Overcoming lust/porn problem? (+ introduction, been lurking for a while now)

Red-Curious · 2018-08-09T04:45:16+00:00

Thanks for the introduction! I really appreciate those stats, brother. You've got a solid body and mind about you and your spirit is oriented in the right direction. This is good news to hear for a newlywed man. You have an opportunity to lay a good foundation from the start that many of us lacked until years into our marriages. In a lot of ways, your story reminds me of my first 6 months of marriage.

I was worried that we would end up having a sexless marriage—completely irrational

That's her frame talking. Sexless marriage are a perfectly rational thing to expect. They are extremely common. But if she can convince you it's irrational, then you'll drop your guard and she takes over.

when my wife isn't interested in sex I'm not really phased. I just move on and initiate again later.

Atta boy!

two weeks ... ended up sliding into porn

Geeze, if I didn't know any better I'd say that's a pretty low threshold. Of course, I know many guys who can't make it past 2 days.

Ok, let's get down to business. First, go back and re-read 202, then immediately the 400-series. In conjunction, they can give a new biblical perception of a longstanding problem. One of my favorite lines from 202 that you seem to be struggling with: "But then you realize that it's silly to assume that guilt could save you from...becoming guilty."

You obviously feel guilty about what you've done. This guilt is putting you in other people's frame. If you want to get past porn, YOU have to be the one to do it. If you're living in someone else's frame, you're not getting past your porn problem; they're helping you get past their problem with you looking at porn. See the difference there?

I know you have a problem with it too. Don't get me wrong on that. But seriously, feeling guilty over it isn't going to make you ... not guilty. Remorse is not the same thing as repentance, despite popular belief. Repentance is repentance.

How do you repent from something like this? Well, I just wrote a whole post on that titled: Sexual Addiction v. Sexual Starvation. Satisfy your sexual cravings and see if you're still looking at porn. I've known guys who would have sex with their wives and then immediately turn around and watch porn 15 minutes later. I was one of those guys for a time (though not for addictive reasons). Are you that guy? It doesn't sound like it. It sounds like when your sex-life with your wife is up to snuff you're just fine.

This tells me that you simply had a time of sexual starvation. It's like when you're fasting and you hit the 5 day mark and you see someone who isn't fasting eating something delicious. You know you want a bite, but are you strong enough to resist? Some people are, some people aren't. Are you going to hell for goofing up on your fast? No. Are you going to hell for looking at porn? No. If you were, then Jesus' death would have no meaning - it would be powerless to save you from porn. Are you suggesting that your draw toward porn is stronger than Jesus' power to save you? I assume not.

Let me get back on track.

ONE

Once you accept that Jesus bore your guilt, you should stop feeling guilty. That's step one. Look at porn tomorrow? No sweat. Confess, repent, and move on.

In Practice the Presence of God, it was said of Brother Lawrence, "That when he had failed in his duty, he only confessed his fault, saying to God, 'I shall never do otherwise, if You leave me to myself; 'tis You must hinder my falling, and mend what is amiss.' That after this, he gave himself no further uneasiness about it." Adopt this attitude.

TWO

When you have adopted an attitude that is not controlled by internal guilt over your actions - that rightly recognizes that your guilt is on Jesus, not on you and that your refusal to relinquish your guilt to the cross is an offense against Christ himself - that is when you will be able to live in your own frame. You will be able to decide for yourself under your own motives, independent of the expectations your wife, your mentor, your Bible study, your accountability partners, your pastor, or whoever else might hold over you on this issue. You need to be at a point where you can tell them with a straight face, "I masturbated to porn last night. It was wrong. I repented. I'm fine with it and right with God. Pass the creamer." If you feel compelled to have an emotional reaction to it, you're still in someone else's frame.

THREE

Once you've accepted the Gospel that Jesus bears your guilt, and developed your own frame on the issue, you need to set your mission. This is the real solution to the porn problem. I am 100% convinced of this. I've seen dozens of books on the topic of curing pornography and none of them have produced any consistent results. I have discipled dozens of men through this issue and received fairly consistent results. A lifestyle of evangelism and discipleship cures a lifestyle of porn. That is your mission.

Why? I might as well make a post about this (and I was just about to write a post on something else - look how you got me distracted now!). I'll give you the brief synopsis real fast and then get that post up soon.

Matthew 12 says that if you successfully cast an evil spirit out, if your house remains empty, it'll come back and bring more crap with it even worse than itself. Point: you can't just kick porn out of your life; you must fill that void.
The Bible gives us three things that can fill that void: the Word of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. Sound familiar? Oh yeah, that's the trinity. Weird how those are the only good references the Bible makes to something indwelling within us.
What happens when those things indwell you? Acts 1:8 says that when the Spirit comes on you, you'll become a witness to the world. John 17 Jesus prays that his disciples would be found in him and he in them - and this in the context of him sending them into the world as disciple-makers. In Matthew 13 Jesus preaches the parable of the sower and explains that when the Word of God enters into the good soil, it produces a crop 30, 60, or even 100 times its yield.

