How to feel alive without the porn – R’s story
I am curious to write you because one angle of my problem is different from what I read here. I’m an artist, and I have an acute visual imagination. Since boyhood this imagination has been busy with detailed and specific fantasies that, as an attractive man of twenty-seven, I am sometimes able to fulfil. That sounds like an enviable beginning. To my loss, though, to the loss of many useful hours, I found porn before I found sex.
I am not suggesting that porn ruined my sex life. When I’m very happily taken, my habit shrinks to nil. But if (as now) I’m sleeping alone and out of work and money and thinking of someone far away, porn is a relief. It’s not the only relief (I did call myself an artist) but it’s the most immediately compelling.
It’s the most immediately compelling in low moments, when it doesn’t make sense to take a long walk because I just did that, and I’m too worried about the job search or the person I miss to let my hands work. When I’m facing the blank wall of my thoughts, porn is a way to set the room on fire.
But I told you that something is different about my case, and this is it: Porn relieves my tension, but that’s not why I have needed it. Porn relieves my lust, but that’s not why I’ve kept going back. Porn gives concrete images to abstract fantasies. I look at it to tell myself, There are real people somewhere who want to do this.
For some male fantasies I would not be able to claim that. So much mainstream porn is obviously a chore to the people involved and too often might be worse—the evidence of human trafficking and slavery. But people don’t have to be captured or paid for what turns me on.
For instance, I’m fond of dominatrix behavior. Between youtube and flickr, that’s exceedingly simple to find. If you even just think of how many old movies have some dominatrix scene— then imagine, on top of those hundreds, all the party videos, old commercials, candid shots, and self-portraits that are added all the time— it’s maddening. And if I’m alone and I don’t look at them then it feels like repression.
So that is what my porn gives me and why I can’t just dismiss it all as a product of women’s suffering. I am quitting it, though, and if you were able to advise at all how to feel alive (and sexually alive) during this bland time I would be glad to listen.
Thank you R for raising these interesting aspects of the porn habit ritual.
Various research studies have suggested that creative, intelligent people are more prone to addiction. It’s possible that such individuals put themselves under more pressure to meet targets in their lives or achieve levels of perfectionism. They may be in high-skilled careers that demand the same. Perhaps creative people go to greater lengths to escape the mundane and are more prone to emotional ups and downs. Compulsive behaviours can easily slip in to all these scenarios.
It’s true that the habit can come and go. When we’re alone and/or feeling at a low ebb, the cravings for pornographic stimulation can feel overwhelming. Yet at those times when we are relishing life, the habit seems like a distant memory. We get a taste of our physical and emotional needs being fully met, and the freedom that comes with it.
There’s nothing wrong with relishing our sexual fantasies too. I’m confident that you already know this. You say that seeking out erotic movies and images feels like a crashing waste of time, and not seeking them out feels like repression. That’s a spot-on account of the frustration of addiction, and so many of us are able to completely relate. In this state, our perspective is out of kilter and we can’t help attaching way too much meaning to porn. It really feels like an all-or-nothing dilemma. All this inner-wrangling consumes our energies and thought processes.
So as you say, the solution is to quit the activity. Trying to cut down on porn time or moderate yourself just doesn’t work out. So what can we do to feel alive during ‘bland time’…?
I’m pretty convinced that the brain has a limited supply of ‘good feelings’ available. These are the feelings of general, day-to-day positivity and self-esteem. But when we’ve conditioned ourselves to rely on the instant buzz of a compulsive habit, we feel entitled to that buzz all of the time. Porn just makes it so convenient.
But if there’s a limited bank of good feelings available, compulsively watching porn takes an advance on them. It rapidly drains the account, leaving us hollow and despairing for more. We anticipated such a high, and now we’re bereft. ‘Bland time’ becomes regret and self-loathing time.
Fortunately, quitting the habit makes space for us to regain perspective. A consequence of porn obsession is the abandonment of so many natural highs. Things that rewarded us just don’t seem to do it any more, and exploring new things just draws us back to porn. So a process of rediscovery and enlightenment is required, and this takes time.
I wish you every success in quitting porn; the maddening frustration and conflict will fall away. But in the first instance, I suggest making a plan. Take some of the measures that we discuss on this site, even when they might seem repressive or trite. Your perspective on all of this can only benefit in the long term.
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Hello R,
I used to be a highly creative artistic person myself also with a strong imagination & lots of vivid fantasies. I trained as a photographer to begin with and later I went on to train in contemporary dance.
However,what comes to mind in what you describe is that your use of porn is linked to your circumstances, I can really understand that. I myself have been unemployed for several months & its a worrying anxiety making time. I think being out of work affects very much how you (we) feel about ourselves and its common to feel rather down, so turning to porn either as comfort or distraction is all to easy.
