Thrive Beyond Pornography

The cue, response, reward system of habit creation can also be used to intervene when our habits don't align with who we want to be. Here is a simple process that you can use every time to intervene when your brain offers you the chance to view pornography. If you are looking to eliminate an unwanted porn habit, this is the podcast for you. Learn more at zachspafford.com

In this interview, Andrea (Andi) talks about being a single woman who, for the last three years, has struggled with and begun to eliminate pornography. If you are someone who needs help with pornography, please set up a free consultation at zachspafford.com/workwithme.

Here are six essential, simple steps that you can use every time to eliminate unwanted urges to view pornography. If you are looking to eliminate an unwanted porn habit, this is the podcast for you. Learn more at zachspafford.com

This podcast is for Latter-day Saints (LDS) who want to overcome pornography and create the life they want. It's hosts teach you how to retrain your brain to completely quit pornography. If you are excited to move past your unwanted porn habit, this is the show for you. For more information on how to overcome porn please visit, zachspafford.com. To schedule a consult, go to zachspaffor.com/workwithme

How do I keep the urges to view pornography from coming back.  Don’t judge who you are in that conversation - allow for neutrality in thoughts Someone can be beautiful or sexy without making it mean anything about you.  Focus on what actions you want to take next Allowing the thought to be there Drop the judgment of what your brain offers you.   Stop believing a thought is morally corrupt if you aren’t choosing it.

My wife used sex as a way to try and control me and I wanted her to My wife is a wonderful woman, whom I love and adore.  She also used to try and control me with sex.  It wasn’t always overt, and it wasn’t usually something that was designed to make me do something that I didn’t want to do.  In fact, it was the opposite.  She was trying to get me to not do something.  She was trying to keep me from looking at porn and I didn’t really want to look at porn. I wanted to stop. It was always, in her mind, something she would do to “meet my needs”. And I thought she was, by her actions, “meeting my needs.”  In her mind, my pornography problem was about controlling how often I needed to give in to my urges. If she could interrupt my urge by engaging with me sexually, then she was helping me. She thought she was helping control my choice to use pornography.  She would ask questions like, “How are you doing today?” in an effort to gauge where I was and if she “needed” to intervene by providing me with an outlet for the day.  What she was doing, in reality, was frustrating herself and rewarding my pleasure center for disconnected, isolating behavior.  Two main things were frustrating her.  First, was the fact that she could not, despite her best efforts, control my urges or when or how I acted on them. Whenever we try to control others, we will always find ourselves frustrated. They will rebel, they will deceive, they will find a way around you. People are like water; they will go wherever their personal gravity takes them.  It is inevitable.  Second, and I think more importantly, when what each of us really wanted was intimacy in the deepest and most connected sense of the word she was creating resentment and I was creating disappointment. Control is antithetical to intimacy because inherent in intimacy is trust and control requires none.  She resented needing to look over my shoulder to make sure I was making good decisions.  I was disappointed that the intimacy that I wanted wasn’t available in a resentful spouse  Don’t get me wrong, when you and your spouse decide that pornography use is not ok in your household then both of you should take steps to create an environment where viewing pornography is difficult. I am also not condoning pornography use.  I am also saying, whether you are a man or a woman, making a decision to intercede in the urges of your spouse in an effort to control their actions is not going to work out in the long run.  Let’s flip this on its head for a moment.  Imagine a wife who is struggling with eating sugary treats. Each morning her husband asks her how she is feeling about that cheesecake with fresh strawberries in the fridge.  During that discussion the husband hears the wife is having a hard time not sneaking a piece. She knows that it is for dessert after dinner this evening, but that she really wants to have just a little.  So, he says, I know what, I’ll help you out. I’ll meet your needs. I have a carrot for you. It should tide you over because carrots have a lot of sugar.  His attempt to “help her out” places him in a position that makes no sense to anyone.  He’s giving her a “sweet treat”, but it isn’t what she wants. Not really.  She may even take and eat it. But she may feel resentful that he is trying to control what she eats.  Do you see the parallels? What we all have to understand is that controlling others behavior isn’t really going to bring us or them to the place we want to be.  It may only to create a short-term fix and will probably create a long-term negative effect. ...

Last week we discussed how goals can be problematic when we are working to achieve lifelong behaviors rather than short term events.  As promised, this week we will be talking about how to decide what your values are. In addition to that we’ll talk about how to more fully live them.  When you think of your values, this is often where your deepest emotions lie. And as a result this may be an emotional process for you to go through.   As you think about what your values might be, I find it helpful to use I statements that convey a sense of who you are.  For example, from the last podcast, “I choose sexual experiences that create intimacy.” Here we have a current position on who we are, who we want to be and how we want to act in the moment.  When you think about your pornography struggle or any struggle you have.  If your goal is to eliminate a pornography habit, ask yourself, what would achieving this goal show that you stand for or support ( or stand against or oppose)? As you look at the core values that emerge from that question, you can form them into I statements that can fully express and inhabit your core value.   So, for instance, if I were answering the question, what would eliminating pornography from my life achieve and show that I stand for or support?  I might say, I stand for living chastely, being open and creating intimacy in my life.  My I statements would then look something like, “ I live chastely”, “I am open with my spouse about my sexuality, including when or if I view pornography” and our phrase from earlier, “I choose sexual experiences that create intimacy”.  As you go through the process of doing this you may want to come up with two or three core values statements that are easy to remember and that help you convey to yourself a new sense of who ¥ou are.   Then, in the process of living those values, it is important to keep in mind what we learned about values last week.  If you havent’ listened to that, go back and get familiar with what values are.  You;ll want to hold these new values loosely. Meaning, rather than holding so tightly to them that when you fail to live up to them, you beat yourself up and feel like these values are impossible to live by, you hold them like you would a handful of sand.  If you’ve ever grabbed a handful of sand and squeezed it tightly you’d have noted that most of the sand escapes your grip and you are left with very little of it when you open your hand .  Rather, when it comes to values, using the sand as an analogy, if we pile the sand on an open palm, we end up being able to hold more than we ever could by squeezing it.   This analogy also allows us to prioritize which sand, and how much of each type of sand we will hold at given times in our lives.  When we prioritize our values properly, we find that we are no longer trying to hold on to ever decreasing amounts of capacity in our hands, but allowing, at times, some values to take a back seat to our current needs while still maintaining a small focus on values that are still important but not urgent.   So as you hold your values lightly, prioritizing them as you do, you’ll find that you’ll need to practice your values for yourself and in your interactions with others.   You’ll also recognize that as you focus in on a priority value, that your other values are still relevant to your life and who you want to be.  One key to living your values more fully is being aware of what they actually are, which is what we’ve just done.  The next key to living your values more fully is practicing them whenever you can.  Think of scenarios where you have not lived up to your values in the past and role play what you would do if you had lived up to your values.   You could...

