The Mini Challenge

General Discussion
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Sunday

@Forodwaith @anon67854825 @Forerunner @Rebooter81

Sorry I haven’t checked in the last few days. I’m back to square one again, not going in the direction I want to be going.

I feel like often I make one step forward and then two steps back, it’s frustrating. My lack of willpower is frustrating. Today only I already fell two times. I know I can do better, but just can’t seem to find a way to stop this. I really need a new plan, a new commitment, I do not want to keep going like this. There must be a way out of this habit, permanently!

I will try to recollect my ideas, and to start again. No more excuses, this is too important for my future, for my life.

Lord, I put everything in Your hands :pray:

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I fell yesterday. It can happen so fast. Later in the day I had some intense time in prayer and really felt like my hope and faith in the Lord and the freedom I have in Christ was built up. It’s amazing how numbing and dumbing this habit makes me in my sensitivity to the Lord and others. I become more and more self-absorbed and lost in a pit.

I have walked out of that pit and I will walk further with Jesus into greater freedom.

I’m trying again to go for a week and confident I can make it with God’s help.

Thank you for your strength, support, and prayers as well.

Peace.

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A reflection on Aoshigreen’s post; I’m sharing here what I recently shared on my Hero’s Challenge. I read my reasons every morning and practise using my vision multiple times daily to defeat urges as part of my urge-overcoming method - picturing it in my mind each time.

Negative Consequences of Viewing and Doing - 5 Strong Reasons Why I Want to Quit:

1. It hindered my spiritual progress, my relationship with GOD, and was a rebellion against His Plan for my life.
2. It stopped me from pursuing my dreams, goals, hobbies and success in this life and the Hereafter.
3. It led to struggles with my self-esteem, my relationships, my career and my finances.
4. It made me disinterested in good relationships with family and friends and killed love with lies and deception.
5. It fueled anxiety, depression, loneliness and self-loathing, and caused deep shame, regret and social isolation.

Positive Consequences of Living a Loving Life - 5 Strong Reasons Why I Want to Be Free and Clean:

1. I am overjoyed and spiritually accomplished after experiencing true repentance and drawing nearer to GOD.
2. I am completely transformed for the better in all aspects of my life.
3. I only see women as people to be loved, and have no interest in unclean imagery and sexual perversion.
4. My motivation to achieve legendary goals and change history has increased tenfold.
5. My confidence, self-respect and integrity are renewed, and I am happy with where my life is heading.

My Vision:
With restored integrity, I feel love and connection to GOD, to my higher self and to the people around me. I’m finally free, bursting with energy, creativity and motivation. I’ve regained my self-control and I advance daily towards a meaningful, happy and successful life by GOD’s Grace.

Sunday

Morning Routine: :white_check_mark:
Wake up by 6AM: :white_check_mark:
Three Important Tasks: :white_check_mark:

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Sunday/Week 50

:white_check_mark: 7/7 Wake up 5:00
:negative_squared_cross_mark: 5/7 Affirmations
:white_check_mark: 6/7 Meditation
:white_check_mark: 4/7 Exercise
:negative_squared_cross_mark: 5/7 Worship

Week Result :palm_tree: :palm_tree:

Week 46 :gem: 78.57%
Week 47 :gem: 60.71%
Week 48 :gem: 75.00%
Week 49 :gem: 82.14%
Week 50 :gem: 77.14%

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Amen @Forodwaith :candle:
“It’s amazing how numbing and dumbing this habit makes me in my sensitivity to the Lord and others. I become more and more self-absorbed and lost in a pit.”
I really feel with this :pray: this is certainly true for me.

Hence the “aside from…” @Rebooter81
Yes, and Correct bro :+1:
Relapses wound us much deeper than we recognise. And, is what naturally drew me here.
But part of me feels, we can replace the truth for untruths.

@Gk-00 :pray::candle:
Even those who struggle, but are honest, and seek strength in God, are living in his truth :pray:
Lord, forgive me for doing otherwise :pray:

I’m usually upbeat, confident, mindful and adaptable - if not completely, at least walking in that tranquil park, rich in blessings.

