00:00:00Overcoming Shame and Unwanted Pornography
00:13:33Understanding and Overcoming Pornography Addiction
00:21:30Understanding Pornography and Healing
TENTANG EPISODE INI
Send us a text with feedback about the show or questions you'd like to see addressed.
Are you hungry for a deeper exploration of your story when it comes to overcoming shame and pornography addiction? With our returning guest, Allan Standford, we examine how pornography use is actually a misguided strategy for working out our struggles and life stories.
The episode drives even deeper into the dark corridors of fear- the fear of rejection, and its intertwined relationship with unwanted sexual behaviors. We dissect this fear, tracing its origin to the unsettling lack of control in vulnerable, loving relationships. As we tread these murky waters, we also expose the exploitative and coercive face of the pornography industry. We urge you to delve into your personal biases and understand the root of your motivations, a critical step towards initiating positive changes. Further, we explore how pornography sometimes serves as a 'window looking out from your inner turmoil and a desperate longing for love."
Join us, as we wrestle with these challenging topics in our quest to understand and overcome.
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Amerika Serikat
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WEBVTT
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Welcome to the Reclaimed and Unashamed podcast.
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We are helping men to rewire their brains and overcome the shame that often surrounds unwanted pornography use.
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I'm your host, Kolton Thomas, and you are now listening to episode 20, where we are having our guest, alan Standford, back again.
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He was our guest a few episodes ago.
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We're gonna have him reintroduce himself a little bit for those of you who did not tune into his last episode.
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However, if you missed that, I would encourage you to go back.
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Listen to that other one first.
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Alan just brings years of practical experience working with men who struggle with not only pornography addiction but also with sex addiction.
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You know men who have had trouble acting out to where their addiction has gone from private to public having affairs.
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One huge takeaway from the episode, as you're going to see, is that we talk about how, specifically, pornography is attempting to help us work something out about ourselves and our story Basically.
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In other words, what is the usefulness that we're getting out of pornography in our life that has us continuing to come back to it, that has us revisiting it again and again, even though it hurts us so badly, because you know, by applying logic, you'd think that well, if something hurts really badly again and again, and again.
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Then we would just be able to eventually stop once it hurts bad enough.
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But for so many guys they feel trapped, and so that would not be the case if pornography was not helping us to sort something out.
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And exactly what that is is something we're going to talk about in this podcast episode.
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Of course, it's a little different for each guy, but we're going to talk about some examples of how to sort this out in your own story, in your own life, and, of course, we don't recommend doing it without getting proper help and guidance from a professional, someone that has experience, especially if you've been stuck for a long time.
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Guys, and there are a lot of places you can go that offer you solutions that produce more shame and more hurt.
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And so be on guard, right?
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I know sometimes it's hard to trust yourself if you're struggling with pornography because you're not doing the things that you say that you're going to do, as in you're not quitting pornography when you want to quit pornography.
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So sometimes it can be hard to trust yourself, but if you're participating in some kind of program and you have a gut that's telling you that this is probably harming you, like you're feeling even more ashamed than you did before.
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Then you can trust yourself enough to get out of that and seek another program or seek more help.
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I also want to add that there are men like Andrew Tate in the world, or even David Goggins you know, I really like David Goggins, but these are men out there who are really kind of becoming iconic in our culture for masculinity and their primary messages are often you know, no one else can help you.
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You've got to do this yourself.
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You don't need the help or assistance of other people.
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You're weak if you rely on other people.
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I just want to take a second and say if you're listening to those guys, that's not bad.
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You can find a lot of motivation in the things that they're saying.
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However, what it can do is create this mindset that help is not good for you, or you don't need it or you shouldn't get it, and you're weak if you seek it, and that's just a very highly individualistic mindset.
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Again, I don't disagree with everything that they're saying, although I do disagree with most of what Andrew Tate says maybe that's a conversation for another episode and I really believe that even David Goggins would agree with that.
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I mean, he was on a team essentially right In the Navy SEALs, like he relied on his team, so he knows how to be a team player too.
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But you just have to be careful if you're listening to certain figures online that get you in this mindset of like, oh man, if I haven't figured this out myself by now, then I just need to engage in a different kind of self-discipline or a different kind of self-talk.
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Man, we are not wired that way.
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We are wired to grow and heal in relationships and so as you listen to this episode, please keep that in mind and along those lines.
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Lately we've had some guys sign up for our 10-week journey here at Reclaim.
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That's our flagship program that's designed to help men, even if they've been struggling with pornography for a long time, even if they've tried a lot of other things and they haven't worked.
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This 10-week journey is designed to help men get results and move forward, and I've had a lot of conversations with guys recently that have said I've tried these other things, either by myself you know, I've been reading books, or I tried getting an accountability from a couple of my close friends or they've even tried someone else's program and they've just said I know I need to go deeper.
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Where can I find that?
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Deeper work?
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And that is exactly what we've designed Reclaimed both the community and our 10-week program to be Now.
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It does require an investment.
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If you guys are interested in that and you think you're in a place where you're ready to do something like that, where you know the work is intensive, I'm not gonna shy away from the amount of work and self-reflection and effort, as well as vulnerability, that doing the program is gonna take, because you cannot get through the program without building real relationships with other men, without getting real accountability, one-on-one accountability and coaching, and so it's not gonna be easy, but it is very, very effective and I've seen it work for so many men.
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So again, guys, we're approaching the end of another year.
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If you want to be free of pornography and live a better than porn life in the following year, then why don't you reach out to me?
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You can get on our main website, wwwreclaimedrecoverycom, and you'll see links right there on the homepage for how to join our community app, and once you get in the app and create an account, you can actually reach out to me and message me directly in there I can get you going in the right direction.
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We can set up a call to discuss the program and we can explore together whether that's something that's gonna be a good fit for you.
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So now I think we're ready to move on with our episode.
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We're gonna begin with Alan just giving himself another quick introduction and then we're gonna dive right in.
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Yeah, man, you are the honored guest of the show and you're a great friend and a mentor of mine.
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You're also a therapist in the community and we share the same alma mater, john Brown University Counseling Program.
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Anyways, tell us some more about yourself, alan.
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Tell us a little bit about your background and therapy and anything you want to share, just about your family and what you love to do.
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Yeah, sure, I've got a big family, five kids, married for 16 years and counting.
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And let's see.
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I went to UCA.
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I studied psychology and philosophy there.
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I started my graduate program in counseling there, took a high atus, finished a John Brown and have a master's in marriage and family therapy and licensed marriage and family therapist and licensed professional counselor.
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Along the way I heard the certified sex addiction therapist credentials.
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Yeah, and so that's a pretty extensive training.
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It really takes an investment, it costs a lot, it takes a lot of time to get the training, and so that's giving you important tools and your tool belt and experience to deal with men who are wrestling with unwanted sexual behaviors and pornography.
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So maybe a good place to start is just talking about why, what are the reasons that you see a lot of men coming in struggling with either pornography or unwanted sexual behaviors?
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Well, for one, because it's so powerful, and by powerful I mean it's effective at getting at the human thing.
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It's like, in a way, porn sex in general speaks to who we are as human beings and the deep desire we have to be wanted and desired.
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You know it has all the it's right.
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I mean it has somebody else wanting to be let in by me and to like, move towards my good and what feels good, and also indicating to me that letting me into them is good for them and that they desire that, and that's like the deepest human thing.
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That's why sex and nakedness is talked about so much in all the ancient religions of the world and it's just it's really core to the human thing.
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It's in culture, it's in art, all the movies we watch, it's everywhere.
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You know, it's not something that can be stifled or pushed down.
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It's that integral to our identities as human and it has to be treated as such.
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And you know, I think what you're getting at there is like we've talked about this on the podcast before but just our desire to be deeply known and deeply loved, fully known and fully loved.
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You know, I'm curious.
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I think so many guys who watch porn know that that's not what they're really getting and yet for some reason, it's still so enticing to us.
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And it makes me curious about why and for example, I think about in movies that we watch we so easily place ourselves in the shoes of, like the hero of the movie.
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You know, if you think about when you were a kid, whether it was Star Wars or the Rings, we do have this amazing capability to place ourselves in the shoes of the people we're watching and feel this sense of realness about it.
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So I don't know maybe you could speak into that Is that a big part of what makes this possible, why pornography is so enticing?
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Well, there's something you said a minute ago.
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I think we all feel that if I were really known, that's what we all want.
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That's what the good guy wants, even the like the most malevolent bad guy in the movie.
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The moment he's really really finally completely understood he is loved, right.
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You can't really separate the two.
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To understand, to know fully is to honor that person's perspective and to validate their.
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I don't know their experience and the whole thing and their motives.
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Like you, don't understand why this villain does this thing, and that's part of the reason he's a bad guy.
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Until you understand it and it's sympathetic, it doesn't make what he's doing right, but it makes you stop hating him.
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Yeah, it makes you see that even people who are taking actions that harm others may not be acting off of intentions of the purest evil.
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There's a reason for everything.
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There's a reason why people are behaving the way that they are, even if it's manifesting itself as evil.
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That's an interesting thought.
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I think there's a lot of movies that add character development to the bad guy, but I also think that there's movies where the bad guy is just the bad guy and his intentions deep down at the core are for power, control and maybe even to harm others, like getting this sort of sadistic pleasure out of harming others.
