I’m so thankful I stumbled across this little corner of the internet by accident. TL;DR: Hang in there. It’s worth it. You won’t be scared of life anymore.
I wanted to share my experience to give anyone struggling prior to day 76 the motivation to keep going. Being reminded daily that other people have done it and were thankful they did is all I needed to keep going.
I’ve experienced all of the standard benefits, but the biggest superpower I’ve gained is my outlook on life and the future. Up until NoFap, I spent my entire life with a quiet but violent desperation always present in the background of my mind. I’m a happy guy, I’m blessed with a great career, a supportive network of family and friends, a great wife, etc. I laugh a lot and I’m able to enjoy the little things. I go through ups and downs like everyone, but even during my happiest times I have always felt inches away from a crippling depression.
My life always felt like it was teetering on the edge of horrible and amazing. The worst part was, at a very deep level, (I didn’t realize this until well into No Fap) I felt like I ultimately had no control over which way I teetered, it was controlled by the random coin tosses of the universe and the way my brain was designed. That was scary and also what subconsciously convinced me to give up so many times on promises to myself to diet, exercise, start businesses, speak my mind, stand up for things, etc.
Eventually, as I got older, I just accepted this as part of modern life, and thought that everyone felt this way. I lumped it in with all of the other realizations people make as they come of age, like realizing adults don’t have things as figured out as it seemed like as a kid.
I started No Fap not ever thinking I had an addiction to porn, and never having sexual problems like ED or anything. I just heard it made people more motivated (and the science of down regulation and FosB made sense), and I’ve always been way more ambitious than my work ethic, so I thought it would help me follow through with some side projects outside of work.
But as the days passed with No Fap, the part of me that always felt a horrible depressing existence was only two inches behind me started to fade away. It was replaced with a feeling of sturdiness at the core of me. I can only describe it as a feeling of being “grounded” and stable. This is absolutely priceless. My life hasn’t drastically changed outwardly. I gained all of the regular benefits like improved concentration, more energy and determination, more ability to control other physical addictions/urges like nicotine, alcohol junk food and procrastination. These are all great but have been discussed at length. But what’s priceless is that the feeling of desperation and lack of control is more or less gone.
Whether I’m sad or happy or angry or tired, that scared feeling in the back of my mind that everything could get awful at any time is gone. Maybe it was hormonal and biological, maybe it was more psychological (accomplishing something difficult made me feel more in control of myself), probably a lot of both, I have no idea. All I know is, it’s totally worth it. When something stressful happened, I used to knee jerk into a mental space that was incredibly frightened of everything. I wanted to crawl into a hole and just ride out the rest of a horrible life until it was over. Now when I get stressed, I’m just stressed. When I’m sad I’m just sad. Then it passes and I’m happy again. And the best part of knowing that is not having a small part of myself worried during the happy times.
After my flatline ended around day 55, it’s been getting harder and harder, and the cravings feel like the first two weeks when I’m stressed and overwhelmed. I still get porn flashbacks a lot of the time. But now I know it’s completely worth it.
Wherever you are, however many times you’ve relapsed, hang in there this time. It will be so worth it. The effort you put in (which I know is a lot) is such small potatoes compared to what you get out of it. This is the force multiplier for a better life.
LINK – Day 76. It doesn’t get easier. But you get better. (age 25)
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