Shifting goals to values: As a person who struggled with pornography I had one goal.  Stop looking at pornography.  There is a problem with this.  It isn’t that this isn’t a worthy goal.  It is.  The problem with this goal is that goals are about finite moments in time.   Goals are about achieving a target at a point, usually, in the future that once passed, will no longer be as relevant to your daily life as it was before you achieved it.  That means, that once this goal is achieved, it stops being relevant, and then becomes something that you are no longer shooting for.  Let me give you an example.  Some of you may have done iron man competitions.  WE JUST had the world championship Iron man, here in st g over the weekend.  If you have a goal of racing in the iron man, you’ll do certain things on a set schedule to achieve that goal.  The day of the race comes and goes and the next day you are back to your routine you had before you were training to become an iron man or iron woman. That is what a goals based result looks like.   But what about those people, who for years, keep doing it.  They seem to love it.  They seem to be doing it as part of who they are, not to simply say they’ve done it.   Often, when I see men or women who come to me after a year or more of not looking at pornography, they have been training hard and achieving a goal.  They have turned things off on their phones. They’ve been careful to not be left alone.  They’ve changed certain aspects of their lives as a process of exercising the willpower to achieve a goal.  But the moment it is achieved, it is no longer a goal. And all that work that we’ve done to get to a certain point, may stop happening.   This is what a diet looks like as well.  You stop eating certain foods.  Foods that you will go back to once you’ve gotten to x weight.  Then when you achieve x weight, the goal is no longer a goal and you go back to the way you ate before and maybe even worse than before.  That is why most people who go on a diet, end up gaining it all back and then some.   The problem is, this goal based system of seeking achievement is not attuned to the long term results you are looking to create.  What you need, what we all need values .  Learning to create a values based decision making process will clean up all the struggle that we have with ourselves and what we aren’t achieving.  First, this week we’re going to teach you about how values work. Next week we are going to teach you about how to decide what your values are and how to live them more fully.  1.     values are here and now. Goals are in the future. a.     So, just like in the case of losing a certain number of pounds or running the iron man, once you’ve achieved your goal to stop looking at pornography, it is no longer a goal.  b.     Some of you might be clever and thinking, well, then what if I say, My goal is to never look at pornography ever again.  c.     Well, ask yourself, have you ever set a goal that you’ve failed to progress at to the point where you’ve convinced yourself it’s unachievable? d.     So, how do we do this different?   e.     we create a value around this f.      I like to use “I” statements for this because they easily capture who we are g.     And by virtue of the nature of “I” statements, they are in the now.  h.     “I live chastely” “I keep my commitments to myself sexually” “I choose sexual experiences that create...

In this episode I interview my client Jonathan Layton.

Most of us, when we find ourselves in a position that we might find impossible, like winning a race that is seemingly unwinnable we beat ourselves up.  That is how many men and women act when confronted with their pornography viewing habit.  We see ourselves in last place and never able to get to that top ten so we can finally win at something. 

What if I don’t want to stop.  I had a consultation with someone this last week that was somewhat out of the norm for me.  Most of the people I speak with are in a place where they have struggled with pornography for a significant period of time and want to end their involvement with it.  That was not the case with the client I’m going to tell you about.  He was earnest and open with his wife and church leaders.  He seemed honestly desirous that he could be in full fellowship with the saints and still view pornography because of what it had done for him.  Before anyone listening gets out the pitch forks, I would like to take a step back and just touch on this perspective.   For this client, who had some recent issues that made zoning out important to him, pornography had become an escape to which he could go for relief from a painful struggle.   According to him, his wife seemed to be accepting of it.   So let’s talk about, what if I don’t know if I want to stop  I have only had a couple of people that have come to me with this type of scenario.   In fact, two people.   The first, really wanted me to say that pornography viewing was ok.  The one I chatted with this week, I’m not sure what he wanted me to tell him. But to both of them I would say the same thing.  

    What is the best way to bring up pornography with teens? What is the best way to find out if they are being exposed to it? How can we help family members who watch porn or struggle with addiction? After many years of a pornography addiction, can an individual overcome this problem on their own without the 3 prong program the church suggests? How do we protect our children and grandchildren from pornography? How do you think it is best to block some of that content on the internet we don’t want to have show up on our screens? Do you have a recommendation for what to tell kids to do when they come across something that’s inappropriate? (eg turn it off, tell a grown up, sing a hymn, say a prayer) How do I encourage someone whose life is impacted by pornography? What are the steps to help someone who has stopped using pornography but they still struggle with masturbation? What can my kids say to others who might show up with inappropriate images or materials?  How can I help my kids confidently shun it and encourage better behavior and activities?  Wanting to remember to hate the sinner and love the sinner “we can do much better”