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I do think that those characters do exist.
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I think that the devil and Satan and the Bible is kind of portrayed that way.
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But even he has a backstory, Right?
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Even he has.
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That's what I was going to say.
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Every step you take towards the purity of the evil of the villain has to also be a step away from his humanity.
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You have to have a villain who is, if he's going to be increasingly purely evil, he has to be decreasing like human and increasingly something else, like Sauron.
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Like Sauron, because to be human, to be man, really is to desire to be understood, even if it's misguided.
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There is something there that sees itself as the good guy and worthy of being understood.
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Now, the degree to which he distrusts that he can be understood, or anybody ever will, may have him committing evil and withdrawing into himself.
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That's where you get if you won't let go of the humanity but you're determined to move towards evil as far as possible.
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It really as far as you can go is something like Gollum, which is a sad, pathetic, self-meaning thing of what used to be a human.
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Yeah, I think the reason why that's true is because if we all believe we're made in the image of God and that image of God is in us, that humanity in essence is he created us with goodness we can't completely separate ourselves from that goodness as humans, like you said, as we move towards evil.
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That's separating ourselves from ourselves as well.
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Yeah, that's a good thought, okay.
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Isn't it possible, though, that one could be known very well and then rejected by someone for any number of reasons?
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Some have described that as our worst fear is to become vulnerable, to open ourselves up to others, even to get down that path, that journey of someone else knowing us.
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I'm thinking, for example, you think about a husband and a wife, one of the greatest opportunities that exists on earth to be fully known and fully loved by someone.
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I think one of the greatest fears is that you will go down this path of being fully known by your spouse and yet they just wind up leaving you or rejecting you.
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That leaves people completely in shambles.
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Yeah, with what you were saying, I think the distinction can be made, but they're part of the same journey.
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Is that a good way to say it?
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Like, being fully known and fully loved go in tandem in the same journey, but it is possible to make a distinction.
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Does that sound right?
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I think what you're putting your finger on, though, is the fear that we feel that if we were fully known, we would be exposed as not good, we would be found to be unworthy of being loved.
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The problem is when you assign the authority to adjudicate on that question to someone as undeserving of that authority as your spouse, who is just another boy or girl struggling with their own insecurities, and you're assuming that they one really do know you fully, which I don't think that any piece.
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I mean, I've been married for 16 years and I couldn't possibly make that claim about my wife.
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Yeah, the fear is that if she fully knew me or like, let's say, that she did turn away from me and left me yeah, it would be tempting to read into that that, see, she fully knew me and rejected me.
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I'm worthless, but that's assigning a lot of authoritative power to her that is not appropriate.
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Yeah, and so we have to turn this conversation towards God.
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If we're going to be fully known and yet rejected and not fully loved, I think God is the one that we fear in this equation then right, and why is that such a big fear for so many people, even though there's such a clear message of grace that rings true in the Bible?
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And then, ultimately, like, how does this tie back to changing our behaviors and leading us to look at pornography, acting out on unwanted sexual behaviors?
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Yeah, I think it.
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You're raising a Really serious conundrum.
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That, I think, has this, all you know, pretty trapped.
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I mean that that's that's exactly the thing.
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I'm a.
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You know CS Lewis said that the gates of heller lock from the inside Because it is to be in hell is to close yourself off to being loved out of fear that you won't be, or out of To be loved is a very uncontrolled experience, like that's just what love is.
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To have other who is Fundamentally other than you, absolutely other, look on you kindly and desire you and want to will your good, is something that you necessarily can't control.
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If you could control they wouldn't really totally be other right, it's a like grown-up, vulnerable love is a very out of control, very scary In risky proposition and so we close ourselves off.
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We try and control as many of the variables as we can to, you know, not put ourselves at the mercy of being loved.
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We don't like yeah resist that scary, and we desperately need it, and so we wrap ourselves up in Looking super successful and, you know, in business, or in sports, or or putting on, or being good at resisting all those things you know being counterculture or whatever.
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You know not letting anybody get above me in any way.
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That makes me feel like I'm at their mercy, which is, of course, where I would experience being loved by someone who was the very least.
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But we just all that.
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We insulate ourselves from all that, and then, in the secret of our bathrooms and bedrooms, we Watch pornography and fantasize about what it would be like, though, if somebody who wanted to Really was let in and really did love me and when wanted to be with me and wanted me to love them.
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You know, it's stuck in the middle, and that's really what hell is, I think yeah, well, that's so interesting because what you're saying essentially is that pursuing pornography is like a slice of hell on earth, because essentially what you're doing is you are foregoing the risk of being known and being vulnerable because you're afraid of it, and you know you're describing that.
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Perhaps that's what hell is like it's for people who are afraid of being fully known.
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They don't want to take the risk to be loved by God and to be loved by others, and so we all say that porn is bad, and Christian men feel that.
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But I think it's so important to flesh out why, because so often, without that full understanding of why, our motivation or our clarity just isn't quite there, and I think sometimes I can make the difference between being able to say no and stop looking at it or not.
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Well and this is a critique of the Christian thing, I think, in its modern expression, but I think really it has been a problem for hundreds of years is this Very juvenile finger pointing at the thing that is obviously bad, that everybody knows is like that.
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There's nothing holy about this, but then condemning that as the problem itself and like priding ourselves in our ability to Put our finger on the thing that's not good, you know.
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It's like oh, you're doing the not good thing, you're, you're one of those, you're on.
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That like proves that you're on the other side of the line.
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You know everybody else is.
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You know, pretend to have it all together and you know it's really.
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I think it's a stupid and childish way of thinking about pornography.
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Yes, there is plenty of evil in pornography, certainly in the industry itself, in sex trafficking, and of course, none of us who are using pornography Really know the extent to which that woman or man is willingly participating in what's happening.
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We can have all kinds of legislation in place, we can have all kinds of agreements and everything you know in place, but at the end of the day, when you're looking at that video, you don't really know.
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Yeah, that person you don't know well, I mean, that's not just a hypothesis anymore.
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That's proven by countless testimonials that have come out from people who have left the industry.
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Especially in recent years, we're seeing an explosion of different former porn stars coming out and sharing their full story of how they were coerced.
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You know, a lot of cases tricked or, at the very least, taken advantage of for their vulnerability Happens all the time, and the biggest and this isn't just like one off people who you know, no one knows about in the industry these are some of the biggest born stars that have come out and shared these stories, and so it's not like a question, it's not a hypothesis.
00:18:38.618 --> 00:18:42.615
So, yeah, the evil in the industry, I think, is very evident.
00:18:43.145 --> 00:18:47.054
I'm gonna say absolutely, and I'm gonna say two unpopular things about that.
00:18:47.054 --> 00:18:55.984
Okay, one is this is going to offend people left of this issue potentially in saying that anybody who is married has been married.
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Any man who has been married.
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I think this is my bias.
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Two woman knows her has worked hard at developing a robust and healthy sexual life with her, and or any man who has had a daughter knows intuitively and powerfully that the life of this worker is a wounded.
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It requires a person to be operating from a wounded state.
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Even people that claim like no, I'm doing this absolutely of my own accord.
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There's something hurt being carried out in that.
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That's my bias.
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But, as you pointed out, there's plenty of reason to believe that that is a subset of sex workers or people who really are doing this because they want to, and there's lots of things that we do that we want to do that is not coming from a Nobody's making us do it, but we're hurting ourselves anyway.
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So I'll say that.
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But the other thing I'll say is that about the sex trafficking and abuses and all the horrible evil that's happening behind the screen.
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While that is sometimes something that helps awareness of that is sometimes something that helps people who are struggling with porn addiction resist and begin to dismantle some of their arousal template with it, it really is not a useful awareness when it comes to understanding the very personal question of why I'm drawn to porn.
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It's a background question.
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There's nothing to do with why a man is drawn to porn.
00:20:25.673 --> 00:20:28.448
What he's sorting out there it's one more reason.
00:20:28.448 --> 00:20:33.765
That's a unhelpful way to sort those problems out, but it has nothing to do with sorting those problems out.
00:20:34.125 --> 00:20:41.219
Yeah, and so it's not particularly helpful in therapy, except in piling on shame and making it more confusing and more painful.
00:20:41.885 --> 00:20:51.751
Yeah, that makes sense, and so I think that we should really steer the rest of this podcast towards getting to the underlying reasons of why we struggle with porn and also what to do about it.
00:20:51.751 --> 00:20:53.096
What can men do about it?
00:20:53.096 --> 00:20:58.684
So how do men go on that journey, and what does that journey look like to understand why they're using it?
00:20:59.767 --> 00:21:30.291
That's a good question and I think that the best programs for helping people steer away from porn, for people overcome or recover from having a dependent relationship with pornography programs like your program and, to a large extent, programs like the CSAT program that we talked about earlier is they're helpful in walking alongside these men and women on their journey of understanding what that part of them that is drawn towards porn is really looking for, what it's sorting out.
00:21:30.291 --> 00:21:39.169
We're all sorting something out all the time, and when we have something that has power in our lives that we can't help coming back to them, those features of our lives.
