Overall I would say that I have not been doing well on my program to overcome porn in my life. I got a new computer the other day and in the process of hooking it up I did not have any filtering on it. In fact, it was a MAC instead of a PC and so I wanted to check out how good the filtering was for the new Parental Controls. So I ended up going to some bad sites to see if it would filter them. It did to some degree, but some of them got through. I added the bad sites to the filter so that I can't go back there again unless I log in as admin.
But that is the rub. I can log in as admin and have been able to do so for several days. But I have stayed away from that evil of visiting bad sites for the past few days. Even as I was checking out my filter, there was a part of me that was really disgusted at what I saw. Porn is undoubtedly destructive in so many ways. In fact, the only thing that I can think that I got from it was a feeling of lust in my body if I lingered too long and let myself fall into it. But although there may be a short "high" from that, it actually turns out to be destructive in the long run. Destructive to my health, my body, my relationships (especially with my wife), my work and everything else. There is no good that comes from it.
And so I thought that I would "just say no" to doing it anymore. When I have looked at porn in the recent past, it was as if I thought that I SHOULD be doing it. Weird, I know, but somehow that is how it seemed. Especially when I felt like I was under stressful circumstances, then that seemed like what I "should" do. But I really don't have to. There is nothing that says that I have to except me. And so if I decide that I don't have to, then I don't have to. I am wondering if it is as easy as that. It has been a long and difficult path in some ways. Anyone can read my posts in the forums about working the steps and see that I spent a lot of time and energy trying to work the steps. And then I thought I worked the 6th and 7th steps of giving it up, but found myself back with the behaviors that I just described. But really the 6th and 7th steps are about giving the behavior up. And that is really up to me, isn't it? I think that it is. Obviously, God will let me do these bad behaviors as long as I want. Yes, there will be bad consequences, but I can keep doing the bad behaviors. I will lose what I love, but I can still keep doing the bad behaviors. God will not stop me. But I don't have to do the bad behaviors.
So I am wondering if at this stage of my recovery I can "just say no", as the 1980s phrase from Nancy Reagan about not doing drugs goes. If I can, it would make my life so much simpler and better. One thing that I need to realize is that it won't make all my problems go away. Some of them will still be there and new ones may arise. But l believe that life will be better. I will have more peace, more love, more strength, probably more health and more of the things in life that truly are meaningful.
I don't know if this will work for me, but I hope that it does. I may have to go back to having to set up filters on my computer, adding sites to an allowed list and all sorts of things that cut down my time and productivity. Or I can just say no each and every day and truly enjoy my freedom. I hope that I can do the latter. May the Lord help me in this.
Tags: Reflective
