How to Stop Using Porn for Anxiety or Depression

NoFap is an exciting way to improve your life.

You stop watching porn and…

It gives you confidence, mental clarity, and vitality.

But two triggers hold us hostage to masturbation and porn: anxiety and depression.

Read this article to understand them, and it will help you quit porn and jerking off.

And I’ll also give you my best tool for dealing with them.

Does anxiety or depression cause you to watch porn?

Thanks to the ideas I’m going to share with you in this article, you’ll become more aware of these two triggers.

Trigger 1: Anxiety
Trigger 2: Depression
Does porn work as self-medication?
The right answer

Companion video

Check out the companion video if you don’t want to read:
https://youtu.be/GXlzg3-K8lY

Without further ado, let’s start with trigger number 1.

Trigger 1: Anxiety

Here’s a story from a NoFap client, Jay.

His mother and father were very critical.

They had many expectations and kept pushing him to become what they wanted.

If Jay did something that pleased his father, the father gave him approval and love.

If Jay didn’t live up to the expectations, the father withdrew approval.

So Jay grew up seeking his parents’ validation and saw any negative reactions as rejections.

Today, he has fear of failure or rejection that causes crippling anxiety.

Jay became a Type A personality.

Whenever he reaches out to someone, he craves a positive response. Otherwise, he gets upset.

So he often chooses not to reach out to people at all.

To cope with anxiety, he developed a porn addiction at 12 years old.

He started by buying porn magazines and trading them with others.

Now many decades later, he finds himself watching porn online and masturbating the whole weekend.

And he feels this addiction drains his life energy.

Jay’s story is quite common.

People develop all kinds of anxiety growing up.

Another example is anxiety around COVID-19.

People are anxious about getting COVID.

And this anxiety triggers them to use porn as a coping mechanism.

Now let’s look at the second trigger.

Trigger 2: Depression

Depression is another pattern that causes us to watch porn as a coping mechanism.

Let me share how I used porn before going NoFap.

I got a lot of programming about how I should be while growing up, especially from my grandmother.

And I am grateful for it because this is where my work ethic, discipline, and passion came from.

But my upbringing also made me a neurotic perfectionist.

One example is when my ex-wife’s dog died accidentally 13 years ago.

I adored that dog because I associated my love for my ex-wife with him.

Taking him on long walks together or laughing at the funny things that he did or taking him to a veterinarian—great memories!

As a result, I developed mild depression.

I blamed myself for not preventing the dog’s death.

I also thought that my life had been so much better before and now the good days were over.

I kept playing these thoughts in my mind, unwilling to accept the new reality and driving myself deeper into depression.

And I escaped that depression with tons of porn.

And it helped me release that emotion and not feel it for a few minutes.

But then I would inevitably feel even worse—because of guilt.

I stayed depressed for 2.5 years. That’s too much time to waste on depression.

So depression is a huge trigger for watching porn as a coping mechanism.

And it’s often the result of the programming from your parents.

They kept criticizing you and turned you into a perfectionist.

Now you beat yourself up for past mistakes such as missed opportunities.

You tell yourself a story about how you didn’t live up to your expectations.

And you go to porn to escape these thoughts.

That said, let’s look at how porn “helps” you.

Does porn work as self-medication?

You learned porn at a young age as a coping mechanism for anxiety or depression.

It seemed like the best idea ever at the time.

But now that you are older and more mature, you realize it’s childish and unsustainable.

It leaves you feeling even worse after jerking off: you regret wasting your time and potential.

But what’s a sustainable solution for anxiety and depression?

Here it is.

The right answer

You want to stop living in the past or future.

With depression, you’re living in the past.

With anxiety, you’re living in the future.

But you can’t run from the past or future.

Neither with porn nor with any other band-aid.

The answer is to live in the present and take positive action now.

Your feeling of self-worth and confidence comes not from running but from taking action.

If you run, you only make it worse.

Admit that porn is self-medication that doesn’t work.

You’re always in pain outside of those few short minutes when you watch it.

And you deplete your energy and resolve to the point that you feel listless.

Set goals for your career, health, or relationships.

Work on them every day.

When you accomplish a goal, you get dopamine and a feeling of achievement.

And you’re motivated to work on the next goal.

That’s how you live in the present, forgetting about the past and working on your future.