00:21:39.169 --> 00:21:54.517
More than any other life is an arena where something important is being sorted out, and if we just paint it with broad strokes and say, well, you're just an addict, or it's just bad, or you're just out of control, or you're immature, or you're a pervert or whatever, it's just totally unhelpful.
00:21:54.517 --> 00:21:57.332
It has never helped anybody understand themselves better.
00:21:57.813 --> 00:21:59.738
So, understanding yourself is critical.
00:21:59.738 --> 00:22:05.557
Understanding what is this sexual scenario that I keep coming back to has power for me.
00:22:05.557 --> 00:22:12.656
There's a wound that it's speaking to, and I think the fact that it has power demonstrates that there's a wound underneath it.
00:22:12.656 --> 00:22:13.539
Does that make sense?
00:22:13.931 --> 00:22:17.941
Yeah, it does, and what you're saying is that this is an opportunity to know oneself.
00:22:17.941 --> 00:22:29.248
The opportunity to grow in self-awareness and to examine yourself perhaps deeper than you ever have before and I think we've talked about this on the podcast too is a lot of times.
00:22:29.248 --> 00:22:35.586
That requires going back to your childhood and examining ways that you were wounded.
00:22:35.586 --> 00:22:48.800
Right and we talked about that recently too is how oftentimes we're acting out based on prior wounding and so we live with this woundedness of, this fear that we can't be our authentic self.
00:22:48.800 --> 00:22:50.544
Could you speak more into that?
00:22:50.829 --> 00:23:17.057
Well, again, I think it speaks to this desperate desire to be loved, and part of the reason I think it's so broad sweeping in its occurrence I mean, it seems like just about everybody in every culture is dealing with this on some level, and I think part of the explanation for that is just how blank the canvas is, I think, in that you can project almost anything you want onto it, and so it's very easily transferred from person to person.
00:23:17.057 --> 00:23:22.626
Two people watching the same video can be experiencing something very different, and that's just across the same video.
00:23:22.626 --> 00:23:25.987
But never mind all the genres of porn and all that, if you know what I mean.
00:23:26.446 --> 00:23:27.429
Like yeah again.
00:23:27.449 --> 00:23:35.191
I think it just comes back to how powerful sex is and how easy it is to project your fantasies onto what you're watching.
00:23:35.491 --> 00:23:37.896
Yeah, I mean, and fantasies are powerful.
00:23:37.896 --> 00:23:53.452
I often talk about how imagination is one of the greatest gifts that God gave us this ability to envision a better future, to build something of our lives and to leave a legacy, keeping the end of our lives in mind and working towards that.
00:23:53.452 --> 00:23:55.479
These are just amazing things about imagination.
00:23:55.479 --> 00:24:07.298
But it's so powerful and there is a fantasy that will engage our imagination that pornography hijacks, it utilizes, and, like you said, there is a fantasy.
00:24:07.298 --> 00:24:19.376
There's a different genre of porn for just about anything you can think of now, and that would not be so if it was not so lucrative and if it did not speak something of man's desire.
00:24:19.376 --> 00:24:22.707
And so let's talk about a couple of examples.
00:24:22.707 --> 00:24:32.517
What does it look like for someone to use porn in order to fulfill the story that they're telling them about themselves, or to try to heal a certain woundedness?
00:24:32.517 --> 00:24:33.519
What does that look like?
00:24:33.680 --> 00:24:42.201
Well, I think your question sort of demonstrates that porn something you said earlier like that is what it's like to be in hell, and I think that's true from a certain perspective.
00:24:42.201 --> 00:24:46.900
But I think more to the point is that porn is a window out of hell.
00:24:46.900 --> 00:25:06.079
That, if to be in hell is what we're talking about earlier, where it's this experience of being trapped behind your own desperation not to be vulnerable, your own determination not to be vulnerable but also desperately longing to be loved, then porn is like a little porthole on the side of that.
00:25:06.079 --> 00:25:16.559
It's warped and it's skewed, but you're looking at and wishing you weren't trapped in hell and fantasizing about what it would be like to be in this free relationship with somebody who just wanted to have sex with you.
00:25:16.559 --> 00:25:21.262
So that's it on a high level.
00:25:21.262 --> 00:25:27.864
But I think you asked the question what does it look like to be looking at porn from this wounded place?
00:25:27.864 --> 00:25:29.730
And I think it looks like anybody watching porn.
00:25:29.730 --> 00:25:47.483
I mean, I think you can take an example of like one genre of porn, be approaching it where there is somebody who clearly has power over somebody else and is like dominating somebody and fantasizing about that is for a lot of the guys that I've worked with is them playing out.
00:25:47.650 --> 00:25:57.836
There's a childhood experience that they have of being in a totally powerless posture and they are fantasizing about one of two things.
00:25:57.836 --> 00:26:13.402
They're either fantasizing about being the powerless person and succeeding in pleasuring the person who's powerful and in that way, securing their position in the relationship, like they're rehearsing their trauma in that regard, or replaying it.
00:26:13.402 --> 00:26:26.219
You know, over and over trauma repetition, we call it, and it's like the more they can do that, the more they satisfy their oppressor in that regard, and there's an arousing component to that for them that makes them feel safe and comforted.
00:26:26.219 --> 00:26:30.954
Or they're fantasizing about being the person in the more powerful position and they're winning back.
00:26:30.954 --> 00:26:41.787
They are rehearsing the mirror, as it were, that they're never going to get beat and that they're always going to win, that they're always going to be on top and that they're going to get theirs and nobody's going to stop them.
00:26:41.787 --> 00:26:46.289
And they fantasize in a way that does do certainly ugly characters throughout history.
00:26:46.289 --> 00:26:51.051
You might imagine Hitler, you know, tossing and turning his bed at night like he's not going to get beat.
00:26:51.051 --> 00:26:53.258
These, you know, these people are not going to.
00:26:53.258 --> 00:26:54.561
He's going to overpower everybody.
00:26:55.769 --> 00:27:09.134
So that's always coming from a very hurt and run over that nobody is doing that coolly and like a twirling the mustache and you know thinking, you know like, oh, this would be a good way to hurt other people.
00:27:09.134 --> 00:27:11.260
That's always coming from a deeply hurt place.
00:27:11.260 --> 00:27:12.032
Does that make sense?
00:27:12.032 --> 00:27:16.813
So that's one of the ways that, like porn, it can be an arena where we're sorting something out.
00:27:16.813 --> 00:27:28.105
And that's an extreme example, and you know I, a lot of people, I say it's extreme, I mean a lot of people experience that, note, that is, if they're brave enough to admit that to themselves and to a therapist that they can trust.
00:27:28.105 --> 00:27:34.612
But the vast majority of people who are struggling with an addiction with porn probably are not moving in that direction.
00:27:34.612 --> 00:27:48.438
It's something less toxic, you know, but it's a good example nonetheless of like that there's something being sorted out even in the most benign and gentle and apparently consensual, you know, pornographic scenarios.
00:27:49.762 --> 00:27:51.749
Yeah, and so you got this woundedness.
00:27:51.749 --> 00:27:57.731
You're bleeding from different insecurities from your past that you've never really faced, or fears, or whatever it is.
00:27:57.731 --> 00:28:02.969
You're bleeding and you slap this really like old, infected band-aid on it.
00:28:02.969 --> 00:28:07.282
That's porn, basically, and that sense porn is a solution.
00:28:07.282 --> 00:28:16.319
It's a bad one, but you know, guys, if you're out there and you feel like, well, you're just watching porn, just for the high of it and that's all there is to it, don't be naive.
00:28:16.319 --> 00:28:20.212
Don't be naive to think that there's not a lot more going on than that.
00:28:20.212 --> 00:28:40.571
You know because, again, you know, alan, you could probably speak to this, but I know, I've seen it time and time again everyone who's struggling with this has a story and there are always more things, more layers underneath, more connections, like a web of connections that can be made that help people understand why they're using something like pornography.
00:28:40.571 --> 00:28:42.819
Because, like you said, porn is powerful.
00:28:42.819 --> 00:28:49.903
You're not using this powerful thing for nothing, you know, especially if you've told yourself you want to quit but you can't.
00:28:49.903 --> 00:28:52.025
There's a reason for that, you know.
00:28:52.727 --> 00:28:56.436
Well, what I would add to that, I think, is or maybe even refine, is that sex is powerful.
00:28:56.436 --> 00:29:00.594
Porn is only as powerful as your wounding is.
00:29:00.594 --> 00:29:04.806
There are lots of people for whom porn has no power.
00:29:04.806 --> 00:29:10.868
There's no, there's nothing intriguing about it, you know, and they don't even understand how porn can have power.
00:29:10.868 --> 00:29:14.849
It's just like, it just feels creepy, like you're watching other people have sex, you know.
00:29:14.849 --> 00:29:17.744
Yeah, that should tell us something, right?
00:29:17.744 --> 00:29:21.040
Well, and that can, because there can be power in that as well.
00:29:21.040 --> 00:29:39.044
I mean, that's, you know, like if you're afraid of it, that's like, maybe, if not being able to look away is addicted, not being able to hold on to yourself in the presence of it might be anorexic, you know, I don't know, but I think what is important is like how, again, how powerful this is.
00:29:39.044 --> 00:29:39.665
Does that make sense?
00:29:40.028 --> 00:29:40.671
Yeah, it does.
