Welcome back. So some of you here may be struggling with a masturbation addiction either as a primary addiction or secondary. Earlier we talked about the difference earlier and how it’s important to treat your main addiction as well as any secondary addictions at the same time.
So masturbation addiction is more like a compulsion. Sometimes the addiction is so intense that you masturbate even without an erection or feeling aroused and masturbation addiction can affect both males and females equally.
If masturbation is a compulsion, meaning you think about it all the time to the point that it is affecting your personal and professional life then it’s a problem and you will need to work on changing the way your brain thinks about masturbation.
Masturbation addiction is so unlike many other addictions like alcohol, smoking, substance use, food, sex, and even porn. Those addictions you can physically separate yourself from the thing that is causing your addiction to make fighting the addiction easier. For example, with alcohol addiction you can pour it all down the drain, with food you can control what food comes into your home, and even with sex and porn, you can physically separate yourself from your computer or people but when it comes to masturbation, that part of your body is always going to be with you wherever you go which makes it that much more difficult to stop.
The first thing you’ll need to do is come up with compromise, a number in your head of what you believe to be a healthy amount of time masturbating. For some, this may be 4 times per week, for others, it may be never. This is a very personal decision and one that is going to be different for everyone depending on their own values, world view, and even religion.
Once you have that number in your head, you’ll need to make a schedule for when this would take place that doesn’t interfere with your life. For example if you choose 4 times per week it might look like Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday. Once you figure out the days then you’ll want to figure out the time of day. For example, 5:30pm after work, 10:00pm while in bed, whatever time you choose that doesn’t interfere with the other things going on in your life. And last, these sessions should be without the use of porn because if you are addicted to porn you are trying to quit that as well.
Okay so to get this whole thing started, you are going to come up with a quit date and will go 30 days without masturbating at all. While you are going cold turkey, you will work through this program that takes a holistic approach so we are going to focus on your physical health, psychological health, your relationships, Now, if are in a relationship and still want to have sex and you do not have a sex addiction, that’s perfectly okay. If you are having sex and cannot perform (which is common for those who suffer from masturbation addiction) then it’s important to relax, take a step back and try again another time but do not resort to masturbating as that will reset your 30 day clock.
Once you are done with the 30 days and really working through this course, then you can start to implement your masturbation schedule if you have one. If you start to waver from the specific time you have set or increase the number of days then you’ll know you are going back to old habits and will then either have to start again with 30 days or if you catch it quick enough make sure you go back to sticking to your schedule.
Okay so now it’s time for you to start thinking of what you want your personal outcome to be and as you are thinking of that continue to work through this course. See in the next lecture
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