Let's recap: kick the demon out; replace it with Father, Son and Spirit; doing this, per the Bible, always results in a lifestyle of evangelism and discipleship.

Why else does this make perfect sense? Because your sin is prompted by a desire for physical reproduction. But the Gospel says that the physical things of this earth are satisfied in Christ on a spiritual level. So, what you long for in a physical way, Jesus satisfies in a spiritual way. So, instead of looking to physical sex to gratify you, look to spiritual sex. What is spiritual reproduction? We call that evangelism. And what is spiritual child-rearing, which pretty much the entire world agrees is the ultimate source of joy in life? That's called discipleship - and 3 John 1:4 agrees, "I have no greater joy than this: to see that my children are walking in the truth."

So, go make disciples. Bear fruit. Don't drop the ball on this one. Just starting this process won't cure you, but running it to completion will. I am very, very confident about this result and it has a proven track record with at least 15 of the 37 guys I've discipled over the years (on my way to the 60 yield!) who are now making their own disciples and seen the freedom that comes with this. Now, that's only 41% - but most of the other 59% never went on to produce disciples of their own, content only to be discipled ... sigh. So, I'd wager the success rate of this method is probably a lot closer to 85-90% - and it's possible that some of those guys simply hadn't seen enough fruit in their lives when I last saw them, but have since overcome their struggle as they continued making disciples after my time with them. So, maybe it is a 100% success rate. Who knows.

Willow-girl · 2018-08-09T14:06:30+00:00

Be mindful. Look at the circumstances in which you stumbled. If you find yourself in similar circumstances again going forward (i.e., unable to have sex because of wife's physical problem), be mindful that this is a danger zone for you, one that makes you more vulnerable to temptation. Examine the choices leading up to your use of porn and look for the places where you could have short-circuited the process.

For instance, the episode probably started with going somewhere private with one of your devices. Maybe you did this deliberately with the intention of looking at porn, or maybe it just happened by circumstance (wife went to bed early, leaving you sitting up late alone with your phone). You need to recognize that this is a situation in which you're vulnerable (sexually needy, alone with a device that allows you to view porn). How do you short-circuit the process? Try not to be needy (i.e., cultivate a frequent and healthy sex life). If you can't not be needy in the moment (wife is out of town on business, has a UTI, etc.), try not to be alone (phone a friend, go for a walk, etc.) or put away your devices. In short, be mindful of the slippery slope, and don't go down it. Have a plan in advance for what you will do when you feel tempted, then work that plan.

rocknrollchuck · 2018-08-09T14:43:41+00:00

Since Red-Curious has already covered most of the important stuff in his response, I've only got a few things to point out.

First, congrats on the solid stats and progress! Give yourself some credit, you've really set yourself up well from an early age, not only in your faith, but in your mission, your health, your lifting. I would give anything to be your age and have all those things already in place! So you're off to a good start by the grace of God.

I read the bible daily, but have been doing it more out of obligation recently which concerns me.

I do not spend enough time in prayer or the Word. I need to remedy this.

So Hunter Drew over at The Family Alpha has a piece he wrote that basically says motivation is the match that lights the fire, discipline is the log that keeps the fire burning. Motivation burns hot and fast, discipline is what is needed to keep going in the long term. Think about it in relation to the gym: you have days that you're pumped and ready to kill it in the gym, and there's other days that you really don't want to be there but you go and end up having a pretty good workout. Reading the Bible is the same way, there will be days you just don't feel like doing it but you do it because of discipline. There's nothing wrong with that IMO. Same with prayer. God sees your dedication (or lack of it).

Jesus said in Matthew 21:28-31 “What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ “‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go. “Which of the two did what his father wanted?” “The first,” they answered."

I made the huge mistake of getting emotional over sexual denial in the early months of my marriage (I'm talking first 1-2 months). At the time, I had no idea about RP and had some major insecurities as to why I was being denied sex. It was pathetic how I acted (broke down crying a few times because I was worried that we would end up having a sexless marriage—completely irrational).

Fortunately, that stopped, but it was one example of some of my beta traits that came out early on in marriage. I wouldn't consider myself a nice guy (I'm quite a direct/decisive person), but I was overly emotional in these first few months.

There's a quote from Jack10 that I have saved, and refer to regularly on this issue. It has really helped me:

Be amused at anger – She’s trying to shake your frame, get a rise out of you, bring you down to her level, and instead, you respond to the manner in which she’s communicating, rather than addressing the feigned issue she’s raising.