00:29:40.671 --> 00:29:41.915
Yeah, that's insightful.
00:29:41.915 --> 00:29:45.269
So I know we've only got a few minutes left, so ending this.
00:29:45.269 --> 00:29:54.355
If porn is not the way we need to be working out our stories, what is the way that we could be working out our stories Like what does the path to healing look like?
00:29:54.826 --> 00:29:55.953
I think the path to healing.
00:29:55.953 --> 00:30:00.452
It could look like a lot of things for a lot of people, but I think for everybody it's going to contain these ingredients.
00:30:00.452 --> 00:30:02.327
It's going to contain understanding yourself.
00:30:02.327 --> 00:30:15.888
It's going to contain owning for yourself the responsibility to know and love yourself in the way you're hoping this other adult is going to show up and give you permission to know and love.
00:30:15.888 --> 00:30:16.471
Does that make sense?
00:30:16.471 --> 00:30:22.794
Like we're all in our woundedness waiting for this mom or dad to show up and scoop us up and tell us we're okay?
00:30:22.794 --> 00:30:29.313
Growing up is, and healing is, a process of owning the responsibility for that task ourselves.
00:30:29.313 --> 00:30:41.252
When we do that, sex becomes a powerful tool for connecting with and knowing another person, rather than being rescued or healed in our wounding or anything like that.
00:30:41.252 --> 00:30:45.690
Those things are always going to get in the way and distract sex from what its purpose really is.
00:30:45.690 --> 00:30:54.766
So, yeah, it's going to include those things knowing yourself, having compassion for yourself and beginning to take a role of authority in your own internal world.
00:30:54.766 --> 00:30:56.690
That is loving and understanding.
00:30:57.912 --> 00:30:58.212
Awesome.
00:30:58.212 --> 00:31:00.057
Those are really good insights.
00:31:00.057 --> 00:31:02.269
More specifically, what does that look like?
00:31:02.269 --> 00:31:11.978
What steps can someone take to go on this journey and know themselves better, and what encouragement can you offer guys who are really feeling stuck or struggling with this?
00:31:13.405 --> 00:31:14.669
Stop being frustrated with yourself.
00:31:14.669 --> 00:31:15.972
That's not helping.
00:31:15.972 --> 00:31:31.507
See your addiction with porn in the same way you see your addiction with alcohol or with anything else, whatever culture or your religious drama or anything else tells you about how disgusting that is or how worthless you are because that's happening.
00:31:31.507 --> 00:31:41.012
Push back at all that and understand that something very sweet and tender and honest is happening in that process.
00:31:41.012 --> 00:31:49.280
And so, I think, not being frustrated with yourself and instead being deeply curious about yourself and finding help.
00:31:49.340 --> 00:32:07.830
Finding somebody in your life that is and I don't say help in a way that because you're helpless and you can't do it on your own, I'm saying that you don't have to, you don't have to do it by yourself and finding somebody who is not going to be the adult that pulls you out of the water, but it's going to be somebody who swims next to you while you're sorting this out.
00:32:07.830 --> 00:32:08.953
I think that can be a therapist.
00:32:08.953 --> 00:32:13.673
In some cases that can be a pastor who's particularly wise and experienced.
00:32:13.673 --> 00:32:15.676
Look for a therapist in your area.
00:32:15.676 --> 00:32:26.336
I think that's a tremendous first step, and as soon as somebody is trying to offer you a controlling solution, trading one mistress for another isn't going to help.
00:32:26.336 --> 00:32:32.678
If somebody is offering you a solution that sounds unduly controlling or shaming.
00:32:32.678 --> 00:32:33.981
Walk away, find somebody else.
00:32:34.324 --> 00:32:35.046
That's not going to help.
00:32:35.046 --> 00:32:37.075
That's so good, alan man.
00:32:37.075 --> 00:32:40.068
Thank you so much for your time sharing your wisdom with us on the podcast.
00:32:40.068 --> 00:32:41.255
I know you've got to go here.
00:32:41.255 --> 00:32:42.923
Loved having you as a guest man.
00:32:42.923 --> 00:32:46.500
We've got to have you back on, thanks for having me Talk about some of these things even more.
00:32:46.500 --> 00:32:48.087
I think there's so many topics we hit on.
00:32:48.087 --> 00:32:51.923
We could go in more detail, so anyways, yeah, man, we will talk soon.
00:32:51.923 --> 00:32:52.606
We'll see you around.
00:32:52.887 --> 00:32:53.592
Sounds great, thank you.
00:32:54.395 --> 00:32:54.738
All right, guys.
00:32:54.738 --> 00:32:55.903
Well, that's all we've got for today.
00:32:55.903 --> 00:32:58.692
Thanks for tuning in to another episode, man.
00:32:58.692 --> 00:33:01.807
It almost seems like these counselors and therapists know what they're talking about.
00:33:01.807 --> 00:33:14.628
Man, just Alan, is so good at getting to the heart of the issue, at really going deeper than I think most people could, at diagnosing this, taking those surgical tools and helping us get to the bottom.
00:33:14.628 --> 00:33:41.978
Of course, in a podcast like this, we're not able to get to the bottom of every single person's unique story, because you've got to have some help that's custom, tailored to you, and so that's where, like I said at the beginning of the episode, don't be afraid to seek that help, whether that's an in-person therapist near you or a community like ours that reclaimed in a program where you can get that individual, personalized help that you need to move forward, get unstuck and live porn free.
00:33:41.978 --> 00:33:43.363
Y'all have a wonderful day.
00:33:43.363 --> 00:33:45.829
We'll see you in the next episode coming very soon.
00:33:45.829 --> 00:33:49.287
Until then, thank you for listening to the Reclaimed Recovery Podcast.
00:33:52.252 --> 00:34:00.338
If you enjoyed listening to today's interview, you can help me move mountains by taking a couple minutes of your time and supporting the podcast.
00:34:00.338 --> 00:34:02.228
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00:34:02.228 --> 00:34:05.621
One is really easy you can leave a review for the podcast.
00:34:05.621 --> 00:34:17.007
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00:34:17.007 --> 00:34:25.740
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00:34:30.277 --> 00:34:31.903
Thanks so much, guys you rock.
00:34:31.903 --> 00:34:34.527
Get out there, be resilient, live porn free.
00:34:34.527 --> 00:34:35.608
We'll see you next time.
00:00:00.924 --> 00:00:03.774
Welcome to the Reclaimed and Unashamed podcast.
00:00:03.774 --> 00:00:09.619
We are helping men to rewire their brains and overcome the shame that often surrounds unwanted pornography use.
00:00:09.619 --> 00:00:17.172
I'm your host, Kolton Thomas, and you are now listening to episode 20, where we are having our guest, alan Standford, back again.
00:00:17.172 --> 00:00:19.079
He was our guest a few episodes ago.
00:00:19.079 --> 00:00:24.225
We're gonna have him reintroduce himself a little bit for those of you who did not tune into his last episode.
00:00:24.225 --> 00:00:26.661
However, if you missed that, I would encourage you to go back.
00:00:26.661 --> 00:00:28.486
Listen to that other one first.
00:00:28.867 --> 00:00:34.963
Alan just brings years of practical experience working with men who struggle with not only pornography addiction but also with sex addiction.
00:00:34.963 --> 00:00:40.387
You know men who have had trouble acting out to where their addiction has gone from private to public having affairs.
00:00:40.387 --> 00:00:51.322
One huge takeaway from the episode, as you're going to see, is that we talk about how, specifically, pornography is attempting to help us work something out about ourselves and our story Basically.
00:00:51.322 --> 00:01:09.503
In other words, what is the usefulness that we're getting out of pornography in our life that has us continuing to come back to it, that has us revisiting it again and again, even though it hurts us so badly, because you know, by applying logic, you'd think that well, if something hurts really badly again and again, and again.
00:01:09.503 --> 00:01:12.861
Then we would just be able to eventually stop once it hurts bad enough.
00:01:12.861 --> 00:01:21.816
But for so many guys they feel trapped, and so that would not be the case if pornography was not helping us to sort something out.
00:01:21.816 --> 00:01:26.319
And exactly what that is is something we're going to talk about in this podcast episode.
00:01:26.319 --> 00:01:42.861
Of course, it's a little different for each guy, but we're going to talk about some examples of how to sort this out in your own story, in your own life, and, of course, we don't recommend doing it without getting proper help and guidance from a professional, someone that has experience, especially if you've been stuck for a long time.
00:01:42.861 --> 00:01:49.231
Guys, and there are a lot of places you can go that offer you solutions that produce more shame and more hurt.
00:01:49.231 --> 00:01:50.859
And so be on guard, right?
00:01:50.859 --> 00:02:01.462
I know sometimes it's hard to trust yourself if you're struggling with pornography because you're not doing the things that you say that you're going to do, as in you're not quitting pornography when you want to quit pornography.
00:02:01.462 --> 00:02:12.643
So sometimes it can be hard to trust yourself, but if you're participating in some kind of program and you have a gut that's telling you that this is probably harming you, like you're feeling even more ashamed than you did before.
00:02:12.643 --> 00:02:18.528
Then you can trust yourself enough to get out of that and seek another program or seek more help.
