ThePoint

I need to be taking a lot more action than I currently am. The fact that I am not taking as much action as I should be taking is going to catch up with me. In general, I am becoming weaker. I want to become strong again. Before this guy gets brought up, yes I have watched and listened to Andrew Tate, and still do to an extent. He just doesn't make anything 'click' in me the same way it seems to do for others. It is likely due to a difference in values, e.g. I have little to no interest in girls or relationships. I don't care about getting rich anymore, but I used to care about getting rich. Maybe if I saw Andrew Tate before I lost myself to anhedonia and emotional blunting I would resonate with some of what he says, but I don't really feel 'normal' or even 'human' the way I currently am, I think there is something wrong with my brain, so the things he teaches doesn't currently resonate with me. I am looking for a kick in the ass. I need something to kick me into motion. I'm in a rut, and I need to start moving ASAP.

@King Merk That’s the entire issue - I don’t enjoy the things I used to enjoy a lot. I can’t enjoy anything at all. Nothing makes me feel alive and engaged anymore, including the things that used to make me feel alive and engaged. @StarStruck I wish I could be angry. I think anger can fuel passion and purpose in a way. But literally nothing angers me. Everything just feels so flat...

I know this post/thread is many years old, but this is timeless and still rings true to this day. I think a lot of people on this forum, including myself, need to be reminded of this. I want to use this as an example of timeless wisdom that was posted many years ago that should still be applied today. If moderators want to lock this then feel free to do so, but I want to see other people’s perspective on this.

@Leo Gura If you close your account, do all of your comments, posts, and private messages get deleted?

Creating this to document my experience and journey participating in No Nut November. I will make it all the way through and focus on my goal of finding a solution to my current health problems. Want to give a special mention and thanks to @Yarco. He told me this on a reply to a post I made about this topic almost a month ago: I want to show him that he’s made an impact on me and go for at least 7 days. But if I abstain for the entire month, that’s really where I should be seeing results. I will repeat my goal again: I will abstain for the entire month and focus on my goal of finding a solution to my current health problems. Also want to thank @Raze for providing these resources: Also https://easypeasymethod.org/ which I may need to reread or go over my notes on it again. And finally I want to thank @StarStruck for the masculine vibe he radiates in the advice he gives. Feel free to comment on this thread with anything you want to add, say, give advice/tips on, or just talk

@StarStruck What are some examples of acts of compassions towards oneself?

@StarStruck This sounds a lot like David Hawkin’s scale. Did they work together or something? I’ll check out the book anyway. I’ve been stuck at Apathy for the past year and a half. I’ve tried to take it one step at a time, and tried to go up to Grief by regretting my decisions etc. But it doesn’t last for long because I just don’t care. I’m indifferent to everything. Even regret can be somewhat motivating but I can’t even feel that. In fact anything on that scale above apathy can be motivating in their own ways. I should be caring more but I don’t. I should be more frustrated that I don’t care but I’m not. I’m just completely flat. That’s exactly why I knew Andrew Tate would be brought up in this thread. He incites hunger and anger in men, which may work for some people who are apathetic because it nudges them enough to go from apathy to something higher. But maybe my brain is so apathetic that even those nudges don’t work. @BipolarGrowth Thanks. I’ll listen to the audiobook. @Eyowey I didn’t mention working out in my post. But thanks for sharing. I do work out by the way. Thanks.

It's masturbation and food. I masturbate every night. I eat food that gives me bad symptoms because of my gut issues but I continue to eat anyway because they are what I use to cope. I even excessively consume healthy food to cope. I want to stop so badly. WHY CAN'T I JUST STOP!?????? It is ruining my life. I think about it throughout the day. I can't concentrate. I can't focus. I have no emotions. I feel numb and depressed. I have zero motivation to do anything with my life. When I was once a very driven person with ambitious goals. My previously ambitious personality is what initially brought me to Leo. But now I don't feel like that same person I used to be. I feel completely numb. My life feels numb. I don't feel like I am experiencing life. It's like my life is on pause. The vision I had for my life... the vision that drove me to work every day to become who I wanted to become... it's gone. I don't care about it anymore. And this makes me feel sorrowful. Why don't I feel motivated by it anymore? Why don't I care about it anymore? HOW DOES ONE SUDDENLY LOSE PASSION FOR SOMETHING THEY WERE ONCE WILLING TO BLEED AND DIE FOR!!?? I don't want to live life like this. I feel like there is a leash around me, enslaving me to succumb to my urges. The only option I have is to turn my life around once and for all. I want to stop this yo-yo cycle of being on track for a few days then backsliding. How do I stop masturbating for good? How do I stop compulsively eating food for good?

