Boredom is the enemy

Hi all, so a short story about myself, I am 25 years old, full time student studying finance, part time shelf filler for a large grocery chain, never had a girlfriend and do not want one (that is a whole other "can of beans" not worth getting into). I don't really like sharing myself with others, neither do I like hang out or be social with other's, primarily because I don't like what my current friends talk about, so I am a bit of a loner, but that's how I like it.

I've been on and off PMO for the last 10 years at least, I've tried to quit many times, but always end up convincing myself that a small look won't hurt me, and like clockwork, every time I view porn I end up masturbating. I really want to change this behaviour of mine, and my first initial thoughts to the desire to masturbate, a big trigger for me is boredom.

When I'm not working, attending university, or learning my university course materials, I can find myself typically surfing through YouTube and Twitch, I watch a lot of IRL streamers (girls ofc) and my youtube videos can be innocent, but it takes such little effort to get onto videos of a more triggering nature.

I want to quit masturbation and porn because of my poor ability to concentrate. I find myself nodding off most days when I'm trying to learn, or even when I'm watching videos online, and I believe its because of my desensitised brain to powerful stimuli (porn).

Thank you for reading my post, it's not much, but it's a start.

Day 2

Well, I almost relapsed this morning, it is such a slippery slope, I woke up and was watching twitch, and without thinking about "tried to make my self more comfortable below my waist line". As soon as I realised what I was doing I pulled away, which is good, but it just goes to show how comfortable and at ease I am with the act.

Such absent mindedness almost cost me my new start in life, so for the rest of the day I am going to keep myself busy with chores around my house, washing, cleaning, and preparing for next week.

I am very happy that I have started this journal, and will continue to do daily updates at least for 30 consecutive days. That is my goal at the moment, the best I have done is 13 days before relapsing, I know I can do far better than that, and I am going to prove it to myself.

Cheers.

EDIT: I live in Australia, so for me its 10:30am at the moment

Day 3

So last night at work was rather interesting, In that I was very irritable, I closed myself off from everyone and for the most part had a scowl on my face. However, I did put a lot of myself into my work last night, trying to keep my mind off things (not sex, but this abstinence might be why thoughts came up)

I've decided to start exercising consistently again, as I feel it helps to keep me away from PMO and masturbation, I should of outlined in my first post that I am going hard mode, so no orgasm of any kind, other than "wet dreams" if they occur.

I've not been tempted to relapse thus far today, I feel scared though. I am scared because every time I go through this withdrawal process I find my mind thinking about getting a girlfriend, about love, about relationships etc. and putting resources such as time and money into building relationships with girls. However, this is folly, I can't have a girlfriend, or even girls as friends, but enough on that. What usually happens next is that the feeling and the thinking about getting a relationship will push me over the edge and I will relapse just to escape the thoughts, because after I PMO I no longer care about girls or relationships with them.

I'm going to have to think of new tactics to manage these thoughts and feelings. Because orgasm and PMO are not an option, not this time. I'll need to give this some more thought.

Cheers.

Day 4

So rather annoyingly, yesterday afternoon I spent most of my time before work looking a youtube videos, specifically ones with pretty girls, not soft-core porn or anything like that, just pretty girls. I then spent most of my time at work thinking about girls and sex, which I almost never do, I usually listen to audio books, podcasts or music. I guess I should be thankful that it was only a small portion of my day, and there were only a few moments at work where the thinking about girls was intense.

I'm glad that I'm doing this now, when I'm on summer break, as it would be arguably impossible if I was back at school, surrounded by pretty girls, this is the problem with reboots, I don't want to think about girls, getting a girl friend or anything of that nature, because it is a waste of my time, I don't have the time to spend with a girl, neither do I have the energy to feign interest in the "what's currently popular and trending" topics that people think seem to matter so much these days.

So, this is me, still aiming for 30 days, then 90 days, but I know, because I can still remember Porn scenes in my head, I still remember the first time I watched it, a so called friend introduced it to me at school when I was 15 or 16, and I can remember other, more popular videos that I have watched many times.

Clearly I have a long road ahead of me, but I believe that it will be worth it in the end, because how I view sex, love and women is toxic, and my energy levels are terrible.

Cheers.

Day 5

I am certainly becoming more prone to frustration and irritation in general. Yesterday at work I could feel it almost blowing over, I was close to erupting and having a go at someone, which I have never done, I have felt the urge to do so, but not as intensely as this.

I was watching some Netflix show and they had a sex scene in it, and I'm happy to say that I did not masturbate or watch porn after it, it's kind of funny really, I felt more like "I'd much rather work towards real sex with someone than what a video and feel empty inside afterwards and no be able to concentrate". This brings up an important point though, some of my favorite shows and movies have depictions of intimate scenes, which can make this process all the more difficult, but that is what adult television is. I'm not watching anything that only revolves around sex, but it is a part of the shows as it is a part of life.

I feel dull this morning, like I know what I'm doing today, and I'm happy that I am doing it, but I'm not really excited for it, maybe I need more sleep, and to eat more. I don't feel like relpasing, but in the past I know that when I've been in a similar mood, I try to get out of it, and then the idea of porn (which has worked so well in that past) will come into my head and I know that it will temporarly work. I will stay strong throughout today, and remember that this is not a sprint, but a marathon.

I guess that will do for today,

Cheers

Day 0

So, yes, I relapsed, however I firmly believe it was necessary this time.

For the past 5 days I have felt off, and what I mean is not myself, my thoughts have not been what they used to be, and the way I felt towards people and behaved has been different. I even went so far as to spend money (little that I have being a student) on new clothes! New clothes, of all things, in order to be more appealing to girls that I work with, and the old me was FIRMLY against any work place relationships, because mixing that level of intimacy at a place which demands you to behave in a particular fashion is not ideal for building those types of relationships (because it's not your authentic behaviour).

My mind has been a blur as well, I went back to my body building mind frame (because girls can be just as shallow as us guys) of working out whenever I can and eating as much protein as possible, the old me gave up that nonsense and was entirely focused on only staying relatively fit, but otherwise completely focused on my studies.

So, I think the issue was that I was far to focused on abstaining from PMO and MO, and trying to distract myself with other activities that took away physical urges.

I think moderation is in order, because I was masturbating either once a day or once every other day, which took its toll on my concentration and energy levels. So, I am going to aim for once a week, if not less, but I am not going to let my mind get to the point of thinking real thoughts of investing money and time into the pursuit of women/ a girlfriend, because the real me does not want one.

Cheers.

Day 1

Today has been a very productive day, and I attribute this primarily to not being overly cautious towards potential triggers. I have been/ felt the temptation to look at porn, but the thought of actually masturbating is not attractive what so ever, I feel bored by the idea of it, and the feeling of climax is not worth seeking out.

I managed to complete tasks around my house and social obligations to people efficiently today, however, there is one thing which of the past few weeks that is bothering me that I have yet to address. Between the hours of late morning and early afternoon, I stuggle to read my textbooks. My mind either wanders or I become incredibly sleepy, and I'm not sure as to the cause, thus how to remedy the situation. I in part believe it is down to my diet, that I need to eat more foods that digest slower, and eat larger portions (I hate eating food, it's so time consuming and is expensive). I think I need a habit to prime my study sessions as well, which I will look into.

So this is day 1 of my second journalled attempt to quit. But perhaps I should just look at quitting porn, instead of porn and masterbation, because porn does have an effect on my attitude towards women (negative). That said, I think masturabation should be okay, so long as I am mindful of my thoughts when I do, which I think is possible, as there have been many times when I have masturbated just to the thought of the act, rather than any pornographic images or "people".

Cheers.