00:02:18.971 --> 00:02:35.687
I also want to add that there are men like Andrew Tate in the world, or even David Goggins you know, I really like David Goggins, but these are men out there who are really kind of becoming iconic in our culture for masculinity and their primary messages are often you know, no one else can help you.
00:02:35.687 --> 00:02:37.275
You've got to do this yourself.
00:02:37.275 --> 00:02:39.905
You don't need the help or assistance of other people.
00:02:39.905 --> 00:02:42.049
You're weak if you rely on other people.
00:02:42.049 --> 00:02:46.219
I just want to take a second and say if you're listening to those guys, that's not bad.
00:02:46.219 --> 00:02:49.475
You can find a lot of motivation in the things that they're saying.
00:02:49.475 --> 00:03:01.253
However, what it can do is create this mindset that help is not good for you, or you don't need it or you shouldn't get it, and you're weak if you seek it, and that's just a very highly individualistic mindset.
00:03:01.253 --> 00:03:11.748
Again, I don't disagree with everything that they're saying, although I do disagree with most of what Andrew Tate says maybe that's a conversation for another episode and I really believe that even David Goggins would agree with that.
00:03:11.748 --> 00:03:17.846
I mean, he was on a team essentially right In the Navy SEALs, like he relied on his team, so he knows how to be a team player too.
00:03:17.846 --> 00:03:30.312
But you just have to be careful if you're listening to certain figures online that get you in this mindset of like, oh man, if I haven't figured this out myself by now, then I just need to engage in a different kind of self-discipline or a different kind of self-talk.
00:03:30.312 --> 00:03:31.900
Man, we are not wired that way.
00:03:31.900 --> 00:03:39.575
We are wired to grow and heal in relationships and so as you listen to this episode, please keep that in mind and along those lines.
00:03:39.736 --> 00:03:43.414
Lately we've had some guys sign up for our 10-week journey here at Reclaim.
00:03:43.414 --> 00:03:51.842
That's our flagship program that's designed to help men, even if they've been struggling with pornography for a long time, even if they've tried a lot of other things and they haven't worked.
00:03:51.842 --> 00:04:14.167
This 10-week journey is designed to help men get results and move forward, and I've had a lot of conversations with guys recently that have said I've tried these other things, either by myself you know, I've been reading books, or I tried getting an accountability from a couple of my close friends or they've even tried someone else's program and they've just said I know I need to go deeper.
00:04:14.167 --> 00:04:15.673
Where can I find that?
00:04:15.673 --> 00:04:16.476
Deeper work?
00:04:16.476 --> 00:04:23.303
And that is exactly what we've designed Reclaimed both the community and our 10-week program to be Now.
00:04:23.303 --> 00:04:24.427
It does require an investment.
00:04:24.468 --> 00:04:52.850
If you guys are interested in that and you think you're in a place where you're ready to do something like that, where you know the work is intensive, I'm not gonna shy away from the amount of work and self-reflection and effort, as well as vulnerability, that doing the program is gonna take, because you cannot get through the program without building real relationships with other men, without getting real accountability, one-on-one accountability and coaching, and so it's not gonna be easy, but it is very, very effective and I've seen it work for so many men.
00:04:52.850 --> 00:04:55.230
So again, guys, we're approaching the end of another year.
00:04:55.230 --> 00:05:02.922
If you want to be free of pornography and live a better than porn life in the following year, then why don't you reach out to me?
00:05:02.922 --> 00:05:18.562
You can get on our main website, wwwreclaimedrecoverycom, and you'll see links right there on the homepage for how to join our community app, and once you get in the app and create an account, you can actually reach out to me and message me directly in there I can get you going in the right direction.
00:05:18.562 --> 00:05:24.656
We can set up a call to discuss the program and we can explore together whether that's something that's gonna be a good fit for you.
00:05:24.755 --> 00:05:27.185
So now I think we're ready to move on with our episode.
00:05:27.185 --> 00:05:31.721
We're gonna begin with Alan just giving himself another quick introduction and then we're gonna dive right in.
00:05:31.721 --> 00:05:39.067
Yeah, man, you are the honored guest of the show and you're a great friend and a mentor of mine.
00:05:39.067 --> 00:05:45.877
You're also a therapist in the community and we share the same alma mater, john Brown University Counseling Program.
00:05:45.877 --> 00:05:48.586
Anyways, tell us some more about yourself, alan.
00:05:48.586 --> 00:05:56.041
Tell us a little bit about your background and therapy and anything you want to share, just about your family and what you love to do.
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Yeah, sure, I've got a big family, five kids, married for 16 years and counting.
00:06:01.382 --> 00:06:01.985
And let's see.
00:06:01.985 --> 00:06:03.187
I went to UCA.
00:06:03.187 --> 00:06:04.963
I studied psychology and philosophy there.
00:06:04.963 --> 00:06:16.401
I started my graduate program in counseling there, took a high atus, finished a John Brown and have a master's in marriage and family therapy and licensed marriage and family therapist and licensed professional counselor.
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Along the way I heard the certified sex addiction therapist credentials.
00:06:21.442 --> 00:06:23.889
Yeah, and so that's a pretty extensive training.
00:06:23.889 --> 00:06:36.177
It really takes an investment, it costs a lot, it takes a lot of time to get the training, and so that's giving you important tools and your tool belt and experience to deal with men who are wrestling with unwanted sexual behaviors and pornography.
00:06:36.177 --> 00:06:47.384
So maybe a good place to start is just talking about why, what are the reasons that you see a lot of men coming in struggling with either pornography or unwanted sexual behaviors?
00:06:47.704 --> 00:06:54.610
Well, for one, because it's so powerful, and by powerful I mean it's effective at getting at the human thing.
00:06:54.610 --> 00:07:05.685
It's like, in a way, porn sex in general speaks to who we are as human beings and the deep desire we have to be wanted and desired.
00:07:05.685 --> 00:07:08.088
You know it has all the it's right.
00:07:08.088 --> 00:07:26.718
I mean it has somebody else wanting to be let in by me and to like, move towards my good and what feels good, and also indicating to me that letting me into them is good for them and that they desire that, and that's like the deepest human thing.
00:07:26.718 --> 00:07:35.793
That's why sex and nakedness is talked about so much in all the ancient religions of the world and it's just it's really core to the human thing.
00:07:36.136 --> 00:07:40.149
It's in culture, it's in art, all the movies we watch, it's everywhere.
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You know, it's not something that can be stifled or pushed down.
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It's that integral to our identities as human and it has to be treated as such.
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And you know, I think what you're getting at there is like we've talked about this on the podcast before but just our desire to be deeply known and deeply loved, fully known and fully loved.
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You know, I'm curious.
00:08:01.391 --> 00:08:08.480
I think so many guys who watch porn know that that's not what they're really getting and yet for some reason, it's still so enticing to us.
00:08:08.480 --> 00:08:17.994
And it makes me curious about why and for example, I think about in movies that we watch we so easily place ourselves in the shoes of, like the hero of the movie.
00:08:17.994 --> 00:08:32.202
You know, if you think about when you were a kid, whether it was Star Wars or the Rings, we do have this amazing capability to place ourselves in the shoes of the people we're watching and feel this sense of realness about it.
00:08:32.202 --> 00:08:39.368
So I don't know maybe you could speak into that Is that a big part of what makes this possible, why pornography is so enticing?
00:08:39.749 --> 00:08:41.273
Well, there's something you said a minute ago.
00:08:41.273 --> 00:08:47.111
I think we all feel that if I were really known, that's what we all want.
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That's what the good guy wants, even the like the most malevolent bad guy in the movie.
00:08:51.692 --> 00:08:58.392
The moment he's really really finally completely understood he is loved, right.
00:08:58.392 --> 00:09:00.034
You can't really separate the two.
00:09:00.034 --> 00:09:08.674
To understand, to know fully is to honor that person's perspective and to validate their.
00:09:08.674 --> 00:09:12.269
I don't know their experience and the whole thing and their motives.
00:09:12.269 --> 00:09:17.571
Like you, don't understand why this villain does this thing, and that's part of the reason he's a bad guy.
00:09:17.571 --> 00:09:23.024
Until you understand it and it's sympathetic, it doesn't make what he's doing right, but it makes you stop hating him.
00:09:23.666 --> 00:09:32.336
Yeah, it makes you see that even people who are taking actions that harm others may not be acting off of intentions of the purest evil.
00:09:32.336 --> 00:09:34.091
There's a reason for everything.
00:09:34.091 --> 00:09:39.037
There's a reason why people are behaving the way that they are, even if it's manifesting itself as evil.
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That's an interesting thought.
00:09:40.650 --> 00:09:59.581
I think there's a lot of movies that add character development to the bad guy, but I also think that there's movies where the bad guy is just the bad guy and his intentions deep down at the core are for power, control and maybe even to harm others, like getting this sort of sadistic pleasure out of harming others.
00:09:59.581 --> 00:10:01.668
I do think that those characters do exist.
00:10:01.668 --> 00:10:06.105
I think that the devil and Satan and the Bible is kind of portrayed that way.
00:10:06.105 --> 00:10:08.572
But even he has a backstory, Right?
00:10:08.572 --> 00:10:09.395
Even he has.
00:10:09.706 --> 00:10:10.687
That's what I was going to say.