@kylan11 Are you a software developer?

@A Fellow Lighter Thank you. That's the problem. I can't seem to muster up a new vision. I redid the LP course all over again since this issue started. Still couldn't feel any spark. My values list doesn't spark me anymore. Also, it's not like my vision was old. It's relatively recent, even now (not even 2 years old yet). I suddenly lost complete interest in it when it was around 8 months old, when it previously got me moving and made me feel alive and was what made me love life. While this is true, the frequency of my masturbation was much less. I averaged around 3-5 times a month. Now I do more than that in a week alone. Now my average is like 30-40 times a month. That's like a 10x increase in frequency compared to when I still had my 'old self' and wasn't neurotic. I still had some problems with food when I wasn't masturbating as much, but I am open to this being a possibility. See, that is one of my main goals at the moment. The only reason I have to live, is hope. Hope that I will get better. Hope that I will get out of this. But I don't know if hope alone is enough. I wish there was just one thing that I could still enjoy, that would get me through every day. But I don't have that right now. So I just need to continue researching and implementing things. May I ask you what is your reason to live?

@Osaid @thisintegrated @LSD-Rumi I would like to see what you think about this video: What are your thoughts?

@A Fellow Lighter I do believe I’ll find a solution to it. I refuse to believe that this will be the rest of my life. So Bramacharya is abstinence from ejaculation right? How do you jerk off during the day without ejaculating? Is that even satisfying for you? An internet search shows that Mula Bandha is a type of yoga. Is there any particular exercise or video you follow?

@thisintegrated ??

@thisintegrated A link to any comment of that discussion would be nice.

@thisintegrated Bro, your journal has 1865 posts and 94 pages... I asked a few simple questions.

@BlessedLion How did you get to this point?

@LSD-Rumi So fapping does indeed decrease energy? @Osaid That is true. If that thought was absolutely true and taken literally, then I wouldn't be alive right now because I wouldn't eat or move. I'm not taking action on what I should be doing. I'm at the same position I was a year ago. I have not made any progress in my life in the past year and a half. That sounds about right. I don't take enough action relative to want I want to do, which is to solve my health problems. I should be experimenting and researching more but I'm not. Yes, there is not a single thing inspiring to you. I know what inspiration feels like. I wasn't just born without being able to feel inspiration. The last time I felt inspiration was about 2 years ago. Anhedonia + emotional blunting stripped inspiration away from me. I don't have any real hobbies anymore, and my previous passions + crafts don't have any spark to them anymore. It's like I lost who I am. I genuinely wish there was at least just one thing out there that I could enjoy, or that inspired me. That alone would probably get me through every day. Now I can't feel emotions the same way I used to, and I don't care about anything anymore, it's like I have lost a part of my humanity. If I can't feel emotions, then why live at all? I think it's more in the multi-millions. The r/NoFap subreddit alone has over 1 million members. So the actual amount of people who subscribe to it or similar things like semen retention is likely a lot more. Look at how many views the topic gets on websites like YouTube. Given how many people are a part of these circles, and how widespread it is, this does sound quite far-fetched. I am open to the possibility that these circles are indeed groups of people with masturbation-related illnesses, it just sounds very unlikely. Almost every person I talk to this about relates to at least some of the symptoms after masturbating, like less energy.

Hello @A Fellow Lighter I used to have dreams and goals that used to inspire me. But anhedonia + apathy took that away from me and I no longer care about the things I used to care about and be passionate about. @at_anchor Yes, wealth gives you more options.

