Five years ago, I was in jeopardy of losing my marriage.
Despite the countless promises I had made to my wife about change, I found that
was unable to avoid relapsing into pornography. Though I could not acknowledge
it at the time, this addiction had a control over me that I couldn’t
comprehend. Today, I am porn-free and enjoying a healthier marriage than ever
before. While I must continually guard my purity and my heart, I no longer
struggle with relapses into this behavior. So what changed? Here are seven
principles that I have found at work in my life and in the lives of many other
guys who have walked this same journey.
Get Honest. One
of the things we all do with behaviors we’re hiding is to minimize them. This
means that we have spent a great deal of time convincing ourselves, and others,
that porn really isn’t a problem. We use lines like, “all guys do this”, “no
one is getting hurt”, or “I can stop anytime I want” to try and reduce the
guilt or negative emotions we feel. Freedom begins by confronting these lies.
Change will only occur when we say willingly and frequently to ourselves and
other trusted friends, “I have a problem and I need help.”
Create Boundaries. When
we are busy minimizing destructive behaviors, this keeps us from seeing how
vulnerable we are to acting out. If we want to establish freedom for the
long-haul, then we will have to make some major adjustments to how we do life.
Creating boundaries means that we look at the places where we are most
susceptible to accessing pornography and we deal with them. For example, I
don’t have a smart phone, but that’s okay. I’d rather have a dumb phone and be
a smart user! You will never regret setting your personal boundaries too high.
You will always regret the ones that were so low they were easy to step over or
ignore.
Join a Group. Especially
for guys, we are guilty of thinking we can do just about anything on our own,
if we but set our minds to it. But the problem with this thinking, when it
comes to pornography, is that porn is a problem we got into on our own. It is through isolation and
separation from relationships that this problem grew to the level of addiction.
So, we cannot hope to find freedom on the same path. Freedom comes as we
process our journey honestly and openly with others who are doing the same.
Commit to the Long
Haul. When it comes to not looking at pornography, will power and sheer
determination will never be enough. We aren’t looking to simply stop a
behavior; we are looking to process life differently. This means changing our
brains and the ways we react to certain stress or stimuli. Scientific research
reveals that true and lasting brain change takes a minimum of 2 years and as
long as 5! If we want to be free of porn for life, then we must embrace that
this journey, and this change, takes time.
Proactive Check-Ins. One
of the greatest faults with traditional approaches to accountability is the
relationship where one person says, “Call me and ask how I am doing.” In this
set-up, we are giving responsibility for our change to another person. If we
really want to change, then checking in with others is something we take
responsibility for, and we do it proactively. We commit to calling others a
minimum of three times in a week to report on how we are doing and what steps we
are taking to stay free. This move keeps us in charge of our own change.
Know Your Pattern. The
problem for most of us with porn is that we know when we’ve looked at it (it’s pretty obvious) but we don’t have any
clue why. Far too many guys think of
a bout with pornography as an isolated, hormonally-fueled episode. But it’s
not. Our brain works on a complex system of punishments and rewards, and if we
keep returning to a behavior which we know we don’t want, it’s because our
brain has associated it with a reward. We must learn to recognize our pattern, and then change how the pattern starts.
If we only try to fight against viewing porn as we’re sitting alone in front of
a computer feeling tempted, this will be a losing battle. Winning starts when
we fight further up in the process.
Tell Your Story. Telling
your story means you know where you have come from and what drives you. If we
know the pain, turmoil, and the joy of our own past, we begin to unlock the
secrets for what drives an addiction to pornography. Our struggle is rooted in
the deeper issues of what we believe about life and ourselves. As we learn to
see and tell our story accurately, we gain the power to change it. This is one
of the primary roles of a group in our lives- a safe, supportive place to start
telling our story.
I believe that if you were to remove any one of these
principles from my story, I would quickly be back where I started. Much like
the 6 or 8 cylinders of an engine must fire together in perfect sequence, so
these principles function concurrently to create real and lasting freedom in
our lives. Where do you need to begin? What principle have you been avoiding or
ignoring? Take that step today, and trust that God will bring freedom you way
as you do!
Blessings-
Nick
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