00:10:10.687 --> 00:10:17.855
Every step you take towards the purity of the evil of the villain has to also be a step away from his humanity.
00:10:17.855 --> 00:10:27.971
You have to have a villain who is, if he's going to be increasingly purely evil, he has to be decreasing like human and increasingly something else, like Sauron.
00:10:27.971 --> 00:10:34.307
Like Sauron, because to be human, to be man, really is to desire to be understood, even if it's misguided.
00:10:34.307 --> 00:10:40.807
There is something there that sees itself as the good guy and worthy of being understood.
00:10:40.807 --> 00:10:48.975
Now, the degree to which he distrusts that he can be understood, or anybody ever will, may have him committing evil and withdrawing into himself.
00:10:48.975 --> 00:10:56.745
That's where you get if you won't let go of the humanity but you're determined to move towards evil as far as possible.
00:10:56.745 --> 00:11:07.471
It really as far as you can go is something like Gollum, which is a sad, pathetic, self-meaning thing of what used to be a human.
00:11:08.273 --> 00:11:26.845
Yeah, I think the reason why that's true is because if we all believe we're made in the image of God and that image of God is in us, that humanity in essence is he created us with goodness we can't completely separate ourselves from that goodness as humans, like you said, as we move towards evil.
00:11:27.265 --> 00:11:29.269
That's separating ourselves from ourselves as well.
00:11:29.730 --> 00:11:34.078
Yeah, that's a good thought, okay.
00:11:34.078 --> 00:11:43.268
Isn't it possible, though, that one could be known very well and then rejected by someone for any number of reasons?
00:11:43.268 --> 00:11:53.368
Some have described that as our worst fear is to become vulnerable, to open ourselves up to others, even to get down that path, that journey of someone else knowing us.
00:11:53.368 --> 00:12:01.677
I'm thinking, for example, you think about a husband and a wife, one of the greatest opportunities that exists on earth to be fully known and fully loved by someone.
00:12:01.677 --> 00:12:12.899
I think one of the greatest fears is that you will go down this path of being fully known by your spouse and yet they just wind up leaving you or rejecting you.
00:12:12.899 --> 00:12:15.427
That leaves people completely in shambles.
00:12:15.427 --> 00:12:22.447
Yeah, with what you were saying, I think the distinction can be made, but they're part of the same journey.
00:12:22.447 --> 00:12:23.551
Is that a good way to say it?
00:12:23.551 --> 00:12:29.822
Like, being fully known and fully loved go in tandem in the same journey, but it is possible to make a distinction.
00:12:29.822 --> 00:12:30.865
Does that sound right?
00:12:31.227 --> 00:12:45.200
I think what you're putting your finger on, though, is the fear that we feel that if we were fully known, we would be exposed as not good, we would be found to be unworthy of being loved.
00:12:45.200 --> 00:13:07.190
The problem is when you assign the authority to adjudicate on that question to someone as undeserving of that authority as your spouse, who is just another boy or girl struggling with their own insecurities, and you're assuming that they one really do know you fully, which I don't think that any piece.
00:13:07.190 --> 00:13:12.248
I mean, I've been married for 16 years and I couldn't possibly make that claim about my wife.
00:13:12.248 --> 00:13:23.748
Yeah, the fear is that if she fully knew me or like, let's say, that she did turn away from me and left me yeah, it would be tempting to read into that that, see, she fully knew me and rejected me.
00:13:23.748 --> 00:13:29.509
I'm worthless, but that's assigning a lot of authoritative power to her that is not appropriate.
00:13:29.831 --> 00:13:33.004
Yeah, and so we have to turn this conversation towards God.
00:13:33.004 --> 00:13:48.480
If we're going to be fully known and yet rejected and not fully loved, I think God is the one that we fear in this equation then right, and why is that such a big fear for so many people, even though there's such a clear message of grace that rings true in the Bible?
00:13:48.480 --> 00:13:57.610
And then, ultimately, like, how does this tie back to changing our behaviors and leading us to look at pornography, acting out on unwanted sexual behaviors?
00:13:58.072 --> 00:13:58.754
Yeah, I think it.
00:13:58.754 --> 00:14:02.470
You're raising a Really serious conundrum.
00:14:02.470 --> 00:14:05.679
That, I think, has this, all you know, pretty trapped.
00:14:05.679 --> 00:14:07.245
I mean that that's that's exactly the thing.
00:14:07.245 --> 00:14:07.666
I'm a.
00:14:07.666 --> 00:14:27.277
You know CS Lewis said that the gates of heller lock from the inside Because it is to be in hell is to close yourself off to being loved out of fear that you won't be, or out of To be loved is a very uncontrolled experience, like that's just what love is.
00:14:27.277 --> 00:14:40.125
To have other who is Fundamentally other than you, absolutely other, look on you kindly and desire you and want to will your good, is something that you necessarily can't control.
00:14:40.125 --> 00:14:53.035
If you could control they wouldn't really totally be other right, it's a like grown-up, vulnerable love is a very out of control, very scary In risky proposition and so we close ourselves off.
00:14:53.035 --> 00:15:00.205
We try and control as many of the variables as we can to, you know, not put ourselves at the mercy of being loved.
00:15:00.405 --> 00:15:18.565
We don't like yeah resist that scary, and we desperately need it, and so we wrap ourselves up in Looking super successful and, you know, in business, or in sports, or or putting on, or being good at resisting all those things you know being counterculture or whatever.
00:15:18.565 --> 00:15:22.413
You know not letting anybody get above me in any way.
00:15:22.413 --> 00:15:29.917
That makes me feel like I'm at their mercy, which is, of course, where I would experience being loved by someone who was the very least.
00:15:29.917 --> 00:15:32.447
But we just all that.
00:15:32.447 --> 00:15:53.477
We insulate ourselves from all that, and then, in the secret of our bathrooms and bedrooms, we Watch pornography and fantasize about what it would be like, though, if somebody who wanted to Really was let in and really did love me and when wanted to be with me and wanted me to love them.
00:15:54.206 --> 00:16:15.750
You know, it's stuck in the middle, and that's really what hell is, I think yeah, well, that's so interesting because what you're saying essentially is that pursuing pornography is like a slice of hell on earth, because essentially what you're doing is you are foregoing the risk of being known and being vulnerable because you're afraid of it, and you know you're describing that.
00:16:15.750 --> 00:16:20.605
Perhaps that's what hell is like it's for people who are afraid of being fully known.
00:16:20.605 --> 00:16:29.792
They don't want to take the risk to be loved by God and to be loved by others, and so we all say that porn is bad, and Christian men feel that.
00:16:29.792 --> 00:16:46.597
But I think it's so important to flesh out why, because so often, without that full understanding of why, our motivation or our clarity just isn't quite there, and I think sometimes I can make the difference between being able to say no and stop looking at it or not.
00:16:47.106 --> 00:17:03.965
Well and this is a critique of the Christian thing, I think, in its modern expression, but I think really it has been a problem for hundreds of years is this Very juvenile finger pointing at the thing that is obviously bad, that everybody knows is like that.
00:17:03.965 --> 00:17:15.770
There's nothing holy about this, but then condemning that as the problem itself and like priding ourselves in our ability to Put our finger on the thing that's not good, you know.
00:17:15.770 --> 00:17:20.607
It's like oh, you're doing the not good thing, you're, you're one of those, you're on.
00:17:20.607 --> 00:17:22.773
That like proves that you're on the other side of the line.
00:17:22.773 --> 00:17:23.616
You know everybody else is.
00:17:23.616 --> 00:17:27.925
You know, pretend to have it all together and you know it's really.
00:17:28.247 --> 00:17:32.307
I think it's a stupid and childish way of thinking about pornography.
00:17:32.307 --> 00:17:48.204
Yes, there is plenty of evil in pornography, certainly in the industry itself, in sex trafficking, and of course, none of us who are using pornography Really know the extent to which that woman or man is willingly participating in what's happening.
00:17:48.204 --> 00:17:55.944
We can have all kinds of legislation in place, we can have all kinds of agreements and everything you know in place, but at the end of the day, when you're looking at that video, you don't really know.
00:17:56.627 --> 00:18:01.105
Yeah, that person you don't know well, I mean, that's not just a hypothesis anymore.
00:18:01.105 --> 00:18:05.916
That's proven by countless testimonials that have come out from people who have left the industry.
00:18:05.916 --> 00:18:16.990
Especially in recent years, we're seeing an explosion of different former porn stars coming out and sharing their full story of how they were coerced.
00:18:16.990 --> 00:18:38.618
You know, a lot of cases tricked or, at the very least, taken advantage of for their vulnerability Happens all the time, and the biggest and this isn't just like one off people who you know, no one knows about in the industry these are some of the biggest born stars that have come out and shared these stories, and so it's not like a question, it's not a hypothesis.
00:18:38.618 --> 00:18:42.615
So, yeah, the evil in the industry, I think, is very evident.
00:18:43.145 --> 00:18:47.054
I'm gonna say absolutely, and I'm gonna say two unpopular things about that.
00:18:47.054 --> 00:18:55.984
Okay, one is this is going to offend people left of this issue potentially in saying that anybody who is married has been married.
00:18:55.984 --> 00:18:58.711
Any man who has been married.
00:18:58.711 --> 00:19:00.457
I think this is my bias.
