The Complete Guide on Nofap Stress and Relapse Prevention
One of the significant causes of Nofap relapse is stress.
Nofap stress causes many people to relapse on their nofap journey.
In nofap, it seems inevitable to control our emotions, our logical thinking goes blank, and all we want is to release this pressure on our shoulders.
But, many surpassed this negative emotion and continued their streak for a long time, and it is forever for some.
These successful people took nofap as a lifestyle and not as a challenge.
So how can we deal with this nofap stress and prevent our relapses in our journey?
This article will tell you how.
Psychological Stress
If a fourteen-year-old is nervous to ask his crush out and smokes a cigarette for the first time to calm his nerves, he will associate cigarette and calmness through most of his life until he realizes it.
If someone starts to drink because he doesn’t want to deal with the credit card EMI’s and loan repayment, you may find him in the bar whenever he is stressed.
Our brain forms connections with events and emotions, and the more you repeat a certain action, the link becomes stronger.
These connections or links form rapidly in our childhood and teenage years.
Therefore, if that fourteen-year-old boy asks his crush out because of a cigarette, his brain will register smoking as important for survival.
So, whenever in the future that boy feels stressed, he can always rely on that cigarette to calm his nerves.
This connection is known as neural connections, and the more that boy repeats his activity to smoke cigarettes to calm his nerve, the stronger the neural connections will be.
Once the neural connection becomes stronger, we form habits or addictions based on our daily use.
If you have viewed pornography at an early age, then it may have caused you some emotions.
The emotions can be exciting or a feeling of ecstasy.
Therefore your brain knows where you can find that ecstasy or the feeling of pleasure.
If you are stressed or in a bad mood, you want to escape that emotion because nobody likes bad emotions.
We all want to feel great.
To escape from these negative emotions, we started watching pornography because this has given us happiness in the past.
In other words, we can say, pornography is a way to escape from reality.
Once we realize we can never escape reality, we start our nofap journey.
Escaping reality through pornography
If we are human, we will feel emotions.
Feeling bad is a part of life and escaping them only complicates our lives.
The person who pushes forward despite the pain and negative feelings always comes out victorious and happy.
This applies not only to pornography addiction but all the other aspects of life.
If you feel bored and start playing video games instead of doing your homework, you act according to your emotions.
If you feel anger and bash someone for making you angry, you act according to your anger.
If you are stressed and start watching pornography because you just want to relieve some stress, you act according to your urges.
The point is if you always act according to your emotions, you will always be trapped in your fake world.
No matter how many video games you play or how many hours of pornography you watch, the cause of your negative emotions will be there.
Once you break the cycle of following your emotions and start acting according to your values, your character starts to change.
You start accepting reality as it is, and sooner and later, you realize that this stress is fake, and soon it goes away.
Biological stress
Of course, in nofap, there are times when the stress level just increases without any reason.
There will be days when the future will make you get worried, and it may seem like you cannot take it anymore.
But, the future that you have in mind was always there, but now you cannot handle it anymore.
Your brain makes you think that nofap is a mistake and all it does is make you feel miserable.
Your logical thinking gets cloudy, you forget why you started your nofap journey in the first place, and all you want to do now is fap for just one more time.
This happens because the brain releases the stress hormone cortisol.
Why does the brain release it?
Is your brain your enemy?
The answer is no.
The brain doesn’t know what good or bad activity is. It only wants to survive, and that’s all.
To survive, it constantly searches for threats and opportunities that can secure its future.
So, if an activity releases happy hormones such as dopamine, oxytocin, endorphin, or serotonin, it marks those activities as important for survival regardless of the nature of the activity.
If you are releasing your happy hormones regularly, and suddenly it stops because of nofap, then your brain assumes something is wrong.
Therefore, it releases those stress hormones so that you go back to your older routine and resupply those happy hormones.
Only your conscious mind knows that these happy hormones are a trap to your true happiness, and this is why you started your nofap journey.
But, negative emotions are tricky because it masks your cognitive functions for a period of time and if you can’t find logic at the time of stress or urges, you relapse sooner than you know.
What can we do?
How can we stop ourselves from relapsing because of nofap stress?
How to control myself at the time of stress?
We will talk about the solution by the end of this article.
Searching for motivation in times of stress
If you are acting according to your emotions, you will probably relapse during nofap stress repeatedly.
It means whatever your emotions are; you act on that without thinking about the consequences.
You start searching for motivation not to watch pornography and continue your nofap journey in a time of stress or urges.
This only means your actions are not independent.
It depends on your external motivation, books, quotes, motivational videos, articles, success stories, etc.
This way, you may not last long in your nofap journey.
Moreover, the ability to think logically during nofap stress goes down.
All you think is that you will never come out of your pornography addiction, or perhaps this nofap journey is meaningless.
You even forget the benefits of nofap, the increase of productivity, girls’ attraction, or just the feeling good of remaining in control of your mind.
Once you relapse, you feel guilty or ashamed that you failed again, and there is no way you can do it like others.
