Pattern of doing something to zone out (online videos, eating junk food, M sometimes) roughly every four days has been continuing. Lately has been feeling sex drive and escaping from that or trying dating apps which takes time. The weird part is I'm not sure if I'm feeling lust for others physically or lust for life (doing things on "list of things that get me closer to where I want to be"). Did life stuff for a few hours and feel relatively peaceful, but also watched fair amount of online videos (unrelated to P, random stuff) earlier. On the upside, will have another chance to find out in a few days if I take the actions to get me there. One cool thing has been getting closer on courage - doing the things I want to because I prefer the world my actions create. Feel like going through this P addiction path should be helpful for being genuine with others since I need to see myself as clearly as possible, but being genuine requires sharing self. I look forward to feeling comfortable with that with my friends.
Slipping on sleep and diet/exercise quite a bit. A tad socially isolated, but can hopefully volunteer and meet people post-holidays. Still in daily cycle of doing stuff during day for some amount of time and trying to kill the rest of it through online videos and junk food haze, have been M roughly every other day. Read an addiction book, it argued addiction is filling a need (real or perceived), think it makes sense. Hm I guess my habit part is "I dont know what to do" -> "How do I kill time?" rather than seeing my situation and making a choice. Feel like I'm at another point where I have the tools/knowledge I need to live the life I want to and I just have to do it. I think what I did for P was replace with writing/reflection, and trusted that relapsing would hinder my life (career/social ability implications). I think my next step is trusting myself again - it's inconvenient because it demands effort, but if not me then who? Trusting the models my parents, peers, and advertisers provide as-is seems risky, they are human too. A healthy amount of egomania.
It's been a minute. Still fairly isolated, seeing more tools to live but very slowly (actions determined by what I see, what I want, what principles I am willing to stay with, and which I am willing to bend/hold arbitrary). Still haven't really found a great motive besides making a better world for others, which is easy to forget inside a quiet room. Have wanted to watch porn several times today. Dullness didn't seem like a bit enough disincentive. Went on insta and tailored the algorithm for scantily clad women. First time, stopped myself by saying I would need to clean room first before which lead to distraction into semi-important things. Second time, I remembered I have a thinking-intensive obligation later this week that will require my focus and prep, so I could not afford to be dull. Reading some old notes from early in recovery helped me remember, emotions in there were very raw. Withdrawal sucks. Still need to find something I care about strongly. Have candidates, just have to pursue them. Will try centralizing ideas and avoiding exposure to distractions to make this as easy as possible. Knowing the consequences for myself watching porn is good, but having a reason to care is also super important. I don't tend to post here when I am doing well, but there have been times where I was. I'll try to do that more, everything I write is just me at a point in time, including this. It's funny, in conversations I sometimes find it hard to talk about being bored/finding things to do because I already know paths forward/understand enough to take action with. I think staying on target/focused on _ is my weak point currently. I hope yall are doing well/making the life you want, whatever that means to you.
To keep updated, PMOed four times over three days. It's been two or three days since, to be honest it felt kind of boring/routine. Outside of P I tend to consume a lot of media, so this felt the same but with a little bit of creation at the end, and extreme tiredness the next day. Didnt get much sleep and slacked on exercise before which probably didnt help me feel super motivated to stay away. But yea, not something that I think helps my life in any way, hanging out with people helped a lot, like with a reason to be not-tired it seems a lot easier. My goal is to find other reasons that arent people too because that isn't guaranteed to be sustainable imo.
