Highlights

• Sex is not a topic of conversation in most modern homes, which leads to a great amount of guilt and shame around unhealthy sexuality
• Online porn can get its hooks in us and it’s hard to break free
• Mindfulness can help you regain control of your life and help you create healthy sexuality

Interview with a Mindful Porn Addict

Hi, my name is Coleman and I’m a . . .

That’s how folks at 12 step meetings introduce themselves right?

Not me. Despite the title of this post – I choose not to identify long-term as an addict. I was an addict, but no more! More on that later.

I’m thankful to Craig for interviewing me for his podcast and this blog is largely an except from it, so it you haven’t listened to it yet, do that first.

Craig asks me why I think talking about sex, in particular compulsive sex and porn use, is shameful to talk about.

In our culture, sex is something largely relegated to the bedroom. Sex is a topic that most of us are not comfortable talking about. I think this is largely due to the way we were raised, which was impacted by the way our parents were raised, etc. There are lots of theories about why sex is a shameful topic in our culture at large. That’s not my point.

My point is that this discomfort with sex in general creates a great sense of shame around unhealthy expressions of sex. Those of us who have struggled with unhealthy sexuality – in whatever form – know this shame and guilt that keeps us hidden in the shadows, trying to keep our secrets from being uncovered.

For me, that is rooted in the lack of open discussion about sex when I was a kid. My father never talked to me about sex. My mother talked to me twice.

Once was when I was around 10 and she decided that was the time for the talk. I was sitting on the couch watching a baseball game and sat next to me and, in what seems like 30 seconds now, told me ‘where babies come from.’ It was forced, uncomfortable, and I was simply wasn’t ready for that talk yet. I needed it a couple of years later.

The second time was when I was around 13 and she found my drawer of magazines. All she said to me was, ‘you should show those to your dad, he might enjoy them too.’ Another very awkward and uncomfortable (and short!) conversation related to sex.

In between these two conversations, I was exposed to porn. I remember with great clarity the very first pornographic image I saw when I was around 11. I remember exactly what she looked like.

I was an adolescent and curious about the naked body and sex. And the only place I felt like I could learn was through porn. Now, this was before the widespread availability of porn on the internet, so it was hard to come by.

My unhealthy sexuality got worse in college, where I sexually harassed females on campus almost daily. Even when I was dating, engaged, and later married.

But the real problem started after I had graduated college, was married, and started my first job. I was in my mid 20s and we had just gotten dial-up internet in our house and my office. My office was secluded and I spent a lot of time alone, so I could spend a lot of time – well, you know. That started my ‘relationship’ with online porn that lasted for nearly 20 years.

Over the course of those years, I tried to stop many times. There were so many times when I would say, ‘I’ve got to stop doing this.’ And I might last three days or four days. I remember one time making it 60 days!

But it never lasted.

I kept going back to it.

I’m now divorced.

My relationship with my children is damaged.

If you’re not convinced that this is a problem – take my story to heart.  If you’re hiding it from your partner, if it’s making you less productive at work, if it’s taking you away from time doing other things, it’s a problem. Continuing to ignore that reality will eventually catch up with you. I didn’t believe it. I never believed it. But it did and it absolutely reframed my life.

But, what this failure did was provide me with an opportunity to regain control of and reframe my life in a positive way. So, what does that reframed life look like?

No more porn – at all. The Mindful Habit system works! And, for me, it worked fast. Within 3 months I had really gained control of my life in ways I haven’t experienced in a long time.

If you are not part of the program, what are you waiting for? Get off the fence and sign up today!

For those of you in the program, I can’t say enough about how important mindfulness practice is to this process. I do not think I would have been as successful at this if I had not gotten really serious about developing a daily meditation practice of at least 15 minutes.

How does mindfulness and habit change help with the porn problem? Primarily, it raises your awareness of what you are doing and increases your ability to focus. Mindfulness helps identify and increase that space between stimulus and response that can help you achieve freedom from your habitual responses.

Mindfulness will also bring to the surface the thoughts and emotions that are at the root of the sex and porn use. It can help you figure out why you are acting out in the first place, and bring healing and health to those parts of you.

Let my story inspire you to take action. Start running from your compulsive use of sex and porn and start running toward creating a great life.