Alone and Ok -       For the first time in a long time, I’m alone at home.   -       Some kids are with darcy at a playgroup, others are out running errands, one, I’ve just dropped off at work -       There was a time when this would be a moment of struggle.  -       When I would fight, with all my might to stay clean through this time.  -       Being alone, with no one to catch me, was always a moment where my mind would offer me thoughts like,  “nows your chance” “no one will know” -       As a business traveler, I found myself in hotel rooms alone often.  -       It was a consistent pattern that I would end up, at some point, spending a few minutes at least and sometimes an hour or so, viewing pornography.  -       Having 8 kids, there have been very few rare moments where I was strictly alone at home -       So, on the road is where I would do it most often.  -       Part of it was loneliness  -       Part of it was boredom.  -       Part of it was the idea that I could get away with something and the only person who would know was me.  -       That last one is the one that really, in the end, made it so I stopped looking at pornography  -       Last night I had a conversation with a client who was telling me about his ‘accountability’ partners.  -       As he described them, various people, including his wife, he asked me, what my thoughts are on the software for accountability and accountability parnters in general -       He also asked if there were a permanent filter that I know of that is free  -       I told him, the only filter or accountability person that really ends up working, is your own brain.  -       That is the only way I know how to truly end a bad habit.  -       Is retraining our brains to no longer desire pornography, no longer follow the urges, and no longer ignoring our moral compass.  -       That process is what I coach people on, how I help them to get to where they want to be. -       That is how I got to the place I am now.  -       Alone, in my house. With no one to catch me.   -       Yet not even fighting with my urges in the slightest.  -       Because, I could look at pornography if I wanted to.  -       I’m allowed, by virtue of my agency to do so.  -       But I choose not to, because the person I want to be, doesn’t -       Not because there is a filter I couldn’t surpass -       There is no free, permanent filter available.  -       You get what you pay for -       That’s why I do the work I do.   -       I wish I had a coach that would have helped me through this process.    -       Because so many of us, feel like we can’t be alone.   -       We

Food porn -       Porn and food are similar in the way we interact with them.  -       Food is required for sustained life  -       Our sexual desires are inborn and not likely to just disappear when we stop looking at pornography.  -       Recently I have been working to eliminate an extra 20 poounds that I’ve earned over the last 20 years.  -       I’m finding a lot of parallels to my struggle with pornography 1.     Urges and cravings come from nowhere  2.     The same techniques that I used to stop looking at pornography are helping me stop eating every time my brain says to a.     Fast food b.     Eating out c.     Sugary treats d.     Stopping, dropping into my body, and breathing e.     Noticing what my brain is offering and asking if it is going to help me achieve my goals.  f.       3.     There are also some differences.  a.     I don’t feel the same kind of guilt when I grab a snack though I do feel guilt b.     I don’t feel like I have to talk to my bishop 4.     There are some similarities a.     I tell my wife when I stop and get some food b.     I don’t feel like I’m living up to who I say I am when I eat in ways that are contrary to how I’ve committed to eating.  c.     Understanding that this isn’t a diet but a way of life.  d.     Sometimes my wife gets upset that I am eating something we’ve agreed I wouldn’t 

Welcome to another bonus addition of wives Wednesday! I am so excited to be here and talk to guy guys today. Today I wanted to talk about how to create more compassion empathy and love for both you and your spouse. When a love one struggles with pornography it often creates very big emotions for both partners. . IF you follow us on Instagram you might have seen the post I wrote that said  The more time we can spend creating compassion, empathy, and love for both ourselves and our partner the further along we get.  I wanted to go into a bit more detail here on the podcast. Sometimes I find it hard to write things because it is hard to convey tone and intent through writing.  The way to create more compassion for each other is realizing we are all just trying to feel better and that we each have behaviors we use to achieve that goal. What are some of the behaviors you find yourself doing when you are avoiding doing housework, meal planning, being present with your kids, stressed, overwhelmed, frustrated, angry, or defeated? I can tell you some of the things I do in case you need some ideas… Scroll Instagram, check our podcast numbers and reviews, go out for ice cream, over eat or just eat food that doesn’t make me feel good. Sometimes I yell at my kids or try to place blame outside of me why and am not feeling happy.  The way we create more empathy is seeking to understand our spouse and trying to imagine what it would be like if we were in their shoes. . The way we create more love is by dropping the judgement we have of our partner and ourself. . When I began to truly empathize with Zach and his struggle with pornography and drop the idea that the way he “sinned” was worse than mine, the easier it was to create a relationship where there was room for us both to grow. . If you are trying to get to this place and feel stuck message me and let’s chat! . I love helping women move forward in their relationship themself and their partner.

Overcoming pornography takes an understanding of what your brain is doing. The model is a great way to get a handle on it and start making changes.

-       Let’s talk about how we can move from fear, worried about how this is going to destroy marriages,  -       To love, letting this become a challenge that we face together, growing with, and strengthening each other -       We are going to discuss ways to understand and recognize the fear based messages that we offer -       As we discuss these we’ll talk about how we might discuss address these when others say them and how we can open conversations differently -       And change those conversations to love, hope, and success -       Let’s start with somethings that we often hear and see -       “This will destroy your life?”/marriage -       You can never forget those images You will always be addicted/this will be a problem 

When Marriage is hard. Seasons of marriage Imagine on the day you got married you knew that there would be a trial so difficult that it had the potential to tear apart your entire life.   Your every belief structure would be questioned. everything you had worked for would be reduced to the decision of whether to stay or go.  all of your hard work, love, and hope would be tested so thoroughly that either this would be the end of your marriage or your marriage will be strengthened immeasurably.   Imagine, as you stand there, vowing to make your life and your eternity with the person you now adore, that this will happen not just once, but multiple times during your life together.   Would you get married?  Would you choose a different partner?  how would you approach marriage differently?

I just listened to your most recent podcast about the vulnerability partner vs the accountability partner and I’m left with one question. When you are the vulnerability partner and the pornography user is expressing feelings of having a bad day or not feeling well about themself, what does the vulnerability partner respond with? Aside from listening what should they do or say to help?

