is subconsciously attempting to figure out his shame cycle. Another possible interpretation is that this fetish has to do with sexual polarity. When he masturbates to a dominatrix, he may be fantasizing about being completely in the control of a woman. He is utterly helpless and subject to what she wants to do. In terms of sexual polarity, one could say that he is leaning more into his yin/feminine pole, which has more to do with receiving. Perhaps this is a man who is rigid and controlling in every other aspect of his life, and so a deep and subconscious part of him wants to not be in control sometimes. The stripper “Ninaunrated” spoke in an interview about the work she does as a sex-worker. She shared about how many of her male clients are powerful men (e.g. politicians, entrepreneurs) who go to her to request that she act out their sexual fantasies which involve her “fucking him with a strap-on.” For the man who enjoys dominatrix porn, but also wants to quit it, the more important area to focus on might be identifying where in his life he is rigid about control and learning to let go and relax. Or if he genuinely enjoys the sexual content of being dominated by a woman, mustering up the courage and honesty to speak to his wife about playing with sexual polarity in their relationship. Sometimes understanding the significance of the symbology behind the porn a man is addicted to can help reframe his mind. Rather than use porn as the only tool for working out those symbols in his subconscious, he can find more direct ways to address the needs and desires beneath those symbols in the real world. This segues into the next approach.3. Meeting the Unmet Needs Directly
Underneath the behavior of seeking out pornography is simply a need. Bringing in points one and two, that need is likely associated with a specific feeling. Anger, sadness, depression, boredom, loneliness, the list goes on. Here are some examples that may be applicable to your situation:You work a job that you hate. You don’t get along with your coworkers and always find yourself the butt of the joke. You feel angry, but are also afraid of speaking up for yourself, so you just take it quietly. Internally, you are a pressure cooker waiting to explode. Because you don’t feel safe expressing your anger in relationship, you take it the only place where it feels safe and under your control. You find some porn content that allows you to feel powerful and accesses your sadist side (your suppressed anger) and then you blow your load (release your anger).You have been single for a long time and your success in relationships with women have been sparse. You feel the bitter sting of loneliness while your mind is crowded by thoughts about your unworthiness. The only way you know of comforting yourself is through watching porn and masturbating. Those porn stars will never judge you and will always be available for you when you need them.You are bored out of your mind. There is nothing to do and you can’t stand it. You go onto social media and scroll around a bit in the hopes of finding something that will stimulate your mind’s hunt for novelty. Angst begins to build up in your body as nothing around seems to satiate your hunger for something to occupy your attention. So, you mindlessly find yourself suddenly browsing porn. “Well hey, at least it turns me on and I’m doing something with myself,” goes the thought.
Looking at these examples, can you identify the basic needs in each scenario? If your friend were sharing these issues with you, what would you tell them? For case 1, the need that his anger might be communicating is, “I cannot stay in a work environment where I am being treated this way. I either need to speak up for myself or find another job.” For case 2, the need is likely for connection and being seen/understood. For case 3, the need may be about breaking the monotony of a predictable way of living. Maybe this man needs to feel bored in order to realize he has been living a small life and shying away from following through with lofty dreams he has had, but labeled as “unpractical.” Or maybe the need is to actually slow down because he is overstimulated and boredom is simply a signal that he is experiencing withdrawals from constant dopamine hits. The more you can connect with the need that is underlying your perceived need to look at porn, the more you will find yourself needing porn less. Johann Hari wrote a book titled “Lost Connections” and also did a Ted Talk about how everything we think we know about addiction is wrong. I highly recommend you watch that Ted Talk and listen to him share about “Rat Park.” Long story short, it speaks to basic human needs and how dependency on substances naturally falls away when we are able to meet those needs. 
4, Undoing Religious Programming
This can be a huge one for those who come from religious backgrounds that instill a deep sense of shame and rigidity around sex and sexuality. While I did not grow up with a religious upbringing, I was a devout Christian for a period of my life. During that period, I took all the teachings I learned in church to be beyond questioning. This included seeing sex and sexual pleasure as only reserved for the context of marriage. Anything outside of that was sinful and bad in the eyes of God. Thus, anytime I looked at porn, masturbated, or even had “lustful thoughts,” my shame was compounded by my belief that I was disappointing God. Male clients I have worked with also expressed similar beliefs growing up. For some, it was as severe as believing God was furious with them for having a wet dream. Undoing such religious programming around chastity can be incredibly difficult. Deeply internalized beliefs around religious doctrine can often feel like the bedrock of your identity. To change even a small belief may trigger the fear of losing your entire faith. Moreover, religious structures and communities can create the sense that such beliefs are much bigger than you and ordained by an all-powerful God. “Who am I to question God’s will around how sex is meant to be?” you might ask yourself. If this is an area you wrestle with, it may be well worth it to work with a counselor who is familiar with your religious background. For myself, it was working with a Christian counselor. I remember feeling rather surprised when he made very little fuss about my having a porn addiction. I was preparing myself for an action plan and accountability program for quitting porn, but that was not his approach. We worked through the beliefs I held around sex and God as well as my view of myself. This is where I began to discover the need that was underlying my behavior of seeking out porn. A huge part of this had to do with my shame cycle. Realizing I was more so addicted to shame and self-loathing than I was to the porn itself blew my mind. This shame was well ingrained into me before I had ever sought out Christianity. Sprinkle in aspects of shame programming within the religious doctrines I was learning, and BOOM, now I had a spiritual significance I associated with my shame. The more I felt ashamed of myself and was reminded of how I continuously “fall short of the glory of God”, the more pious and holy I believed myself to be. It was twisted, but it made sense to me at the time, and thus I considered suffering to be a marker of a holy man of God. Such a deeply internalized belief creates a self-sustaining shame cycle, and porn can easily become a tool that feeds this machine. 
