saying goodbye to porn we're back for day seven of your 30 day challenge i'm Dr. Trish Leigh thank you
for joining me and if you've made it this far even if you it hasn't been perfect for you if
you're still here congratulations because staying with a program for 30 days is difficult so you are
awesome just for being here now today we have an important message on saying goodbye to porn i know
some of you are going all right lady you're crazy others this is going to hit hard so stay with me
now why do we have to say goodbye to porn for most of you porn has played an important role
in your life without you even knowing so if you've been consuming pornography
for any amount of time with consistency frequency and especially intensity it is giving your brain
this rush of neural chemicals that not only is making you feel good it is offsetting
pain and discomfort from the world from your life now unfortunately i'm sorry to tell you it's also
frying out your brain simultaneously and creating double the amount of pain in your life inevitably
but we'll cross that bridge but for the short run it's really filling a need for you and it's
it's filled that need for a long time so many people start a porn habit when they're young and
they stay with it because it's the thing they can count on to make them feel better so that requires
saying goodbye and being able to grieve and mourn the loss of this friend that has been there for
you neurochemically speaking so this is what we're going to do today the action step for today
is to make a good old-fashioned cost benefit analysis chart in your journal
true story when i met my husband believe it or not he made this chart of the costs and benefits
of being with moi i know what you're thinking what are the costs well with any relationship
there's cost thankfully the benefits shirt was long and luscious if you know what i mean so
and here we're going to be married 20 years coming up so cost-benefit analysis so silly that man and
he still does it he makes a cost-benefit analysis for things but it's a very powerful tool so the
benefits we're going to start there what are the benefits that porn has offered you over the time
over time so like i just said it's there for you it's easy peasy easy button literally can't get
any easier to get that rush that deluge that flood of dopamine into your system to take the edge off
to go from hyper arousal very fast brain speed of stress and overwhelm and bring you into this
very slow brain speed of hyper hypoarousal very effective there but so what it does for
you is it takes the edge off quickly it might be part of your nighttime routine to help you sleep
it might fill a need sexually and again unfortunately it's probably preventing
you from finding the intimacy and connection and the fabulous sex that you could be having in the
real world but in the short run it's filling that sexual need that you have anytime that you want it
without any strings so it fills a lot of holes and gaps for you some you're not going to be aware of
so i want you to write down all the benefits that it has provided you over time and you'll see them
there and then you might think oh why should i give this up there's so many benefits to it
well we know that for most people the cost list is much longer and if it's not longer yet
it becomes longer in the future so we know that a major reason that people really want to leave porn
behind is when they develop porn-induced erectile dysfunction and that's happening for very young
people right now so if you're a young person and you go to be with your partner and you can't it is
likely porn induced erectile dysfunction if porn's in the mix that is a major motivator it's a major
cost erectile dysfunction not being able to think well not being able to focus getting
into trouble at work because you're consuming pornography at work losing jobs relationships
your partner doesn't want you to consume pornography and now you've got all this strife
we know that it impacts your mood it makes you angry and irritable because there's not enough
dopamine in the real world anymore dr jekyll and mr hyde we know that it creates more anxiety those
anxious feelings that you don't even trace back to porn use they are being impacted by the use
depression we know depression general malaise that's just feeling of unmotivation and
not wanting to embrace the day and your get up and go got up and went we know that divorce two
times is likely breakups for younger people two times as likely we know it impacts your kids we
know it makes you objectify women so now you're checking people out all the time even if you're
with your partner or your family so we know it impacts your behavior we know it impacts your
thinking we know it impacts the way that you feel we know it steals your time from you it sucks the
energy and the joy out of your life we know that it's literally sucking the life force out of you
by decreasing activity in your frontal lobe by desensitizing the reward center in your brain
and having this massive ripple effect so i want you to outline the cost that you have
experienced so far a very big motivator in cost is money right it's all about the money money
when it comes down to it many people are not reaching their full potential thus what happens is
the income you could have earned had you finished school had you gone after that project have you
had you been promoted if if your porn use wasn't in the way for the authentic life you would have
sought out for yourself if you had the brainpower to do it when people put that down in terms of
the benjamins that have been lost over time that becomes a really powerful motivator and of course
i'm here to tell you we want to use those losses to motivate you into the future to regain them and
recoup them reinvigorate your brain performance pattern fire up your frontal lobe re-sensitize
the reward center in your brain so you can go get the job you want you can get the relationship that
you want or improve the relationship you have heal it can be healed so that you have better
relationships than ever you have better sex in the real world than ever before so that you chase
down the hobbies that you wish you would have pursued and now you can do it we're gonna use the
losses of the past that have been taken away from you by your porn use and we're going to use them
as fodder as fuel for the fire to chase them down in the future it is never too late so if you're
watching this and you're 18 years old you've got a lifetime ahead of you if you're watching
this and you're like me you're approaching 50 or you're over 50 years old you still have a whole
life ahead of you you have the best season of life ahead of you that you can use your brain
to create the dream life that you want in this season no matter where you're at so benefits then
you have to mourn the loss of the benefits you have to say goodbye to it and we're going to talk
about this in the offensive plan you have to fill those holes so once you see what the benefits are
that porn is affording you then we know what holes we're going to fill with something healthy in the
future so likely it's going to be mood regulation ways to take the edge off of anxiety we're going
to find healthy ones likely it's going to have something to do with sex even though really and at
the foundation it doesn't but there's going to be healthy sexuality on the other side for you lots
and lots of fun sex with your partner that not only fires up the pleasure centers in your brain
but the happiness the joy and the connection and we're going to we're going to douse we're going
to get rid of shame and guilt and you're going to feel in integrity and have dignity glowing
from you that's what we're going for because we have to identify what do we need to what
holes do we need to plug so the benefits that you have been reaping we're going to create a way to
to soothe them and to get them met in a different way in the future the costs are what has been
taken from you and we're going to look at that and say that is a bummer but that is in the past and
we're going to use that to fire us up into the future okay go make your cost benefit analysis
and i'll see you tomorrow for day eight until then control your brain or it'll control you