The three steps that take us down the rabbit hole.  As I have worked with hundreds of men and women over the past few years, I have noticed a pattern of behavior emerge that is the critical turning point from being fully the master of your behavior to viewing pornography and following the habitual following of feel good now based rituals. This doesn’t happen with every one every time, but it happens with such frequency that it makes sense to get a feel for it, if you are someone that is working to eliminate a bad habit in your life.  It all starts with a near truth.  A near truth is something that, on the surface is easily seen as true and something that most people would agree with you on.  These kinds of thoughts sound like this: These are all actual beliefs that individual clients have said to me in the scope of our coaching. “I don’t want to be miserable all day” “being in control of myself is so hard” And  “When I find something I enjoy, I stick to it” These are the kinds of thoughts that we think should be true.   I’ve never met someone who wanted to be miserable at all, much less all day.  We have all been in a position to where we think self control is hard.  And who doesn’t want to stick with enjoyable things.   They are near truths because they are the kinds of phrases that are hard to argue against.  They seem right, others are likely to agree with you when you say them, and they are easy to believe because of these things.  The problem here is that though they are near truths, they aren’t true in the long term.  They are actually lies in the long term.  Not because you actually do want to be miserable all day or because being in control of yourself is really easy or because when you find things you enjoy you don’t stick to it.   Let’s start with the first one, “I don’t want to be miserable all day” There are at least two untruths in this statement.   The first issue is that most of us, when we deal with our feelings directly, are not going to feel miserable “all day”.  Modern research shows that most emotions, when felt out to their full extent, last about 90 seconds.  That isn’t to say that your feelings might not last longer or shorter.  Just that is the average.  Usually, the reason our feelings last longer is that we keep retelling stories that refresh and restart the cycle of the feeling.  When we fall in love, we tell stories of how our new love loves us.  When we are miserable, we tell and retell stories about how someone has wronged us, how we are in the right, and they are not. This particular client was dealing with work struggles.  He was telling himself how others around him were talking about him.   The only way he was going to be miserable all day was if he kept telling himself repeatedly about what he thought others thought about him.  All day is a long time to dwell on anything, especially, when we are aware that our thoughts, beliefs, and stories are the things making us miserable and we get to choose whether they are true or not and how long to dwell on them.  The second issue with this statement is that we assume that we don’t want to feel miserable and that the proffered solution is going to make us feel better.   Funny thing about emotions is that they exist to be felt and we often do everything in our power to avoid feeling them.   In this scenario this client believed that he didn’t want to feel miserable all day, and the solution his brain offered him was 30 minutes of arousal to remove the miserable feeling.  a thing that our brains often do is discount future pain based on current desire to feel pleasure,  What his brain didn’t take...

Darcy shares her experiences.

How to make yours real.

Accountability partners There is often, in marriages and in the addiction model of pornography struggles, a question of, “what about my accountability partner?”   Often, we ask this because we are seeking to have someone who will struggle through this with us and help us in those intense moments where we are believing the lies our brain tells us about how we don’t want to feel bad and pornography will help solve that immediate, acute struggle.  As I was talking about this with a client this week, I urged him to use the plan ahead protocol that we teach to our individual coaching clients and in our membership, as well as, being radically honest with the people around him.  In particular his mother.   His response to me prompted this podcast.   He said, “my mom struggled through my dad’s drug addictions as his accountability partner and isn’t really willing to do that for me.  She said, I need to do this one on my own.” Her story was one of being crushed by the overwhelming burden of being the person who is supposed to help someone do something, and having absolutely no control or influence over that person’s behavior.  She didn’t want to be “responsible” for her son the way she had been “responsible” for her husband all those years.   What is the difference between being or having an “accountability partner” and being accountable to yourself while being open about our struggles? The traditional role of an accountability partner the way it was explained to me and the way I interpreted it, was that they were a person you checked in with regularly, they measured your progress, you called them when there was a crisis and they were the person who was going to talk you down off the ledge, convince you to stop, try to interrupt your model and get you back on the straight and narrow path.  Sounds good right?   Darcy, what do you think about this idea? Then there is the idea of partnering with yourself and if you desire one other person to help you just be honest out loud with what is going on for you.   This is the person you are going to tell what is happening for you, while simultaneously expecting nothing from them.   They aren’t there to talk you off the ledge, help you stop, or distract you from your problems.   Really, what we are talking about is a vulnerability partner. Being willing to say what is really going on with you.   Talk openly about your wants, struggles, feelings, and joys  

Radical honesty.  Not lying to self about what pornography does for you -       I don’t want to feel frustrated the rest of the day – this is where it starts -       Now’s a good time,  -       After I turn to pornography I won’t feel frustrated -       Turning to pornography will help me forget -          Being aware that your brain is trying to help you feel good now, not feel good about yourself. Or in the future – your brain is always in the moment Being upfront about your pornography use.  -       Plan ahead,  -       Confess ahead -       Stop acting like we don’t know the pattern -       Owning the decision o   Don’t want to believe the things that you would believe about yourself if you were actively, consciously choosing it, rather than being caught off guard or a victim, or addicted, 

Fear Not Is it going to destroy your life if you drink a cup of coffee?  What if you have sex outside of marriage?  How about if you don’t eat meat sparingly and fruits and vegetables in the season thereof? We think the more that we oppose something, talk about how bad something is, create and perpetuate fear around it, the more we will be able to keep people, including ourselves, from doing it.  So, we often tell stories of designed to highlight the absolute worst thing that could happen to a person should they engage in a particular behavior that is contrary to the gospel.   When it comes to things like pornography, modesty, alcohol, or really anything we are striving to keep our kids and family members away from.   We tell the stories of the one person we know who did, you name the sin, and lost everything.   So to help us stop doing that we are going to tap into 2 timothy ch1 v 7 to talk about how we can stop stigmatizing what we find morally wrong and start living more fully within the gospel that heavenly Father has given us.  7 For God hath not given us the spirit of https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/#note7a (afear); but of https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/#note7b (bpower), and of https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/#note7c (clove), and of a sound mind. Let’s start with power.  I personally interpret this as agency.  We have the power to chose what it is that we feel is right.  Oftentimes, the fear side of things tells us that we are addicted, trapped, stuck.  When we talk about our struggles this way we disempower ourselves and others.   To take back power, we must accept our agency.  Take responsibility for our choices.  Stop saying “can’t” should, shouldn’t.   Let’s move to love Charity and love go hand in hand, but they also are complimented by empathy and understanding.  I’ve yet to meet anyone who didn’t prefer love to a story of doom and gloom about their behavior.  Just because we don’t agree with a behavior, doesn’t mean that telling horror stories is going to keep people from doing it.  Last – sound mind.  This is probably one of my favorite things within the gospel and often it gets short changed because we like hearing dramatic stories of revelations and hero stories of great triumph.  But a sound mind, to me means that we just need to use our brains and the logic and gospel principles that God has given us.   We can figure things out.  we are pretty smart.   The brother of jared comes to mind. He was sent back to come up with a solution.  Only the parts we aren’t able to do, like lighting the stones, are where the lord wants to intervene because he wants us to grow.    Shame cannot survive being spoken, it cannot survive empathy,  brene brown.  