If you become angry, defensive, hurt, etc., then the message you’ve sent to your woman is: “You are more powerful than I am. You have the power to affect my emotional state. I don’t decide how I feel. You do. I don’t take charge of my life. I just react.” In fact, if you address the issue at all, you’re saying: “You control what is and is not important in our lives. You set my priorities just by talking. You’re my boss.”

Your woman doesn’t want you to get angry. She wants you to remain a solid rock, upon which she can rely. Your job is to be the Rock, not address her every issue brought about by her feelings. She needs you to be a MAN, not one of her girlfriends. The added bonus is that if you’re always amused, stoic, and unshakable, then on the rare occasions when you do raise your voice or become aggravated by something, your woman will know that you are expressing anger intentionally, and with great purpose, because the issue is important - and you command her attention.

Your wife does not like getting worked up about things, then seeing you get worked up. She's self-aware enough to realize this is crappy behavior on her part, but she sort of hates you for enabling it. Seeing the emotional exhaustion on your face fills her with shame, which she hates. But the only way to avoid that, she thinks, is to quash her emotions entirely. Which she thinks is impossible, and that's why she hates you. "I hate that expressing my emotions does this to him, but I hate that apparently the only way I can stop doing this is to stop expressing my emotions."

If you draw a hard boundary and tell her to go screw herself, she'll hate you for that, since clearly your aggressive response means you think her emotions are so out of line that she shouldn't have them. "Does my man even give a crap about me? Or does he just use my hysterics as an excuse to shut down however I feel about things as quickly as possible?"

But if you immediately surrender and placate her anxiety, she hates this too. "Man, he doesn't even understand why I'm so upset. He just sees me upset and falls all over himself to apologize. He doesn't even know what he's apologizing for and why I'm even acting this way. Does my husband even give a crap about me? Or does he just use my hysterics as an excuse to shut down however I feel about things as quickly as possible?"

This is why you should play it stoic, straight, and narrow, because "screw you, you're out of line" versus "OMG I'm so sorry whatever I did, I'm sorry," essentially earns you the same contempt from your wife either way.

When you're stoic in the face of a hysterical wife, there is no shame. When you tell someone, "take a minute, start over, because whatever you want to communicate, it's not working," there is no shame. You're not tolerating their crappy communication, but you're not invalidating their feelings either. It projects a strong boundary but also an empathetic mindset. This is what your wife wants. This is what everyone wants, to be honest. Someone who won't judge their feelings or act terrified of them, but also won't tolerate their crap if they even try to project it on to you.

This is the man your wife wants. Are you that man?

That's how I've been approaching things for the last couple of years now, and it's made all the difference.

I'm better now by the grace of God (I was seeking fulfilment in my wife instead of Him)

This is good insight, it's great that you have the maturity to recognize it.

Please do pray for me.

I certainly will, brother!

Deep_Strength · 2018-08-11T20:05:47+00:00

Welcome! I appreciate the shout out :)

Mainly will cover this, as the other things have been answered extensively already.

I made the huge mistake of getting emotional over sexual denial in the early months of my marriage (I'm talking first 1-2 months). At the time, I had no idea about RP and had some major insecurities as to why I was being denied sex. It was pathetic how I acted (broke down crying a few times because I was worried that we would end up having a sexless marriage—completely irrational).

Fortunately, that stopped, but it was one example of some of my beta traits that came out early on in marriage. I wouldn't consider myself a nice guy (I'm quite a direct/decisive person), but I was overly emotional in these first few months.

Always ask yourself before you do anything stupid:

God appointed me as the strong, masculine leader in the marriage
Is what I am doing consistent with being a strong, masculine leader?

The answer to the above is clearly a no. This is where the fruits of the Spirit really shine: your wife is expecting you to get angry and discontent and bitter if she does something that you don't want. Instead, you need to be more kind, more joyful, and more patient so that she starts following your lead instead of you responding and following her bad emotions/temper tantrum/power trip. This is the Adam and Eve dilemma... do you follow her when she is leading you into sin, or do you say no I'm going to be faithful to God to walk in His roles and responsibilities and His fruits of the Spirit.

This is the importance of being grounded on God and Jesus. Adverse situations with your wife won't cause you to respond in a sinful manner but an honoring manner. It breaks the cycle of dysfunction.

Title	Overcoming lust/porn problem? (+ introduction, been lurking for a while now)
Author	valortus
Upvotes	6
Comments	11
Date	August 9, 2018 3:59 AM UTC (5 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/RPChristians
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/RPChristians/comments/95t528/overcoming_lustporn_problem_introduction_been/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/RPChristians/overcoming-lustporn-problem-introduction-been.301807 https://theredarchive.com/post/301807