00:19:00.457 --> 00:19:20.259
Two woman knows her has worked hard at developing a robust and healthy sexual life with her, and or any man who has had a daughter knows intuitively and powerfully that the life of this worker is a wounded.
00:19:20.259 --> 00:19:23.444
It requires a person to be operating from a wounded state.
00:19:23.444 --> 00:19:27.153
Even people that claim like no, I'm doing this absolutely of my own accord.
00:19:27.153 --> 00:19:30.718
There's something hurt being carried out in that.
00:19:30.718 --> 00:19:31.527
That's my bias.
00:19:31.527 --> 00:19:48.005
But, as you pointed out, there's plenty of reason to believe that that is a subset of sex workers or people who really are doing this because they want to, and there's lots of things that we do that we want to do that is not coming from a Nobody's making us do it, but we're hurting ourselves anyway.
00:19:48.005 --> 00:19:49.969
So I'll say that.
00:19:50.469 --> 00:19:57.227
But the other thing I'll say is that about the sex trafficking and abuses and all the horrible evil that's happening behind the screen.
00:19:57.227 --> 00:20:21.339
While that is sometimes something that helps awareness of that is sometimes something that helps people who are struggling with porn addiction resist and begin to dismantle some of their arousal template with it, it really is not a useful awareness when it comes to understanding the very personal question of why I'm drawn to porn.
00:20:21.339 --> 00:20:23.147
It's a background question.
00:20:23.147 --> 00:20:25.673
There's nothing to do with why a man is drawn to porn.
00:20:25.673 --> 00:20:28.448
What he's sorting out there it's one more reason.
00:20:28.448 --> 00:20:33.765
That's a unhelpful way to sort those problems out, but it has nothing to do with sorting those problems out.
00:20:34.125 --> 00:20:41.219
Yeah, and so it's not particularly helpful in therapy, except in piling on shame and making it more confusing and more painful.
00:20:41.885 --> 00:20:51.751
Yeah, that makes sense, and so I think that we should really steer the rest of this podcast towards getting to the underlying reasons of why we struggle with porn and also what to do about it.
00:20:51.751 --> 00:20:53.096
What can men do about it?
00:20:53.096 --> 00:20:58.684
So how do men go on that journey, and what does that journey look like to understand why they're using it?
00:20:59.767 --> 00:21:30.291
That's a good question and I think that the best programs for helping people steer away from porn, for people overcome or recover from having a dependent relationship with pornography programs like your program and, to a large extent, programs like the CSAT program that we talked about earlier is they're helpful in walking alongside these men and women on their journey of understanding what that part of them that is drawn towards porn is really looking for, what it's sorting out.
00:21:30.291 --> 00:21:39.169
We're all sorting something out all the time, and when we have something that has power in our lives that we can't help coming back to them, those features of our lives.
00:21:39.169 --> 00:21:54.517
More than any other life is an arena where something important is being sorted out, and if we just paint it with broad strokes and say, well, you're just an addict, or it's just bad, or you're just out of control, or you're immature, or you're a pervert or whatever, it's just totally unhelpful.
00:21:54.517 --> 00:21:57.332
It has never helped anybody understand themselves better.
00:21:57.813 --> 00:21:59.738
So, understanding yourself is critical.
00:21:59.738 --> 00:22:05.557
Understanding what is this sexual scenario that I keep coming back to has power for me.
00:22:05.557 --> 00:22:12.656
There's a wound that it's speaking to, and I think the fact that it has power demonstrates that there's a wound underneath it.
00:22:12.656 --> 00:22:13.539
Does that make sense?
00:22:13.931 --> 00:22:17.941
Yeah, it does, and what you're saying is that this is an opportunity to know oneself.
00:22:17.941 --> 00:22:29.248
The opportunity to grow in self-awareness and to examine yourself perhaps deeper than you ever have before and I think we've talked about this on the podcast too is a lot of times.
00:22:29.248 --> 00:22:35.586
That requires going back to your childhood and examining ways that you were wounded.
00:22:35.586 --> 00:22:48.800
Right and we talked about that recently too is how oftentimes we're acting out based on prior wounding and so we live with this woundedness of, this fear that we can't be our authentic self.
00:22:48.800 --> 00:22:50.544
Could you speak more into that?
00:22:50.829 --> 00:23:17.057
Well, again, I think it speaks to this desperate desire to be loved, and part of the reason I think it's so broad sweeping in its occurrence I mean, it seems like just about everybody in every culture is dealing with this on some level, and I think part of the explanation for that is just how blank the canvas is, I think, in that you can project almost anything you want onto it, and so it's very easily transferred from person to person.
00:23:17.057 --> 00:23:22.626
Two people watching the same video can be experiencing something very different, and that's just across the same video.
00:23:22.626 --> 00:23:25.987
But never mind all the genres of porn and all that, if you know what I mean.
00:23:26.446 --> 00:23:27.429
Like yeah again.
00:23:27.449 --> 00:23:35.191
I think it just comes back to how powerful sex is and how easy it is to project your fantasies onto what you're watching.
00:23:35.491 --> 00:23:37.896
Yeah, I mean, and fantasies are powerful.
00:23:37.896 --> 00:23:53.452
I often talk about how imagination is one of the greatest gifts that God gave us this ability to envision a better future, to build something of our lives and to leave a legacy, keeping the end of our lives in mind and working towards that.
00:23:53.452 --> 00:23:55.479
These are just amazing things about imagination.
00:23:55.479 --> 00:24:07.298
But it's so powerful and there is a fantasy that will engage our imagination that pornography hijacks, it utilizes, and, like you said, there is a fantasy.
00:24:07.298 --> 00:24:19.376
There's a different genre of porn for just about anything you can think of now, and that would not be so if it was not so lucrative and if it did not speak something of man's desire.
00:24:19.376 --> 00:24:22.707
And so let's talk about a couple of examples.
00:24:22.707 --> 00:24:32.517
What does it look like for someone to use porn in order to fulfill the story that they're telling them about themselves, or to try to heal a certain woundedness?
00:24:32.517 --> 00:24:33.519
What does that look like?
00:24:33.680 --> 00:24:42.201
Well, I think your question sort of demonstrates that porn something you said earlier like that is what it's like to be in hell, and I think that's true from a certain perspective.
00:24:42.201 --> 00:24:46.900
But I think more to the point is that porn is a window out of hell.
00:24:46.900 --> 00:25:06.079
That, if to be in hell is what we're talking about earlier, where it's this experience of being trapped behind your own desperation not to be vulnerable, your own determination not to be vulnerable but also desperately longing to be loved, then porn is like a little porthole on the side of that.
00:25:06.079 --> 00:25:16.559
It's warped and it's skewed, but you're looking at and wishing you weren't trapped in hell and fantasizing about what it would be like to be in this free relationship with somebody who just wanted to have sex with you.
00:25:16.559 --> 00:25:21.262
So that's it on a high level.
00:25:21.262 --> 00:25:27.864
But I think you asked the question what does it look like to be looking at porn from this wounded place?
00:25:27.864 --> 00:25:29.730
And I think it looks like anybody watching porn.
00:25:29.730 --> 00:25:47.483
I mean, I think you can take an example of like one genre of porn, be approaching it where there is somebody who clearly has power over somebody else and is like dominating somebody and fantasizing about that is for a lot of the guys that I've worked with is them playing out.
00:25:47.650 --> 00:25:57.836
There's a childhood experience that they have of being in a totally powerless posture and they are fantasizing about one of two things.
00:25:57.836 --> 00:26:13.402
They're either fantasizing about being the powerless person and succeeding in pleasuring the person who's powerful and in that way, securing their position in the relationship, like they're rehearsing their trauma in that regard, or replaying it.
00:26:13.402 --> 00:26:26.219
You know, over and over trauma repetition, we call it, and it's like the more they can do that, the more they satisfy their oppressor in that regard, and there's an arousing component to that for them that makes them feel safe and comforted.
00:26:26.219 --> 00:26:30.954
Or they're fantasizing about being the person in the more powerful position and they're winning back.
00:26:30.954 --> 00:26:41.787
They are rehearsing the mirror, as it were, that they're never going to get beat and that they're always going to win, that they're always going to be on top and that they're going to get theirs and nobody's going to stop them.
00:26:41.787 --> 00:26:46.289
And they fantasize in a way that does do certainly ugly characters throughout history.
00:26:46.289 --> 00:26:51.051
You might imagine Hitler, you know, tossing and turning his bed at night like he's not going to get beat.
00:26:51.051 --> 00:26:53.258
These, you know, these people are not going to.
00:26:53.258 --> 00:26:54.561
He's going to overpower everybody.
00:26:55.769 --> 00:27:09.134
So that's always coming from a very hurt and run over that nobody is doing that coolly and like a twirling the mustache and you know thinking, you know like, oh, this would be a good way to hurt other people.
00:27:09.134 --> 00:27:11.260
That's always coming from a deeply hurt place.
00:27:11.260 --> 00:27:12.032
Does that make sense?
00:27:12.032 --> 00:27:16.813
So that's one of the ways that, like porn, it can be an arena where we're sorting something out.
00:27:16.813 --> 00:27:28.105
And that's an extreme example, and you know I, a lot of people, I say it's extreme, I mean a lot of people experience that, note, that is, if they're brave enough to admit that to themselves and to a therapist that they can trust.