Listen to my conversation with Ben, an amazing coach for parents. You can find out more about him and his amazing work at benpughcoaching.com

Healthy sexuality is not a fear based avoidance of difficult sexual topics. We need to teach our children swimming skills -       Agency -       Repentance -       Atonement We need to model the skills of healthy sexuality with our kids.  Want to work with Zach or Darcy. Set up a consult at zachspafford.com/workwithme

Let’s talk about what coaching is.  The kind of coaching that I do is called causal coaching.  This work seeks to find the underlying issue that is creating the results in your life.   This means that when someone comes to me and says, “I’m looking to eliminate a pornography habit from my life.”  I seek to understand what is creating that habit.  Many times that habit is a result of a lack of emotional skills.  In my own life, I had a lack of understanding about what was driving my behavior and a lack of understanding on how to deal with what was driving my behavior.  So the two skills I needed and everyone needs to begin cultivating to be successful in this work are  1.     Awareness of the emotions that are created in their life by the thoughts they believe 2.     Practice dealing with those emotions without trying to avoid them, suppress them, or discount or negate them.  For instance, when darcy would go on trips with the kids to see her family and I was left alone to work, I had to learn to recognize that I was feeling lonely and learn to understand the thoughts surrounding that feeling.   Then I had to learn how to process that loneliness.  How to accept it, feel it, and not avoid it.   Sometimes, clients want to get a new emotion by just switching their thoughts or trying to skip past feeling the emotion.  That’s a mistake.  In this situation, I want to feel lonely because it serves me to recognize that when my family is gone, I miss them.  In gaining an awareness of the emotion of loneliness through practiced Noticing, I was able to see it coming, see when I was most likely to turn to pornography.  This helped me be able to make conscious choices, rather than following the easy path toward just seeking to feel good that my brain had often offered me.  In addition to that, feeling loneliness fully allowed me to get good at feeling all of my emotions.  So, when Darcy or the kids were on the phone, I could feel happy to talk to them more fully.   When my clients work with me, they are responsible for taking practicing these new skills as often as possible.  I call it off game work.  Just like in sports, where we practice outside of the game to help us prepare to play our best in game time situations, this off game work is done by repeatedly engaging with the skill in non game time situations.   For anyone trying to kick a habit, like pornography, overeating, or excessive phone use, practicing noticing your emotions on something that occurs regularly but isn’t the habit you are trying to eliminate gives perspective on what is happening in your brain.  It empowers you to use those skills when powerful urges that you would normally give into come knocking.  So, how do you take advantage of this newfound off game practice? Start by writing down what you are going to do and attach that practice session to a current habit.  For instance, every time you brush your teeth, you can take 1 minute immediately afterward to practice being aware of how you are feeling and what your thoughts are that are creating that feeling.  I like doing this in the mornings because, for many of us, this is a good time to reflect on what is happening that day, which can be a source of stress for the work we have to accomplish that day.   Once you’ve done that, take 1 more minute to write down what thoughts are creating the feelings and what feelings you have.   This is a small practice, but it will help you to become more aware of what is happening for you.  Once you have written down your thoughts and feelings, take just one more minute, so we have a total of three minutes here, and...

Register for webinar https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_HgvmOmyPQn-fY2bDTWPjTw The other day Zac h and I went hiking up Shadow Mountain with our 4 little kids. Just to get up to the base of the “Mountain” you have to climb up two very steep hills. The two toddlers were complaining about their legs being tired before we even got to the base. . As we started to climb the “mountain” my brain started thinking in metaphors and how this hike up this “mountain” was a great metaphor for all the challenges we experience in life. . As we began to climb it was pretty flat. Then it got steeper and steeper. . There were points along the trail were the toddlers needed some help along the way or they wanted to hold hands to steady themselves. . Then there were a few instances were the toddlers were not physically able to do the next step on their own and needed us to boost them up the boulders so they could continue on their way. There were points along the way where Zach had to carry our youngest. . As we were climbing, if I looked up ahead at where our 9 year old boy was, (he likes to RUN up this “mountain”) it was easy to get discouraged and feel like we were so far behind and that we would never going to catch up to him. . It was easy to think how lucky he is too have a healthy body that can scale this “mountain” in no time compared to the rest of us that went a lot slower. . But, as we put one foot in front of the other we eventually got to the top of the “Mountain” just like Briggs. It took us WAY longer to get to the top but, we DID IT!!! . It was so awesome to look back down the “mountain” and see how far we had come. . Sometimes moving away from pornography and moving closer to what we truly value in life can feel like a huge “mountain” to climb. . The truth is all you have to do is keep moving forward and when you slip on the loose gravel on the path (like we all do) you get up, learn from it, and keep climbing. . If you don’t give up eventually you will make it to the top of the “mountain!”