The poles shifted massively.

It wasn’t a sh*tty feeling, an easy to come-by grace that I could emotionally point to,
and say “aha, yes, relapses suck”

But “loss of sensitivity” is the closet way to describe it.
Eventually experiencing ‘those’ old dis-graces, which I hadn’t felt in a long time.

  • Unable to look people in the eye.
  • Post-relapse fog hanging in the air.
  • I look worn out, clothes look wrong.
  • I just look wrong.

Sunday

I was so glad to be in church today :pray:
To seek the Lord, to come home, to be with people, and to say “Yes.”

Penitential service tomorrow ~
I’m really looking forward to confession :pray:

@Forerunner bless you again bro :pray::pray::pray:

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Monday

Thank GOD for consistency!

Morning Routine: :white_check_mark:
Wake up by 6AM: :white_check_mark:
Three Important Tasks: :white_check_mark:

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This morning’s relapse has me feeling so much self-loathing. The truth is, the self-loathing preceded the act, it probably spurned it, and the shame of the act just amplifies a burning self-hatred. It is not the message of my God but is so loud right now. The voice of shame, of the crushing spirit
Please pray for me brothers that I might know God’s love deeper and especially in this place.

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It’s an illusion @Forodwaith
Please don’t let it bring you down, nor keep you away from God.
You’re here, admitting your faults, you know it, and God knows it :pray:

What can you learn from this situation?
That spurring on self-loathing is surely not a good thing, ungodly, and a good reason to want to keep trying?
And a good reason to start implementing some rules and regulations? :pray:

I will pray for you

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Monday/Week 51

:white_check_mark: 1/7 Wake up 5:00
:white_check_mark: 1/7 Affirmations
:white_check_mark: 1/7 Meditation
:white_check_mark: 1/7 Exercise
:white_check_mark: 1/7 Worship

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Monday

@Forerunner @Rebooter81 @Gk-00 @Forodwaith I’m truly gutted to see you down my dear friend :pray::pray::pray:

It was a lovely evening playing music and having confession.
Nothing amazing or profound.
No deep prayers unfortunately - I don’t really have any questions, or particular things on my mind.

I wonder whether we really don’t ask the Lord for much at all.
I’m pretty sure we don’t :pray:
Using Jesus’ encounter with the devil in the desert as an example to not want earthly riches, isn’t it.
If we are to trust God, and glorify him, shouldn’t we be asking for bigger things?
So then we can “Yep yep yep!!! God is Marvelous. I owe it ALL to him alone”

These are just some of my thoughts for tonight.

Media = viewed inappropriate things on YouTube this morning :pray:
No phone in morning, night.
Purposeful, suitable entertainment only :pray:

Exercise = some now :pray:

Social = :+1: getting closer to someone.
Lord, I’d like sparks and romance to blossom :pray:

Prayer/Confession = :pray: I need to read a paragraph of any scripture and look at my lifestyle as penance :pray: Thank You :pray:

This Journey/ocd/contrivedness = hmmm…
I spent a while editing, deleting, rewriting,… I was just about to refer to something I wrote but just realised I’d already deleted it.
Journey = trust/faith at the moment.
The reason for no questions in prayer - I have already received what I need to quit pmo, the Lord has provided, word, example, and through others, especially @Forerunner

Forerunner writing out reasons,
was it/should it be painful? Or bring revulsion?
If so, I find it difficult at the moment.

Its really late now, and I’m wanting to write more, and feel a sense of resolve (ocd?)
So, I’m gonna leave it there for now :wink::pray:

Love you guys - Thanks be to God, for everything.

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@Forodwaith Said a prayer for you this morning.

You are worthy of love brother. You’re here because you’re leaving this behind; that’s commendable. Hate the sin, love the sinner. Let that fuel you and give you new resolve to put a plan in place.

Tens of thousands of people die annually of curable illnesses simply because they don’t love themselves enough to continue taking their prescribed medicine. Our medicine is doing the work to get a proper plan in place with real accountability as @Rebooter81 described, positive activies to improve and uplift our moods, methods we can use to overcome every urge that comes. We have to love ourselves enough to change.

@anon67854825 No, writing out reasons shouldn’t be painful, perhaps some slight discomfort and uneasiness at best. What it should do is bring out passion in you. Reading the reasons should restore clarity to why you’re on this NoPMO journey and remind you that you wanted to quit for good.

How I made my list was by going online and searching negative consequences of watching pornography, selecting 25-30 that resonated with me and narrowing the list down to my top 5, then personalising them. I did the same for the positives, searching benefits after you stop watching pornography and the like. We tend to find that other people are quitting for similar reasons to us when we search enough. I didn’t have to do much digging, perhaps the 1st or 2nd page of results was enough.

GOD bless you brothers :pray:t5:

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@Forerunner, can you share the top 5 negative results of watching porn and the top 5 benefits of renouncing porn that you compiled? I think it would help and motivate us. Thank you.

Peace, MJ

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@MJ2019 Here they are, my friend. I shared here them previously in Sunday’s post.

As mentioned, I personalised the list. So for instance, I found many people who experienced great difficulty in maintaining their relationships with wives and girlfriends as a result of the addiction, but since I’m single, I didn’t include this reason, or anything related to sexual dysfunction. I focused more on what people shared that was personal to me, like an inability to feel connected during prayer, lack of motivation, depression, poor resource management like overspending and constantly wasting time, continually sexualizing every woman in sight and so on.

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Thank you. Any chance you could DM me right now? I am really struggling

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@MJ2019 I’ve dropped you a PM.

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I’ve reset my counter not because I viewed porn but because I masturbated and fantasized while half asleep in bed.
To me that could be seen as progress but it wasn’t necessary so equally it was a step back. Much as I wanted to justify it or play it down as better than a porn binge I realised not resetting just felt like being dishonest. Lying to myself and anyone following me. It weakens my commitment to total abstinence; ('damn it can’t I just have that but not porn or not reset the counter and I’ll feel better? ')
Nah I think better to be all or nothing. ‘All In’ is the way to go. I’m accountable on all my devices now anyway might as well go completely clean

So that’s me thinking out loud and sharing.

Then I found this video online which confirmed that choice to me

https://youtu.be/-upq1SeZuuk

Hopefully this link works and people can access it? I might have to watch it again personally

I think this is a good tip (not that I’m doing much better than anyone else I’m not setting the pace like ‘forerunner’ well named friend)
The tip is this watch loads of motivational nofap videos including forerunners of course (he isn’t paying me to say this honest)
Watching lots of no fap videos maybe a couple a day will def help remotivate those of us who have fallen

Peace and God bless Rbtr81

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@anon67854825 @Forodwaith @Forerunner @Rebooter81

Still struggling, i fell yesterday and once more this morning. I want to get back from this pit, need new hope and energy to go on. Thank you for the enthusiasm and prayers guys, it really means a lot to me.

@Forodwaith we are in this together, I am struggling a lot as well and sometimes I really lose hope. I really wish I could get going again, and leave the past and my errors behind.
We have a fresh start in our hands, let’s pull each other out of this mess! :muscle:

Let’s start from today, without worrying about the future. I will post again before going to bed, to tell you how was the rest of the day.

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@anon67854825 @Forerunner

Thank you for your prayers and encouragement.

@Gk-00 hearing your fight in this and knowing we are in this together really encourages me, thank you!

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Bless you @Rebooter81
Thank you for this.
I decided to be completely honest too, I looked at things on YouTube again this morning, which transpired into a few moments of “p” searching, raising fantasy levels, so I’ve reset as well :pray:

My mornings are extremely poor.
I set my alarm early but never get up straight away, fall back asleep and have weird dreams

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@Rebooter81 Thanks for the kind words brother, and the channel endorsement :pray:

Tuesday

Morning Routine: :white_check_mark:
Wake up by 6AM: :white_check_mark:
Three Important Tasks: :white_check_mark:

New video: The Truth about Pornography!

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