There is no light at the end of the tunnel.
But, there is a way.
The way that can shape your life, your mind and bring success in every aspect of your life even if you don’t have clarity in times of nofap stress.
You will not relapse during nofap stress or urges; you will not quit after 90 days of nofap because you will not be dependent on motivation ever again.
A personal note on Character Shift
I have read most of the motivational books to keep myself motivated to continue my nofap journey.
I have read most of the posts and success stories in the nofap forums that can help me in my nofap journey.
These books, articles, videos, and posts are very helpful, and it gives you hope for a better life.
It makes you believe that you can do it.
But, once you relapse, your self-belief shatters.
Once your self-belief shatters, you are not self-disciplined anymore, and once you are not disciplined, you cannot have a happy and successful life.
So, no matter how hard I tried, I kept relapsing over and over again, after a few days or weeks or months.
I stopped writing my stories regularly, stopped caring about others, stopped going out, and only played video games with my friends.
The video games helped me escape from reality, but it was more like a trap in truth.
The more I played, the more I got dependent on it.
The truth was I didn’t even enjoy playing video games or watching pornography, but the low feeling was too heavy to bear.
These activities gave a temporary relief to escape from those negative emotions.
The monthly bills were piling up, the relationships were shattering, the hope and dreams were losing their lights, and all I could do was sit in the furthest corner of the room and watch.
It was like I was helpless.
Everything changed the day when my friend came to my room and asked how I was doing.
I said everything was going well, the usual reply I gave to everyone.
“How is your writing going?” he asked me with a doubtful voice.
“It’s going well,” I replied with a fake smile.
“Have you written anything recently?”
For some reason, he knew I was lying, and now there was no escape from it.
So, I had to tell him the truth, “ I haven’t written anything recently, I was just busy with some other stuff.” I hope my image didn’t shatter too much.
“You have gained weight.”
I know I have gained weight, and there was no need to point that out. I felt like he was my father, enquiring every detail of my life.
“Yea, I will join the gym soon.”
He nodded his head as if he understood something deep about me.
He looked at the acoustic guitar that was lying beside my bed and picked it up. I knew what the next question was.
“I think you have learned a lot by now.”
“ No, I didn’t.”
“But, you were practicing for a long time.”
“ I stopped.” I did not like his visit anymore.
I wished he could leave so that I could play video games again.
After this, he went to the kitchen and saw the unwashed dishes piling in the basin sink from the last three days.
The washing machine was also jammed with unwashed clothes, and my bed was a mess.
My room was also not cleaned for a while.
I know he would judge me for this, but I had my line of defense for this.
“I know what you are thinking, but I cannot do these minor things everyday. I stay alone and if I start wasting time on these, I will never work on my goals.”
He shook his head and replied something that still rings to my ears, “Don’t you see, this is your character. You cannot work on your priorities unless you work on your basics.
You can never write that story you want to write unless you clean your dishes. If you do, then you will have two characters at the same time, and that’s not possible.”
Basic and Priority
If you don’t make your bed in the morning, don’t expect to file your tax return on time.
If you don’t take care of your eating habits, don’t expect you to succeed in your nofap journey.
How are these connected?
Because your action is only originated from your character.
Again, your action builds your character.
It means if you start watching pornography because of nofap stress, it means you have a character who succumbs to emotions.
A character who doesn’t do the right thing at the right time.
A character who depends on his emotions.
This kind of character does the right thing only when they feel like doing it. They don’t live according to their values in life.
They often say I don’t feel like doing it; I am not in a mood, I am bored, I feel like playing games instead of working, etc.
They often surrender to pleasure instead of finding joy in life.
But, the character whose basic is strong, who does the right thing at the right time, irrespective of the importance of the activity, is always focused in life.
His emotions are secondary; his actions are primary.
He doesn’t wait for motivation to do the right thing. He just does it.
How can he do it without motivation?
Because that’s his character.
In nofap stress, he doesn’t surrender to his emotions or urges because it is not the right thing to do.
He is not hiding his emotion or pressing it down; that’s different.
He is just not interested in the negative emotions.
He is the master of his mind. His self-respect even increases because he starts trusting himself.
Therefore, start making your bed in the morning. That’s the first thing to do after you wake up.
Please don’t do it because you want to build a strong character.
Just do it because it is the right thing to do.
No matter how trivial the work seems, if it is right to do and is your responsibility, then just do it.
Conclusion
Nofap stress is just a withdrawal symptom.
Don’t rely on motivation to continue your nofap journey.
Motivation is not reliable in the long run.
Sooner or later, you will not have the motivation to continue your journey anymore.
There will be days where you may not see any benefits of nofap that you heard about.
The doubts and stress will be there in your journey, but it’s worth it.
Your self-respect and confidence will increase over time, your productivity and love for life will increase over time.
The more difficult your journey will become, the better your strength will grow over time.
Nofap is life-changing.
Give it a try; you will never regret it.
Best
Ahbab