zachspafford.com/freecall Emotional debt We’ve talked about this on the podcast before – we bought a house. It was super exciting for us to buy our house here in st g because, for about 18 months we lived in Milwaukee and missed all our friends and the life that we had here in st g.  We are super excited to have the chance to buy our house.  But when I look at the amortization table, which is the thing that tells you how much you end up actually paying for the thing you just purchased I cringe a little.  In the end we’ll pay 2x the amount that we purchased the house for.   When we talk about buffering we often just call it a behavior that creates a net negative in your life.   While buying a house is probably not exactly a net negative in your life, in fact, hopefully it is a net positive, loans and money offer a great analogue for what we do when we buffer or really how we manage our emotions. Let’s talk about how we are both borrower and lender for our own emotions and how we can better manage that process by using some very simple math.  I like to talk about emotions as the math of our lives for a couple of reasons.   One is, I’m usually speaking with men and we men like to think of our life’s journey as a series of solvable puzzles and problems.  Unfortunately, the men and women I work with often think that the emotional struggle that is often part of leaving pornography behind is a foreign land of mush and gush. Second, it really gives us some powerful perspective on what is happening and what it costs to choose certain ways of dealing with our lives. Here’s what the emotional loan process looks like.  Let’s start with a really simple example.   When we feel stressed and choose to turn to pornography, we feel arousal.   Now if this is where the emotional exchange ended then we would be fine.  That would be the end of it.  The problem is that this is usually not where it ends.   First, feeling arousal doesn’t actually deal with the reason why you might be stressed.  So, if I’m stressed because of work, then turning to pornography won’t get my work done any faster.   Second, that stressed feeling is now going to be compounded by additional negative feelings that I’m going to have to deal with as well.   Just like interest, when we borrow a positive feeling from ourselves, like arousal, that doesn’t fit into our moral compass, we are creating an emotional loan that will be paid back with interest.  So now, we have stress, guilt, shame, frustration, and maybe even more stress that wasn’t there before because we’ve spent time doing something that didn’t help us get work done and we are now even more behind.  We’ve just created a 4 or 5 to one exchange.  Imagine if someone walked up to you on the street and said, hey, I’ve got a nice crisp new dollar bill.  I’ll give it to you for that crinkled up old 5er.   You’d say, no thanks.   But that is exactly what you are agreeing to when you take the emotional loan of arousal or overeating or checking our phone.    We are taking an emotional loan from ourselves, short changing ourselves and paying back at a 5 to one ratio, sometimes more, in order to feel good right now.  In the moment.  When we feel a negative emotion, often times we look to mitigate it by using a good feeling emotion, like arousal, which is what we feel when we look at pornography.  So, in that moment we have done what I like to call, taking an emotional loan.  Meaning we have now borrowed a positive emotion from ourselves which we will need to pay interest on over time.   The interest that we usually end up paying is a compounding of the...

Mothers day! As a mom how often do you talk to other moms about pornography and how often do you find that their kids are struggling? Mom’s often bear the burden of talking about pornography with their kids, what tips would you offer any mom who wants to begin creating an open dialogue with their kids around pornography? There is often a lot of guilt and shame for moms when they find out their child is looking at pornography.  Why do you think that is? What ideas would you offer to moms to help them eliminate the shame for themselves so they can come to that conversation with their kids in a frame of mind that they can be pleased with? When you go to mothers retreats like the one you just attended, you seem to find that everyone wants to talk to you about your work once they find out about it.  What would you say to women who don’t know who to talk to about the struggles they are having with pornography and their children? 

zachspafford.com/freecall You’re addicted to pornography, Right? Monthly webinar T: The addiction Causes Problems.  F: Stress ·      Addiction means I’m not responsible for my actions –  ·      Addiction can be a rationalization that our brain offers when we want to believe we are a good person even though I don’t always live up to my values.  ·      What is the value in believing “I’m an addict?”

Do you hold your husband to a standard that you yourself can’t uphold? This idea has been on my mind a lot lately.  We are all designed to notice beauty Just because we notice beauty it doesn’t have to mean anything Is it possible to notice and appreciate beauty and still live in line with out values

That’s faith. Let’s talk about prayer.   I’ve often gone back to the bible dictionary to understand this principle and I am struck by what it teaches about the nature of prayer.   First, it is work.  So many of us go through prayer as though it were just an incantation that we learned to conjure the spell of this blessing or that.   The way we pray over our food may be an example you can look to for what I mean.   But work is uncomfortable, sometimes strenuous, and, often, marked by giving up something we want.    Interestingly, one of the only things that we have that we can give up is our will.  And in this context, our will is often, as much as it is anything in our lives, the desire to feel good here and now.   When we layer that idea into our pornography use, it’s important to acknowledge that the thing we are often seeking when we seek out pornography is to feel good, here and now.   In the ancient world, people hit themselves in the chest or tore their clothing as demonstrations of sorrow.  They were, in their attitude of prayer, literally giving up comfort in the here and now and paying the cost of discomfort in giving up their will to God in that moment.   Second, It is not a commandment, it is a conversation.  It is an opportunity to acknowledge what we’ve been given by our Heavenly Father.  It is an opportunity to discuss with him what we believe we need, want, and desire.   Prayer is an intimate expression of our weakness and dependence on our Father.  It is an opportunity to express and experience the love He has given us.   Prayer, as far as I can tell, has two main purposes.   Firstly, it is meant to help us bring our will into concert with that of God’s.   Secondly, it is a place to seek out the blessings that are already ours, but that we are required to ask for.   All of this, in my view, brings the discussion we are having with Heavenly Father about our pornography struggle into a bright highlight of what we might do better to fully realize the blessings our Father has in store.   So lets start with the phrase that I used and I’m sure many of you have as well. “Lord, please take this pornography problem away from me.” That may not be your exact wording but, it is likely similar to things you’ve said in your moments of want and struggles to end pornography in your life.   Let’s dissect where this type of prayer might miss the most powerful parts of prayer. First off, this sounds like we are giving up our will to HF.  We’re thinking, I don’t want this problem any more, I can just ask HF to take it away and make it so that I don’t have to struggle with it, because I’ve asked for a clearly good thing.  I’ve asked that I no longer look at pornography.  But what this misses, is that in asking HF to “take this away” we are asking Him to be in charge of our choices.  Problem there is, he gave you agency, he isn’t taking it back.   It also doesn’t account for work.  This is a want, a wish list item that doesn’t have any cost to it except that you asked for it.  This is like a little girl who asks her dad for a pony.   All she does is say, I want it and doesn’t create any path to making it a reality.   But, you say, this is a blessing that God might be willing to grant.  Sure, I think that might be possible.  But I also think it is unlikely.   To be honest, I don’t think HF cares if you look at pornography.  I don’t think that sits high on his priority list of things to eliminate from your life.  What I believe HF wants for each of us is an abiding testimony in the...