5. Cultivate and Nurture Your Desire for Pleasure
As a man, your desire for pleasure and sex is natural and innate. Trying to negotiate yourself out of having or experiencing desire is a losing game. Doing so often leads to men becoming incredibly rigid in how they live life. A place where you can begin to nourish your desire for pleasure is self-pleasuring. Practically, this can look like masturbating without the use of porn or fixating on sexual fantasies. For the longest time I believed porn use and masturbation were inseparable. It wasn’t until a coach I was working with suggested to me the idea of masturbating without those things that I thought, “Wait, you can do that? That’s allowed?” Doing so allowed me to separate the neural link I had created between the two. It was incredibly healing and liberating when I was able to make this separation. This would be called conscious masturbation. Rather than getting in your head, which is what happens when men fixate on visual stimulation and sexual fantasies, conscious masturbation gets you back into your body. You start to feel the sensations in your body and track how pleasure flows in you vs rushing to bust a nut going from 0-100. Such practices have long been part of Taoist and Tantric sexual practices. These traditions know the power of sexual energy as a force for deep healing and alchemy. If this is something that interests you and you need a place to start, check out the work of Sasha Cobra, Kim Anami, Mantak Chia, and Johnathan White. Cultivating your desire for pleasure can also look like doing activities that simply bring you joy and tap into your creativity. This could be dancing, singing, painting, writing poetry, the list goes on. As your capacity to feel pleasure and enjoy life expands, you will naturally feel less drawn to porn as a means of seeking connection. It's like moving from a diet of strictly fast food to homemade food cooked with love. 
6. Let go of the Rigidity
Quitting the compulsive use of porn is a process. Do not expect it to happen on some timeline you have made up in your head. When I was trying to quit porn on my own, one of the thoughts I always had was, “when will I finally conquer this?” I was so fixated on “today is the last time,” that I inevitably failed because I was so attached to the outcome. And then I would beat myself up about it, once again reinforcing my addictive shame cycle. My therapist NEVER promised me a timeline for when I would conquer my porn addiction. In fact, we rarely ever focused on my porn use as THE problem. We focused on my beliefs about myself, the feelings I didn’t ever want to share with anyone, and my deepest desires in life. As I became more interested in myself and the life I was living, my interest in porn naturally faded. If you’re a man who is fighting hard to conquer your porn addiction, take a deep breath and slow down. If you relapsed and looked at porn, it is okay. Acknowledge that you did, accept that you may be experiencing negative thoughts and unpleasant feelings, and then let it go. If you must flagellate and beat yourself up over it, I guarantee you that it isn’t the porn you are addicted to as much as it is the shame-pain-pleasure cycle that you’re addicted to. Sometimes it fits our worldview better when we believe defeatist narratives about ourselves. “If I am such a piece of shit, then it makes sense why I feel awful and deserve to feel awful.” The moment we are challenged in our own narratives and the possibility that there actually isn’t anything wrong with us, we can spiral into any number of defense mechanisms. If this is you, I encourage you to explore working with a therapist or coach. I can also recommend Byron Katie’s work on Four Questions That Can Change Your Life. Letting go of any intense feelings you have about porn will be helpful to loosening the rigidity as well. Many men have described their love/hate relationship with porn. “I love it in that it does make me feel good sometimes, but I also hate it because it is ruining my life.” Both ends of the pole create an emotional attachment to porn and still gives it real estate in your mind. Instead, I recommend a neutral emotional stance towards porn. Sure, you may have some feelings or opinions about it, but it is not something you spend too much of your energy on. Porn may always be around in some form or another. But your wellbeing need not depend on its presence or eradication. The more you can find yourself in a place of indifference towards porn, the more you will have less charge around it. Even if you do look at it once in a while, it doesn’t stay with you. You can acknowledge, “Yeah that probably wasn’t a good use of my time nor something I truly wanted in the end. Let me check in with how I’m actually feeling and reorient towards what I truly want.” At the end of the day, you are far bigger and more important than the shadow of your porn addiction. Do not lose sight of who you are and the potential within you. I also made a video version of this topic. You can view that here: