- Prelude
I had 5 previous attempts of quitting before reaching a year, first a bunch of 20 day streaks, then 3 months, and finally, one year of hardmode. I don’t often visit the subreddit since most posts are about people starting, or relapsing. Don’t get me wrong, those posts remind me not to relapse, and also how far I got, but I don’t feel them as a great contribution, so, I’ll do my best to contribute with this post.
- Introduction
NoFap helps you realize when you’re wasting your time, by leaving something you’re hooked with, you realize what else keeps you hooked, that’d be, anything filling the void of not masturbating. For me, that was online videogames, which I could finally quit 2 months ago, not because of willpower, but because you start to perceive those as a waste of time.
It also helps to build healthy habits, like lifting, extroversion, even engaging conversations, that led me to believe that superpowers actually come from creating changes in your life, if you start changing something, in no time you will WANT to change more, especially if you are not happy.
- The actual superpower
Abstinence, as you already probably know, is as simple as abstaining from ejaculating, many cultures relate semen to the vital force of the body, and in my experience, it is THE superpower.
I started to realize that, in my case, flatlines occurred right after a wet dream, which happened every 7 to 15 days, depending of how my week was, that day and the 2 days after were hell, I’d feel like my soul was out of my body, weak, timid, depressed.
- Realizing actual needs
One day in college, my class was introduced to the maslow pyramid of needs, which made sense to me, except for one bit, why is sex included in the Physiological step, and also, why it has nothing to do with the Love/Belonging step.
I found the answer to that question in this very last month, and my thoughts might shock some of you, especially those who are still with the idea of a perfect relationship in mind, or finding “her”
At some point you will need sex to function, not love, raw sex, the contact with another being, despite of it has love involved or not is necessary to achieve further steps in your life. Why?. Because getting to have sex means you can achieve all of your most intrinsic or primal body functions, you are alive and successful from the evolutionary point of view. Maslow knew his shit.
- Relationships are a power-play (any kind of, for both sexes)
I’ve met a woman in college at the very start of my journey, I fell for her at first, but as I progressed and the fog was clearing, I could actually realize why I was so attracted to her at first, the point of sharing this is trying to get someone of you to relate and maybe even get a realization out of this.
Here’s why:
Lack of interaction: prior to meeting her, I’ve had almost zero interaction with women in the past 5 years, she never actively tried to get advantage of that, but my always pleading position was obvious, so the advantage was on her all the time.
She’s not even close to a friend: we would always chat, laugh, help each other out with assignments, get coffee together, but, the day I confessed to her over text that I was unsure about what I wanted life-wise (I was on a flatline), she avoided me for a while, and since that day, she no longer texted about any non-college subject. At the first sign of weakness she stopped talking, that left me a big lesson, leave real troubles for real friends.
Finally, the most important one: She was the only one: contact with women is fundamental in your life, it’s different than contact with males, because of one simple reason, you get off from it, you release the dopamine you are right now abstaining from. Mark those words. I’ve realized that the more women I held contact with, the less I needed to be with “she”, that’s why I described relationships as power-play, the more options I had, the less I needed to be with her.
- Closing
I would feel guilt for chatting with a female acquaintance in her presence, because I knew “she” would get jealous, and I felt that as my fault. It was a great feeling to leave that box of thought, to not give a fuck about her anyone feelings, but not in a harmful way, it’s about realizing that your sanity goes before the feelings of others. NoFap helped me to build better relationships (and strengthen previous ones), but with said power you have to draw boundaries, most posts here talk about how everyone feels better around people, and loses some of their anxiety, but a few give further explanation.
Don’t be afraid to be powerful, it’s not a bad thing, don’t ever let anyone have power over your mind, you should own it, and I think that’s the core of joining NoFap, to own your emotions, to know what’s good and bad for you, to create your own restrictions and limits.
Thanks for everything.
LINK – One year later, what I learned.
by delayedufo
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