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Learn how saying no to something in your life is easier when you know what your real priorities are.

What happens when we get excited to look at pornography but that is contrary to who we want to be and outside of us being in integrity with ourselves.

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4 key skills that you can use to help your kids navigate pornography in their lives. https://zachspafford.securechkout.com/Membership (https://zachspafford.securechkout.com/Membership)

Recently I was discussing a specific commitment with my client that his wife was expecting from him.  One of the skills that I teach my clients is to bring their urge responses from a place of unconscious habit to a place of choice and planning.   As my client was working through this with his spouse one of the things she asked was that he not look at pornography while she is in the house.  He committed to that with her and immediately broke his word. His desire to be “good” for his wife was pretty strong and I think a lot of us do things like this.   We commit to things because we want to, we think doing so will help our spouse feel better, and it doesn’t seem like a huge ask and we should be willing to do what we’ve been asked.  This particular commitment is one that I think comes up pretty often as men and women work through their discussions about pornography in their lives. Seems simple, she says, Please don’t look at pornography while I’m in the house.  Or please don’t look at pornography while the kids are in the house.  Most men want to acquiesce to this request.  We don’t even really want to be viewing pornography to manage our lives anyway, so why wouldn’t we say yes to this? For a lot of us, this boundary is hard and fast and should never move.   So, let’s discuss it.  There are a couple of things that you and your partner need to be clear about and understand when you make commitments.   Is it realistic? Is it going to produce the results we want? Let’s start with that first question.  Is it realistic to ask your spouse to never look at pornography in your home? From a statistical perspective, americans spend 70% of our time at home.   This means that at home is the most likely place that pornography is being accessed.   Darcy – a subtle way to Control his behavior - If the result you are looking for is to restrict pornography  It is also a little scary to think he’ll be out, somewhere, looking at pornography.  Which creates a possibility that he could have an interaction with police because he’s looking at porn in public and create some additional issues.  Darcy – telling him to take his biggest struggle out of the home Is it going to produce the results we want? Darcy – whats the result Many times this is a subtle way to reduce  if the result you are looking for is to restrict pornography use, then I would say no – if it were that simple then this wouldn’t be a problem.  I think a lot of people are looking to rebuild trust in their relationships and this seems like one of the things that seems like it should be easy enough to do and totally a good idea, but I think it creates a situation where failure is inevitable.   The client I was working with was really struggling with this because he wanted to do what his wife was asking but also, basically knew that he was going to fail.  One thing that his wife has said is more important than if he looks at pornography is if he is honest with her.   This is a tough moment because it is clear that he can’t really be honest with her and commit to this requirement.  So, it’s important for each of us to be clear on what we are committing to.  For this client he needed have a candid conversation with his wife and tell her that this is not something that he can commit to at this point.   This candid honest is really difficult for both parties.  But it is essential because the intimacy that we want requires us to know our partner.   When we know our partner and are able to hear their reality and can accept them as they are we create intimacy.   So, is telling our partner that they aren’t allowed to...

New lives begins at conception.  * Nothing I’ve ever done in my life that has been worth it was an accident.  * Yet so many of us believe that we can just fall into a life where pornography no longer has a hold on us.  * One of the most important things that a man or woman who is using pornography to escape can do is just begin to think about what their life will be like without pornography.  * This new conception of the life they want is a simple, impactful stepping stone to becoming that person.  * Once that life begins to formulate in your mind, only then will you have the capacity to believe in it.  * Belief in this new idea of who you are won’t be easy at first.   * You’ll need to practice it, play with it in your mind, and work to integrate that belief in who you are into the subtle soul of your identity.  * As you believe in you, believe in your new vision, the concept of a person who doesn’t spend their time viewing pornography, you’ll begin to start achieving it.  * Many people make the mistake of thinking that achieving will lead to belief, but that is the wrong way around.  * You know this if you’ve ever watched someone accomplish a dream that only they could understand and see.  * Achievement comes after the idea is formed and the belief is solidified.  * Start thinking today about what your life looks like when pornography is no longer part of it.    

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   Travel and pornography use Lots of you guys travel.  This is a huge issue for pornography users.   It is a great opportunity to start learning what is going on for you.  Loneliness is probably the biggest issue I dealt with when I traveled for work.  Boredom is another feeling travelers often try to avoid.  Whatever negative feelings you are seeking to avoid through buffering, I want to give you 3 things that you can do to make your trip successful and pornography free.  1.     Plan ahead a.     Know your down time  b.     Create a schedule c.     Create a back up plan for down time  d.     Plan for exercise e.     Plan for positive eating f.      Plan wholesome entertainment g.      h.      2.     Increase self awareness a.     Create intimacy – reach out to friends, family and your spouse b.     Don’t expect them to fill the void of bad feelings c.     Be willing to feel bad d.     Notice your feelings e.     Notice the thoughts that create them f.      Be willing to ask questions of those thoughts  g.      3.     Learn from your actions a.     In our membership we Use something called learn something and move forward in  b.     Look back at the last time you went out of town.   c.     When did it hit you last time? and  d.     what could you do differently? e.     What is the story that you tell yourself about when you go out of town?                                                i.     Is it that this is a time to escape and let loose?                                              ii.     Is it that you always fail?                                             iii.     Is it that you never win these battles?                                             iv.     Is it that you are going to have to fight and be strong and struggle?                       &

