Avoiding Pornography

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? I’ll give you a one word answer that you may not want to hear: YOU 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

22 Elo 202212min

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15 Elo 202235min

Create realistic expectations - Not expecting my husband to commit to things I know he doesn’t have skills for. Looking honestly at yourself Could you honestly commit to eliminating your coping mechanism immediately Instead of looking to give you a right answer, because that answer looks like it will give you peace of mind, it is about being able to Instead of expecting your partner to give you the right answer because it might make you feel better in the moment Become willing to hear the honest answer without losing yourself and becoming disregulated. Creating realistic expectations reduces the possibilities that you are setting your partner up to make lying to you his safest move Don’t make their behavior about you - This is difficult and they do impact you It may hurt when your partner doesn’t live up to your values and your shared values Be willing to be wrong Reevaluating your understanding of pornography Being willing to address where you are not being or have not been kind in the relationship Become willing to see how you’ve been untrustworthy in the relationship. It might be good sense for your partner to not share what is going on for them around pornography What you do when you learn the truths and realities of your spouses struggle impacts their decisions, sense of self, and their sense of the relationship This is not an excuse for their choices, it is an awareness of your impact on them as you are becoming aware of their impact on you. Become willing to hear the truth of where your spouse is in their journey Not internalize it to mean anything about you Be capable of choosing to be near your partner even when that truth is not what you want to hear You become more trustworthy, which sets up a framework where openness and honesty are not simply expected but more likely. Because your partner becomes more aware of your capacity to hear their open, honest reality. And you become more capable of confronting their reality without needing to cater to their struggles or enfold into their anxiety.

8 Elo 202226min

Three secrets to creating trust after pornography Here is the truth of it. You can not make your wife trust you again. You do not have control over if your wife trusts you. All you can do is be someone who she can trust. Don't commit to things you can for sure follow through on. Be honest. Each of these revolves around an honest presentation of yourself, but probably not in ways that you have ever thought of before. Let go of the outcomes A lot of us have been working to manage our partner’s feelings This is something that is trackable and leads to a fundamentally dishonest way of interacting Client - when I speak with my wife, I’m often looking to figure out a way to present my side in a way that is least likely to have her blow up or get upset Say “no” to your spouse when it is your true position Be willing to tell your partner “no” rather than trying to find the answer that will keep the peace, make her happy, or keep you from getting in trouble. example Darcy: Your partner knows when you’re telling them what they want to hear. They may like it in the moment, but it’s a hollow victory Our kids do this as well, they tell us the answer they think we want to hear. Clean rooms Be more circumspect about what you tell your partner. Don’t just say yes, because you think it’s what your partner wants Be careful in agreeing to a plan of action because you feel like you are in a one-down position of having messed up. Becoming willing to disappoint your partner if it is the more honest position If your partner asks you to never look at porn again saying “yes” even if that’s what you want to say, might undermine the trust in the relationship. example When we say “no” from an honest position or disagree we are letting go of the outcome and offering our partner an opportunity to hear us being real with them. They are also going to be presented with an opportunity to grow through the process Integrate your private self with your presented self Say what you are doing and do what you say. For instance, if you say you’re leaving work at 5 o’clock then you do so. This is like doing what you say, but I want to emphasize the cost Often we can rationalize not doing it. But, can you do it regardless of the ratio nalization. Become committed and take action in the direction of your values. be willing to reevaluate, renavigate, and restate your position Example Hear what your partner is saying and make the argument for them about your behavior This is a process of self-confrontation and winning strategies in your arguments Self-confrontation - episode https://www.zachspafford.com/blog/episode-127-overcome-pornography-through-self-confrontation-the-secret-to-intimacy-series-chapter-2-of-5 (127) Hearing what they have to say and understanding their perspective on how you are showing up Being willing to see your behavior objectively and without the need to defend it. I feel valued We can work together

1 Elo 202223min

One of the books that I have often recommended to my clients is a work by Dr. Robert Glover. His book, No More Mr. Nice Guy is a guide to men who have struggled to get what they want in “love, sex, and life”. I’d like to share one of the key concepts from this book and a caution as you begin to integrate the ideas the book offers you. First, what is a “Nice Guy” or as Dr. Glover nice guy syndrome? It is essentially this. Nice guys are men who, at the expense of their own happiness and from a position of hiding real and important parts about themselves seek the approval of others. They do this at work, they do this in their church callings, and they do this in their personal lives, particularly as part of their marriages. What this looks like is often saying, “yes” to things that they are not fully on board for, in an effort to gain the approval of those around them. Their boss, those they attend church with, and especially their spouses. This may not sound problematic, as being a person who serves in their community is often a well-regarded thing. But this overwhelming need to seek the approval of others at the expense of one’s own honestly held position can create a problem called covert contracts. Covert contracts are actions that we take in order to obligate others to take actions that validate us without their consent. An example of this might look like a spouse doing all the right things around the house, doing the dishes, cleaning up the house, getting the kids to bed and so on, in order to get their partner to have no possible excuse to not have sex with them. At it’s core, a covert contract is a manipulation of those around you, in particular our spouses, into giving you validation through things like sex in a quid pro quo that the other party is not fully agreed to. For some of you listening to this, you might be saying, “Well, how else am I supposed to get my partner to have sex with me, she always has some reason why not to, unless I maneuver her into feeling like she has to.” When we create these covert obligations, in the long run, we end up alienating our partners, and get less of the things we want, including intimacy and sex. We are essentially manipulating our partners for coerced validation at the expense of self-validation and their desire for us. What I find here is that many men feel like getting some sex, even bad, servicing-based sex, is better than no sex. What we fail to see, from that perspective is, that the servicing sex that we end up getting isn’t fulfilling, but we can control, to some degree, when we get it. That control is the thing that you and your partner will eventually push back against and may create damage to your relationship that is difficult to reconcile in the long run. By the way, both men and women do this. My mom once told me that if she wanted something from my dad, she would have sex with him and then ask him about whatever she wanted. He was much more likely to give in to her position if she did that. So, how do we stop creating covert contracts? I’m going to give you two things that you can do. Part of the process of leaving behind covert contracts is letting go of the outcome. The other part is becoming more desirable. Let’s start with being more desirable. Most of us, if we take a few moments to examine our lives, can see a number of things that we would like to change or improve about ourselves. Those of us who engage or have engaged in covert contracts are often, fundamentally dishonest about what is real and truly going on for us internally. Meaning, we don’t really tell our partner what is true, we often tell them what we think we want