@thisintegrated Only partly. The main thing is how masturbation is robbing me of my life because it makes me less motivated to do anything. I don’t want this to come off as rude, but I’m still interested in your answers to my questions. @LSD-Rumi @Osaid Y’all are telling me that everyone that’s on NoFap and Semen Retention that relates to these symptoms has POIS? Over 1 million+ people?

@Osaid After a week if not doing it, it FEELS a lot worse if I do it because the difference is much more apparent (due to the difference I feel after not doing it for a week), even though it might not objectively be worse. It’s like jumping into hot water when you weren’t in hot water before. If I were to masturbate everyday the difference doesn’t feel that apparent because it’s like I am in the hot water anyway so my body got accustomed to it, but this is not a good thing because I am always in an unmotivated low energy state. Yes. I had many times where I woke up with semen in my pants before I ever masturbated. But I still did not have any urges to release sexual energy. The only thing that lead me to masturbating was my peers doing it and talking about it. You’re right. Thanks. Okay. I’ll try now. How am I pathetic and a loser? I’m a loser and pathetic because I am wasting my potential. I’m a and pathetic loser because I can’t motivate myself to do anything. I’m a loser and pathetic because I don’t take enough action. I can’t feel inspired anymore. It’s like I’ve lost that emotion entirely. I’m not inspired by the goals I used to have. I don’t feel any spark anymore. I don’t care about anything anymore. I’m just apathetic.

@AtheisticNonduality This isn’t OCD. I genuinely feel worse after masturbating. My energy and motivation get even worse. I know this is not about OCD because I have OCD, so I know what the difference is. I know what an obsession feels like and this is not one of them.

@Osaid Even when I stop caring about masturbation entirely and get rid of my projections of it I still experience those effects, just without the “damn it you did it again” aspect. Daily. I use it as a coping mechanism. Are you sure? I don’t know man. I never had an impulse to release sexual energy until my first time masturbating. They feel true though. Pathetic by my standards I guess. I wouldn’t be surprised if I still thought I was pathetic even while being a millionaire. I missed out on 2 life changing opportunities in the past which would have made me a millionaire by now. But I’m not the same person I used to be. I’m a loser now, or I feel like a loser. Isn’t there a benefit in accepting that I’m a loser and pushing myself to get out of being a loser? Thanks. Makes sense. What should my solution be? Lower my standards? I don’t want to lower my standards though.

@thisintegrated Masturbation is much easier to access than sex. You can masturbate multiple times a day. You can masturbate daily. You can do the same with sex, but it is harder and more time consuming. When you can masturbate to pixels on a screen, what drive do you have to go and have real sex? Okay this just sounds insane to me. You’re telling me you genuinely feel great after masturbating? You don’t feel like like you lost 50% of the energy you had left pre-masturbation? How do you feel after you masturbaye? By masturbation I am talking about masturbating until you ejaculate/cum. I don’t know what flood-flow exercises are. What do you mean by ‘something’? If by the traditional sense you are referring to ejaculation, then that still sounds crazy to me that you feel great after masturbating even if it’s once or twice a week. I masturbate daily and I feel worse every time I do it. Do you experience urges in between the times you do it? Ejaculation. Bro what am I reading lol? Are you trolling or something? I experience the literal opposite effect. If I’m in bed already tired and I masturbate, it makes it harder and takes me longer to fall asleep. During the day if I do it, I completely lose motivation for everything and it feels like it depletes my dopamine. Similar with music, if I listen to music I just start daydreaming instead and it distracts me. It doesn’t pump me up.

Hey, thanks for sharing your experience. What are the most important actions and activities you did to get yourself to this point?

@thisintegrated The belief is formed from my experience with masturbation. Perhaps it’s more accurate to call it a mental model. Since I experience negative effects from masturbating, my mind creates a mental model (belief) that masturbating does not serve me. Similar to how if you were to try to put your foot on lava, your mind will form a belief that it shouldn’t step on lava because it is painful and burns your foot. To be clear, I’m talking about masturbation, not having sex. Do you honestly ‘feel great’ from masturbating? I have three questions for you: 1. How often do you masturbate? How many times a day or week? 2. How much time do you spend per week masturbating on average (a range is fine)? 3. How do you feel immediately after you masturbate? How are your energy levels?