I’m less convinced that using porn will help improve your artistic abilities or stimulate your real deep seated artistic creativity. I think our sexual fantasy persists despite our use of porn, in fact I have concluded that using & viewing porn leads to a dulling or deadening of my sexual fantasy life and definitely makes my lust much worse.
**YES! I too find the empowered female roles in porn far far more fascinating & far more erotic than the mainstream vanilla flavored macho male porn scenarios.
**Porn cannot fill up that sense of emptiness when your partner is physically away from you, cannot satisfy your desire to be held, touched & loved etc. Porn can never be a substitute for actual loving intimacy or sexual intimacy but I think you know that anyway.
good post. i think that porn giving concrete images to your abstract fantasies is just part of the ritual. it is the same for all of us whether we are artists or bus drivers. we see something during the day and it triggers all kinds of horny ideas and fantasies and we look at porn because living those fantasies for real is difficult to do.
i am not knocking you at all because i have exactly the same experience
Hi again,
I came to realize a long time ago that acting out your sexual fantasies is something that can only take place in the intimacy of a close loving relationship. With someone you love a great deal and with whom you can be very open & with whom there is an vast amount of mutual trust & safety. If you have these basic requirements then exploring your sexual fantasies is like adult play and is part of what helps keep intimate relationships alive.
**As I’m not in a relationship and have little or no expectation that I will be then I have come to accept that acting out my sexual fantasies is not going to happen but nor is it nearly as important as I once thought it was. I have also come to realize that I have no wish to act out my sexual fantasies as I will probably always be rather disappointed if I tried. I just enjoy my private fantasies for what they are i.e. all mine.
**Paradoxically I found using & watching porn deadened my own fantasies. But inflated my feelings of lust whilst closing my heart. Meaning I ended up with an unhealthy focus on the sexual act or sexual acts of various forms but no interest in the other person or their feelings. i.e. wanting the sex for myself & the pleasure but in a totally selfish way without regard for the humanity of the other person and I think this is the negative effects of viewing porn. We loose contact with our own deeper humanity & the humanity of the other person we might have sexual contact with. In that sense using porn is damaging but the good news is that stopping using porn gives an opportunity for a healing process to take place. And the more time away from porn & distance from porn you can gain the more likely that self healing can take place.
“Paradoxically I found using & watching porn deadened my own fantasies. But inflated my feelings of lust whilst closing my heart.”
Yes, this is definitely the paradox of using porn. My husband is the only porn addict I’ve ever had as a sexual partner and you’d think that with all the sex he watched on a constant basis, he’d have been a highly imaginative, passionate lover. But he wasn’t. I don’t mean this to sound cruel or bitter, but sex with him was the worst I ever had. It was tense and mechanical and really quite boring. That’s because good sex is about *feeling* and being spontaneous and in the moment–not about performing. It’s like any creative endeavor–when you let go and stay present, whatever you make is going to be beautiful. When you’re locked in your own head and trying to emulate someone else, whatever you make is going to be forced and superficial.
Absolutely 100% agree totally with your comments Margaux.
Porn sadly disconnects you (the user/viewer) from your real feelings, & when someone is disconnected & numbed out they are obviously not present nor in the moment. Heres yet another paradox of porn that actual sex might be one of the few things that has the potential to bring a porn obsessive out of their head and back into there bodies (i.e. has the power to reconnect them to themselves and their feelings once again). YES! the sex might not be very good but the sex would re-ground them. I’m not for a moment suggesting its a price worth paying for a partner though. But porn obsessives probably do need bringing down out of their heads/minds.
Yesterday I had a long discussion with a very good friend of mine about porn and we both concluded that porn has reached such a wide spread & almost saturation level that its now going to be totally impossible to ban porn or be rid of it. Its just not possible the porn genie is out of the poison lantern so to speak.
But nor should porn be allowed free reign either, I do think there are things we can do to curb the more negative effects. It might sound a cliche but I think like many harmful risky things in our society (illegal drugs, gambling, alcohol & binge drinking,etc) the more we educate, talk & debate porn the better. Further more I would like to see more substantial boundaries placed around internet porn. Meaning that porn would still exists but people who wanted it would perhaps have to register there desire to access another part of the internet where they could indulge there habit but porn wouldn’t be so easily accessible to young children.
I am fully aware there are no easily solutions here & its a real dilemma but I am in favor of having better boundaries around porn & explicit adult content. I use OpenDNS free content filtering service which I find very helpful as it allows me access to the internet whilst blocking the content I wish to avoid, it does this based on up to 30 categories. And because I have chosen this for myself & because I am in control of my own choices it doesn’t feel imposed. The result is I can use the internet without having to worry about stumbling across site’s I know I’m better off not seeing, I can use the internet with more confidence & feel more relaxed with it too. Its all about boundaries!!.