25 Heinä 202221min

I had a conversation with a friend of mine who while we are about the same age, he started his family well after I did. His two kids are the same age as our youngest two kids. We worked together in Wisconsin and each week when we returned to work on Monday he would ask me, “what did you do this weekend?” My answer varied, but once I said, “I pulled weeds.” I don’t remember anything about that particular weekend’s worth of activities, but my friend recalls the story and brings it up occasionally when we chat. It made me realize that one weekend's worth of work is often what we think lasting change looks like. But in truth it is more like this: Last year we bought a house that we love, right next to the house that we used to own here in St George. When we bought it, we had some pretty big ideas about what we wanted to do. We had a vision of what this property would look like when we had finished. We got to work, I cut down 20 or so cedar trees that were shedding harsh, thorny bits all over the yard. We took out about 10 evergreen bushes that were both ugly and prickly. We built a wall so our yard would extend 5 to 10 more feet in the back. I started to lay a stone path in the backyard so we could have a nice comfortable place for the kids to play. Then a back injury I received while playing football on Thanksgiving 2019 flared up and everything stopped. During that period, the yard didn’t change much, but my concept of what the yard needed to look like and how I wanted it to change did. As I waited for my back to strengthen and heal, I kept thinking about how I wanted things to look in the yard. Things that I thought were certain changed and morphed and became something completely different. As that evolution happened, I found that there were some new and awesome things that I loved about the way I wanted to do the yard. These were things I didn’t even have any idea about when I started the process of updating the yard. While the new yard is far from complete, It is well on it’s way. For many of you, the process of overcoming pornography will be the same. As you listen to these podcasts and work on the things that you learn, you’ll have an idea of what it means to execute that skill. Some of you will ask questions about it during open coaching in the Self Mastery Membership, others of you will discuss it with your partner, and some of you will think it through and just do it. As you go through episodes, ideas that you have will fade and you’ll move on to new concepts, adding them to your mind and letting them become a dominant force as you work to eliminate this unwanted habit. You may even stop listening for a while, stop doing the work, and stop trying the skills because a particularly difficult setback has made it tough to continue. All of that is ok. What I hope you will remember is that, if you will come back to it when you’re ready, you will keep growing, keep succeeding, and eventually overcome pornography forever. That may sound simple or even naive, but it is the way I’ve seen things work for so many men and women. They learn, they grow, they stop, they restart, and they do it again. Overcoming pornography is doable. I hope you see it.

18 Heinä 202211min

In this interview with Josh and Amber, we discuss their success and how overcoming pornography has made their lives better.

11 Heinä 202234min

This week in the membership one of my members was talking about the question that another member had asked during our previous session. The man I was coaching said, “when That guy asked that question, it was as if he had been reading my mind.” This is the amazingness that comes from being part of the membership. You get to hear the questions you didn’t even know how to ask, asked for you! This moment was when I decided that I needed to answer that question for you all, here on the podcast. As part of the coaching I do, often we talk about shame and how to manage and deal with it. The question we’re talking about was part of this discussion about minimizing shame in our lives. The question was, “what is a good way to not let myself feel so much shame when I act on my urges?” First off, let’s talk about why we feel shame. Knowing what shame is gives us the ammunition we need to actually end it. Shame is often contrasted with guilt. The thing about guilt is that it can be a powerful catalyst for change. Guilt is about learning that what you have done is not what you would like to have done, had you been able to. I’ve heard it said this way and this definition works for me. Guilt comes when I understand that what I’ve done is not right for me. Guilt comes when I’ve acted incorrectly, based on my own sense of right and wrong and according to my agency within the framework of truths I hold. As brene brown put it, guilt is I did something bad. Shame on the other hand, is not about a behavior, but about our sense of who we are. Shame comes when when I believe that what I’ve done makes me bad, irredeemable and unacceptable. Shame comes when I’ve acted contrary to my framework of truth knowing that I’m discarding my own sense of what is right and wrong and feel incapable of exercising my own agency. Again, going back to brene brown, Shame is, I am bad. So “What is a good way to not let myself feel so much shame when I act on my urges?” Here are 3 things that you need to do to eliminate shame when you have acted on urges that don’t fit your idea of who you want to be. First, you need to decide that this is an opportunity to learn Learn something move forward. Second thing you’ll need to eliminate shame when you’ve acted on your urges is talk to someone you trust. - Create intimacy - Practice openness. - Third thing, understand that you are enough. - Atonement - Each of these things will help you eliminate shame and understand that you are not bad. Hopefully they will serve to strengthen your capacity to exercise your agency, accept responsibility for your actions and shape the person you want to be.

4 Heinä 202221min