00:27:28.105 --> 00:27:34.612
But the vast majority of people who are struggling with an addiction with porn probably are not moving in that direction.
00:27:34.612 --> 00:27:48.438
It's something less toxic, you know, but it's a good example nonetheless of like that there's something being sorted out even in the most benign and gentle and apparently consensual, you know, pornographic scenarios.
00:27:49.762 --> 00:27:51.749
Yeah, and so you got this woundedness.
00:27:51.749 --> 00:27:57.731
You're bleeding from different insecurities from your past that you've never really faced, or fears, or whatever it is.
00:27:57.731 --> 00:28:02.969
You're bleeding and you slap this really like old, infected band-aid on it.
00:28:02.969 --> 00:28:07.282
That's porn, basically, and that sense porn is a solution.
00:28:07.282 --> 00:28:16.319
It's a bad one, but you know, guys, if you're out there and you feel like, well, you're just watching porn, just for the high of it and that's all there is to it, don't be naive.
00:28:16.319 --> 00:28:20.212
Don't be naive to think that there's not a lot more going on than that.
00:28:20.212 --> 00:28:40.571
You know because, again, you know, alan, you could probably speak to this, but I know, I've seen it time and time again everyone who's struggling with this has a story and there are always more things, more layers underneath, more connections, like a web of connections that can be made that help people understand why they're using something like pornography.
00:28:40.571 --> 00:28:42.819
Because, like you said, porn is powerful.
00:28:42.819 --> 00:28:49.903
You're not using this powerful thing for nothing, you know, especially if you've told yourself you want to quit but you can't.
00:28:49.903 --> 00:28:52.025
There's a reason for that, you know.
00:28:52.727 --> 00:28:56.436
Well, what I would add to that, I think, is or maybe even refine, is that sex is powerful.
00:28:56.436 --> 00:29:00.594
Porn is only as powerful as your wounding is.
00:29:00.594 --> 00:29:04.806
There are lots of people for whom porn has no power.
00:29:04.806 --> 00:29:10.868
There's no, there's nothing intriguing about it, you know, and they don't even understand how porn can have power.
00:29:10.868 --> 00:29:14.849
It's just like, it just feels creepy, like you're watching other people have sex, you know.
00:29:14.849 --> 00:29:17.744
Yeah, that should tell us something, right?
00:29:17.744 --> 00:29:21.040
Well, and that can, because there can be power in that as well.
00:29:21.040 --> 00:29:39.044
I mean, that's, you know, like if you're afraid of it, that's like, maybe, if not being able to look away is addicted, not being able to hold on to yourself in the presence of it might be anorexic, you know, I don't know, but I think what is important is like how, again, how powerful this is.
00:29:39.044 --> 00:29:39.665
Does that make sense?
00:29:40.028 --> 00:29:40.671
Yeah, it does.
00:29:40.671 --> 00:29:41.915
Yeah, that's insightful.
00:29:41.915 --> 00:29:45.269
So I know we've only got a few minutes left, so ending this.
00:29:45.269 --> 00:29:54.355
If porn is not the way we need to be working out our stories, what is the way that we could be working out our stories Like what does the path to healing look like?
00:29:54.826 --> 00:29:55.953
I think the path to healing.
00:29:55.953 --> 00:30:00.452
It could look like a lot of things for a lot of people, but I think for everybody it's going to contain these ingredients.
00:30:00.452 --> 00:30:02.327
It's going to contain understanding yourself.
00:30:02.327 --> 00:30:15.888
It's going to contain owning for yourself the responsibility to know and love yourself in the way you're hoping this other adult is going to show up and give you permission to know and love.
00:30:15.888 --> 00:30:16.471
Does that make sense?
00:30:16.471 --> 00:30:22.794
Like we're all in our woundedness waiting for this mom or dad to show up and scoop us up and tell us we're okay?
00:30:22.794 --> 00:30:29.313
Growing up is, and healing is, a process of owning the responsibility for that task ourselves.
00:30:29.313 --> 00:30:41.252
When we do that, sex becomes a powerful tool for connecting with and knowing another person, rather than being rescued or healed in our wounding or anything like that.
00:30:41.252 --> 00:30:45.690
Those things are always going to get in the way and distract sex from what its purpose really is.
00:30:45.690 --> 00:30:54.766
So, yeah, it's going to include those things knowing yourself, having compassion for yourself and beginning to take a role of authority in your own internal world.
00:30:54.766 --> 00:30:56.690
That is loving and understanding.
00:30:57.912 --> 00:30:58.212
Awesome.
00:30:58.212 --> 00:31:00.057
Those are really good insights.
00:31:00.057 --> 00:31:02.269
More specifically, what does that look like?
00:31:02.269 --> 00:31:11.978
What steps can someone take to go on this journey and know themselves better, and what encouragement can you offer guys who are really feeling stuck or struggling with this?
00:31:13.405 --> 00:31:14.669
Stop being frustrated with yourself.
00:31:14.669 --> 00:31:15.972
That's not helping.
00:31:15.972 --> 00:31:31.507
See your addiction with porn in the same way you see your addiction with alcohol or with anything else, whatever culture or your religious drama or anything else tells you about how disgusting that is or how worthless you are because that's happening.
00:31:31.507 --> 00:31:41.012
Push back at all that and understand that something very sweet and tender and honest is happening in that process.
00:31:41.012 --> 00:31:49.280
And so, I think, not being frustrated with yourself and instead being deeply curious about yourself and finding help.
00:31:49.340 --> 00:32:07.830
Finding somebody in your life that is and I don't say help in a way that because you're helpless and you can't do it on your own, I'm saying that you don't have to, you don't have to do it by yourself and finding somebody who is not going to be the adult that pulls you out of the water, but it's going to be somebody who swims next to you while you're sorting this out.
00:32:07.830 --> 00:32:08.953
I think that can be a therapist.
00:32:08.953 --> 00:32:13.673
In some cases that can be a pastor who's particularly wise and experienced.
00:32:13.673 --> 00:32:15.676
Look for a therapist in your area.
00:32:15.676 --> 00:32:26.336
I think that's a tremendous first step, and as soon as somebody is trying to offer you a controlling solution, trading one mistress for another isn't going to help.
00:32:26.336 --> 00:32:32.678
If somebody is offering you a solution that sounds unduly controlling or shaming.
00:32:32.678 --> 00:32:33.981
Walk away, find somebody else.
00:32:34.324 --> 00:32:35.046
That's not going to help.
00:32:35.046 --> 00:32:37.075
That's so good, alan man.
00:32:37.075 --> 00:32:40.068
Thank you so much for your time sharing your wisdom with us on the podcast.
00:32:40.068 --> 00:32:41.255
I know you've got to go here.
00:32:41.255 --> 00:32:42.923
Loved having you as a guest man.
00:32:42.923 --> 00:32:46.500
We've got to have you back on, thanks for having me Talk about some of these things even more.
00:32:46.500 --> 00:32:48.087
I think there's so many topics we hit on.
00:32:48.087 --> 00:32:51.923
We could go in more detail, so anyways, yeah, man, we will talk soon.
00:32:51.923 --> 00:32:52.606
We'll see you around.
00:32:52.887 --> 00:32:53.592
Sounds great, thank you.
00:32:54.395 --> 00:32:54.738
All right, guys.
00:32:54.738 --> 00:32:55.903
Well, that's all we've got for today.
00:32:55.903 --> 00:32:58.692
Thanks for tuning in to another episode, man.
00:32:58.692 --> 00:33:01.807
It almost seems like these counselors and therapists know what they're talking about.
00:33:01.807 --> 00:33:14.628
Man, just Alan, is so good at getting to the heart of the issue, at really going deeper than I think most people could, at diagnosing this, taking those surgical tools and helping us get to the bottom.
00:33:14.628 --> 00:33:41.978
Of course, in a podcast like this, we're not able to get to the bottom of every single person's unique story, because you've got to have some help that's custom, tailored to you, and so that's where, like I said at the beginning of the episode, don't be afraid to seek that help, whether that's an in-person therapist near you or a community like ours that reclaimed in a program where you can get that individual, personalized help that you need to move forward, get unstuck and live porn free.
00:33:41.978 --> 00:33:43.363
Y'all have a wonderful day.
00:33:43.363 --> 00:33:45.829
We'll see you in the next episode coming very soon.
00:33:45.829 --> 00:33:49.287
Until then, thank you for listening to the Reclaimed Recovery Podcast.
00:33:52.252 --> 00:34:00.338
If you enjoyed listening to today's interview, you can help me move mountains by taking a couple minutes of your time and supporting the podcast.
00:34:00.338 --> 00:34:02.228
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00:34:02.228 --> 00:34:05.621
One is really easy you can leave a review for the podcast.
00:34:05.621 --> 00:34:17.007
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00:34:17.007 --> 00:34:25.740
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00:34:25.740 --> 00:34:30.277
So you can find a link to support us through PayPal or Patreon in the show notes.
00:34:30.277 --> 00:34:31.903
Thanks so much, guys you rock.
00:34:31.903 --> 00:34:34.527
Get out there, be resilient, live porn free.
00:34:34.527 --> 00:34:35.608
We'll see you next time.
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