And remember that after quitting porn, anxiety or depression might get worse initially.

It’s like you stopped running from the monster, turned around, and looked it in the eye.

I know it’s difficult. But that’s part of your path of spiritual growth.

You learn to be comfortable with discomfort.

And the longer you are on “No PMO,” the easier it gets.

And you don’t need porn as a coping mechanism anymore.

Your biggest growth in life comes from facing a challenge head-on and tackling it.

That’s how you uncover the root issue and deal with it.

As a result, you heal and you become a stronger person with tons of perseverance.

And that feels fantastic!

There you have it, an alternative to using porn for anxiety or depression.

How to build confidence instead of soothing yourself with porn

One reason you watch porn is that you don’t feel confident in life.

You struggle with being social. You don’t have the confidence to talk to other people. You have anxiety.

And then you watch porn to escape those depressive feelings.

But you know that this coping mechanism is not sustainable. Your life is already getting worse. And eventually, PMO will drive you into the ground.

Instead, you can build your confidence so that you are social and can enjoy life rather than run from it. Here’s one key strategy for doing that.

Your animal brain hates embarrassment. This is exactly why you don’t feel confident. You don’t want to say or do something stupid so that other people judge you and laugh at you.

Now you can hack this smartly. You need to teach your brain that embarrassment is okay.

To do that, you embarrass yourself on purpose. You do absurd things in front of other people. You push your comfort zone.

That’s how your animal brain lets go of micromanaging the expectations of other people. And you feel more confident.

Sustainable ways to relieve anxiety

I see a lot of clients go to PMO as a coping mechanism for relieving anxiety. It does work for a short moment but ultimately, it is an unsustainable strategy.

The key is to deal with anxiety directly—as the root cause of PMO addiction.

And I totally understand if you are feeling anxious. People are simply unprepared physically and psychologically for the amount of pressure the modern world puts on them.

I am not a naturally anxious person. But I had periods in my life when I had it.

One time was after my son Denis was born. My cousin’s kid had died a year before, right before his birthday. I was scared that something like that could happen to my own son.

I’ve been struggling with overthinking recently. I feel it is also related to anxiety.

I might think of all the different details of any task at hand. Even something as simple as riding a bike to a grocery store.

That said, let me share a few ways I’ve used to overcome this anxiety.

Focusing on just one thing

Just like many people, I like focusing on one thing. When I am laser-focused, I forget about any problems that I might have in the future. I feel calmer.

To achieve that focus, I set goals and make plans for achieving them.

Then I take that planning down to a day level. I schedule my day in 30-minute segments. I know exactly what I will be doing and that helps with focus.

I also make sure to minimize distractions. If I have a distracting thought, I write it down. It’s like I’m downloading this thought off my mind. My mind stops worrying about it as a result because now it knows that I will get back to that thought later.

I also eliminate distractions from the phone. I turn off notifications and look at the phone as little as possible.

Letting go of control

Anxiety is about trying to control everything including perceptions of yourself in others. I do my best to let go of that control. My goal is to be like a speaker in a club. It just plays music and doesn’t care about how anyone reacts to it.

Create an explanation for your fear (I learned this from Daniel Gilbert). Our mind lets go when it has an explanation of the things it wants to worry about. It’s best to do this in writing.

Do your best and let go of everything else. One way to avoid anxiety is to focus just on the next hour, not on your entire future. Do your best in the next hour. That’s why scheduling works for me: I focus on the next 30 minutes.

Go into the trance of the present moment. Do activities that don’t have a goal. It also teaches you to let go.

One exercise that I recommend to reprogram your mind is using public washrooms as much as possible. Be as loud as you can 🙂

Attack your mental health issue via your physical health

Although anxiety happens in the mind, it is tightly connected to the rest of the body. For example, I feel more anxious when I am hungry after 22 hours of intermittent fasting.

That’s why your anxiety might have a physical cause. Or you might be exacerbating your anxiety by keeping your abdominal muscles tense.

I’d recommend seeing a doctor for your anxiety. But if they prescribe a medication, proceed with caution. See how it works for you and compare the benefits to the side effects. Some of those medications might kill your motivation.

Finally, stay active and exercise to engage your mind through your body. You will produce serotonin that makes you feel better, including alleviating anxiety.

Don’t just read and forget! Take action now

Be the hero you’re destined to be. A hero right here!