When you are struggling with porn addiction, you often feel helpless...

When I was in a porn addiction, I put porn on a pedestal. This is natural.

Last night I spoke to one of our first clients. He joined the Beyond Compulsion Academy around a year and a half ago. He's now stopped the behaviour for over 16 months.

This week, a new client shared that it has been one of the happiest weeks of his life. He had been stuck trying to find a solution to his problem with porn for years, but finally he now knows exactly what to do at all times.

Last night, I spent over 3 hours in the podcast studio. We had a big BCA group call (record number of guys on it) and then I went straight to playing football. The football game was with some guys I haven't played with before and it was pretty terrible. We ended up playing for an extra 20 minutes and so I didn't get home until around 9. I cooked, ate, facetimed my partner for a bit and chilled out on my sofa. But, I felt very awake from such a busy day and from playing fo

Yesterday, someone got in touch with me who didn't feel he was addicted to porn, but felt like it was a real problem in his life. I have been exactly there myself. I get it. There can be a lot of unhelpful stigma around "porn addiction" and many misconceptions too.

A lot of people don't expect to have any desires and then are hit out of nowhere by strong compulsive desires. And it is right there that people face a problem. Porn addiction is not a problem when you have no desires. It is a problem when you do have desires.

When I was in a porn addiction, I found it hard to focus on one task at a time. I jumped from activity to activity and would give myself constant breaks to scroll on social media or have a snack. And often I'd end up watching porn and masturbating too. My focus was terrible.

Whether you feel a lot of shame around your porn use or not, you will eventually experience the inevitable moment of compulsive desire. This is that exact moment where you want to go ahead and engage in your compulsive behaviour.

I know the feelings of doubt. The uncertainty. The anxiety. The fear of relapsing, again. I know it all. I have lived it. And now I am on the other side and can see what is going on in society, very clearly.

I believed that relapse was part of recovery. I believed that one day my desires would magically vanish and I'd just forget about this problem altogether. This wasn't the case.

"what is wrong with me?" "why do I keep having these desires?" "when will this go away?" "will these desires be around forever?" "how do I get rid of these desires?" "I will just look once... this will be the last time, that is okay right?"

A lot of addiction recovery advice is founded upon the socially constructed idea of a person being an "addict". The idea is that the "addict" is fixed with a certain problem for life and that they should manage their addiction until the day they die. My personal experience and work with clients completely conflicts with this idea.

Back then, I was deep in a porn addiction and going through that broke up propelled me on a mission to change. I never wanted to experience such strong feelings of rejection and failure again. So, I tried to transform my life and overcome my porn addiction.

One of the reasons that I am able to talk so openly about porn addiction is because I understand why I was stuck in the addiction for so long...

For years I would really beat myself up over my use of porn. I'd call myself a "failure", a "loser, and at times I'd really despise who I was.

In the film Mean Girls, Cady Heron says "Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything about it..."

Trying to stop watching porn is difficult because most people who talk about this problem do so from a place of helplessness. People are confused. People lack clarity. People keep relapsing. But, it doesn't have to be like this!

This morning I woke up to read another lovely message from someone who joined our program a few months ago...

My shame compounded as I did everything the experts told me and yet continued to relapse over, and over, and over. It got very dark at times. I want to expose this helpless language and show an alternative way of thinking is possible.