EP Will more sex solve my porn problem?

I used to think that once my wife and I could have sex because we were married that my pornography problem would go away.

Then when we got married and my pornography problem kept going, I used to think that if we had sex that day, I wouldn’t turn to pornography.

Then if we had sex that day and I chose pornography, I used to think that our sex life needed to be more interesting before my porn struggle would end.

There are a lot of reasons why people choose pornography when they are morally opposed to it. Many of those reasons stem from trying to resolve an issue that is difficult or painful. Often they either do not have the tools to resolve these issues or that they are unskilled or unpracticed at using the tools they do have.

 Within the Self Mastery Membership we dive deep into the tools you need as well as help you hone those tools to make them effective in your day to day life.

 When I believed that sex would solve my pornography problem, I failed myself by believing that the answer to my struggle was outside me.

 I believed that Darcy would solve my problems. I believed that God would make me stop somehow. (Agency tells us He won’t) I believed that if I had my needs met often enough and well enough that I simply wouldn’t have more desire than to be with my wife.

 The idea that external forces will help us resolve our pornography problems is the same idea that keeps us from solving our pornography problems.

 The more we believe that someone or something outside of us has power to solve for how we feel or what we need, the more we will believe that pornography can help us solve for how we feel or what we need.

The idea that Darcy could make it so I wouldn’t want porn is the same concept as porn could make it so I wouldn’t struggle with my difficult or painful issues.

When Darcy can make the bad of porn go away, porn can make the bad of loneliness go away. Placing our ownership of what is going on for us outside of us, in the hands of a person, a substance, an electronic dopamine machine like video games, or in pornography only aleviates the struggle for a short time. Then, we have to face up to both our choices and our previously unaddressed difficulties.

So, if sex won’t solve your porn problem, what will? ’ll give you a one word answer that you may not want to hear: You are the only person who can solve for how you feel, why you choose porn, and learn the skills you need to practice in order to leave it behind.

I can teach you those skills, you can learn them through individual coaching or in the membership, but you have to be the one who takes the steps to make it happen.

Heavenly Father could create the perfect conditions that would make your life perfectly simple and easy to live, but you have to be the one who exercises your agency around pornography. 

Your wife can have sex with you every day, three times a day, she can be understanding of your issue and not make you feel shame or guilt when you choose porn, she can be emotionally available and alway meet your “needs”, but you have to be the one who owns your emotions, experiences your frustrations, and resolves them internally before they become so overwhelming that you feel like you have to escape them.

This is why more sex won’t solve your porn problem. You have to hold on to yourself and create the sense within yourself that you are capable of solving the problem, learn the skills and utilize them, and stop relying on externals to manage you.

This is why I don’t encourage accountability partners, too often we think of them as external checks on internal choices. (they can be effective if used as a way to become known more fully) This is why I don’t recommend internet or device filters for adults. Too often we use them as external puzzles to be circumvented. This is why, no matter how much sex you get, it will not keep you from looking at porn.

If externals, like sex, had the power to keep you from choosing porn, there would be a lot less people choosing porn 

Here’s what you do about it instead.First, take a look at all the reasons you choose porn. Get familiar with them, understand how they keep coming up, and get open feedback on them from those close to you who are willing to honestly discuss them with you.

For me, stress was a huge struggle. Talking about my stress with Darcy helped me understand where it was coming from, how I was contributing to it, and how often I would need to deal with it.

Second, learn key strategies, skills, techniques, and processes that you need to become proficient in to mitigate, eliminate, or endure those reasons that you choose porn.

I often say this during my initial coaching sessions with people. “I’m going to teach you how to get good at feeling bad”. If you want to resolve your struggle with pornography, feeling good is not going to help you. Desire to feel good is the reason you’re probably turning to pornography.

If you want to talk to me about how you can get good at this, set up a free call with me by going to zachspafford.com/workwithme and scroll all the way to the bottom. It will be the best 30 minutes you spend on pornography ever.

Learning to get good at feeling bad, I realize is a terrible sales pitch. But if rings true because if we want to have joy in our lives as Lehi described in 2 Nephi 2:25 we need to get good at dealing with opposition to joy in our lives as Lehi indicates just 13 verses earlier in that same chapter.

The third and final thing that you need to do is practice. Malcolm Gladwell is an economist and writer who is famous for coining the term, the 10,000 hour rule. If you want to become excellent at something, whether it is sports or business, singing or the piano, there is a process to getting there that requires about 10,000 hours.

Please don’t let that number discourage you. It’s likely that most of the hours you need are already racked up and waiting to be leveraged.

You can start today by devising a path, create a plan of doable steps that you can execute on but that expand your capacity. Some of the things you need to do are already things that you do, but that need to be honed. Some of the things you need to do you already know about and need to be learned. Some of the things you need to do are things that you will discover you didn’t even know anything about but that will be key to your longterm success.

I can promise you this. If you will/ Take a look at all the reasons you choose porn. Learn key strategies, skills, techniques, and processes that you need practice resolving why you choose porn through what you’ve learned.  It will change the trajectory of the struggle you’ve been engaged in and help you finally overcome pornography forever.

If you don’t know or don’t see the reasons you choose porn, please set up some time to meet with me. I will help you figure this out.

As we say in the coaching world, it’s hard to read the label from inside the bottle and you are no exception. Sometimes, we need someone who is skilled at seeing things we can’t see and who will teach us how to observe and address it.

Listen to the Full Episode:

Enjoy the Show?