This week in the membership one of my members was talking about the question that another member had asked during our previous session.   The man I was coaching said, “when That guy asked that question, it was as if he had been reading my mind.” This is the amazingness that comes from being part of the membership. You get to hear the questions you didn’t even know how to ask, asked for you! This moment was when I decided that I needed to answer that question for you all, here on the podcast. As part of the coaching I do, often we talk about shame and how to manage and deal with it.   The question we’re talking about was part of this discussion about minimizing shame in our lives.  The question was, “what is a good way to not let myself feel so much shame when I act on my urges?” First off, let’s talk about why we feel shame.  Knowing what shame is gives us the ammunition we need to actually end it.   Shame is often contrasted with guilt.   The thing about guilt is that it can be a powerful catalyst for change.   Guilt is about learning that what you have done is not what you would like to have done, had you been able to.   I’ve heard it said this way and this definition works for me.   Guilt comes when I understand that what I’ve done is not right for me.  Guilt comes when I’ve acted incorrectly, based on my own sense of right and wrong and according to my agency within the framework of truths I hold.  As brene brown put it, guilt is I did something bad.  Shame on the other hand, is not about a behavior, but about our sense of who we are.   Shame comes when when I believe that what I’ve done makes me bad, irredeemable and unacceptable.  Shame comes when I’ve acted contrary to my framework of truth knowing that I’m discarding my own sense of what is right and wrong and feel incapable of exercising my own agency.  Again, going back to brene brown, Shame is, I am bad.  So “What is a good way to not let myself feel so much shame when I act on my urges?”  Here are 3 things that you need to do to eliminate shame when you have acted on urges that don’t fit your idea of who you want to be.  First, you need to decide that this is an opportunity to learn Learn something move forward. Second thing you’ll need to eliminate shame when you’ve acted on your urges is talk to someone you trust.   -       Create intimacy -       Practice openness.   -        Third thing, understand that you are enough. -       Atonement -        Each of these things will help you eliminate shame and understand that you are not bad.  Hopefully they will serve to strengthen your capacity to exercise your agency, accept responsibility for your actions and shape the person you want to be.   

Work with me through the model of one of my clients and see if some of your own logic has been where he is.

Your happiness is within reach I used to think that darcy could make me happy.   I thought that if I could just make her happy enough then she would, in turn, make me happy.  Seemed simple enough.  I used to do pretty much whatever she wanted.   I would let her get things that I thought we didn’t need.   I would do whatever it took to make her life as comfortable as possible.  In the first few years of our marriage we moved so many times, just because Darcy found a new apartment that she liked better than the one we lived in at the moment.   The first time we lived in Milwaukee we only lived here for about 6 years and we lived in 3 different places before we bought a house.  6 years, 4 houses.  Did we really need to move. No.  did we do it because darcy wanted to. Yes.  I learned to build things, fix things, make more money and climb the corporate ladder all so I could give Darcy more.   When it came to my personal time.  Time to go play basketball, watch sports or do outdoors activities, Darcy had a firm veto on all of it.   If she didn’t like what it was I wanted to do, she would put a stop to it.  Then there was sex.   I would do anything for sex.   I would give up whatever I wanted for sex.  Some strange bargains were made in the name of sex.  I did this in an effort to make her happy and to make me happy.  I have a confession.  I was doing it wrong.  I was looking for happiness in the wrong place.  I was looking for someone else to make me happy.  I was looking for something outside me to make happiness available.  All while this was going on for me, something else was going on for Darcy.   Something similar, but slightly different. Tell your experience of trying to get happiness from me.  Darcy –   I truly believed it was Zach’s job to make me happy, I 100% believed he had the power to do that and that he should. When I wasn’t happy it was his fault, or the kids fault or the houses fault. Pretty much everything outside of me what to blame for my unhappiness. Don’t get me wrong I was not miserable all the time but when I was not happy it was not my fault. I would use sex as a bargaining tool for me to get what I wanted on occasions. I also used sex as a way to feel validated by Zach. I also thought I could make Zach happy by having sex.  Sounds terrible.  So, what happened and how can you take control of your happiness? Around the time I was really making headway in quitting pornography I became more aware at how much of my choices were dependent on Darcy’s desires.  I worked really hard to do what she wanted because I thought that it would build our relationship.   In part, it did and in part it created a lot of resentment.   Sure, in the moment, it usually made her feel good and I could say that I would feel good too.  But in the long run, I would look back at some of the choices and I would feel like I had been manipulated.   Now, I want to be clear, I know now that I was choosing what I was choosing.  I don’t blame Darcy for any of the way I acted.   What I was missing was the idea that I have to take both responsibility and action where my happiness is concerned.  1.     Marriage isn’t a fairy tale 2.     We weren’t bringing everything we could because we were acting like the other person would make up half the work.  3.     You can’t be happy by waiting on someone else to make you happy.  So, how can we be happy? -this is something we talk about in the self mastery

You can choose.  -       New years  -       New beginning -       Time to create turning points in life -       Give you 2 keys to make any new habit stick -       I can’t  -       One of my least fav phrases -       It means we aren’t capable.  -       It means we don’t have agency,  -       Agency is o   Knowing what is right and wrong o   consequences o   Ability to choose o    -       Any missing – don’t have agency -       A lot of us have, in our heads a laundry list of things that we can’t do.  -       I want to give you three keys to help you deal with that list and start doing the things that you want to do -       More importantly these three things will help you become who you want to be.   -       Because this is so important,  -       Want it to stick -       Not going to talk about 5 things or 10 just two -       If you want to make a permanent change to anything in your life.  -       New habit -       You have to do two things -       First, make it doable every time.  o   Let’s say you want to be able to do 50 pushups o   Your goal will be to just do one o   When you are going to do it, all you have to do is one.  o   If you want to be a runner, your goal is to put on your shoes o   If you want to eat healthier your goal is to write what you’re eating once a day -       Second, attach your goal to something you are already doing.  o   50 push ups, do one every time you finish peeing. o   Running? If you want to do it first thing in the morning, put your shoes on immediately after you turn off the alarm o   Food journaling – right as you sit to eat, before you pick up your fork.  -       third – create and believe in I am statements o   Change is most effective when it is who we are not what we are doing o   I’m a push up fanatic o   I’m a runner o   I’m a healthy eater o   Don’t have to be doing it all the time, or even consistently o   We all know a hunter – they say, “I’m a hunter”  o   No one is like, “are you hunting right now?” o   Have you hunted in the last week?  Prove to me you’re a hunter o   We just take people at their word o   The more we believe we “are” the more we are likely to act in a way that reflects that belief o   

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