Are Overcoming Addictions A Method Of Spirtual Purification

[Huz]

Addications are your ways of escaping from the truths of life. We as humans are addicts, espically in our societies, there are so many things to keep us distracted from doing deep inner work. This takes us out of the present moment and when you are addicted to things, I think you aren't truly living. 

I have addictions and working to overcome them. One way is Leo's do nothing technique. When you just watch them and allow your urges to arise, but not indulge in them. It feels like reality is beating you up. I was just wondering, is this method of overcoming addications the same as spirtual purification Leo is talking about in his retreat videos?

(ie the less you are addicted to things the more spiritually purified you are, so a good metric of measurement of purification?)

Edited May 8, 2017 by Huz

[Shin]

Yes it is.

The more addiction you overcome, the more you'll start to understand why people are the way they are, you'll be more and more accepting towards them and reality as a whole.

When you overcome an addiction, you realize that your mind can't be what you are.
You can't overcome your mind with your own mind.

Something else is there ...

[Huz]

@Shin  I have overcome some powerful addictions. Smoking, drugs (used to do mdma, chronic weed, and others by-myself/with friends when 18), alcohol dependence, meat.

However, my main addications today are porn, sugar, overthinking. These I found to be the hardest to budge. I accept myself fully for them, they are a part of my life and I love that. I would happily live with these addications for the rest of my life if that's the way it has to be. But, it seems watching the sensations and doing nothing doesn't really work. I have been doing that with these addications for 3/4 of a year. It seems like it works for a month or two, but then I crash back to square one. It feels more like an absitance then dealing with the addications.

I think the reason why is because I have been addicted to all 3 since I was a young boy. Eating sugar and being fat since 8/9 (lost the weight now though ). Watching porn mostly every day for a decade, since like 12. And being a very mathematical minded and logical person since childhood. (The only exception is meat. I was eating that for my whole life. From 7-20. But some experiences shifted my perspective on that and I gave it up with little resistance.) Maybe it just takes more work and love and that would help drop them...

I really notice the difference with the 2 sets of addications I have given. With the first set, I noticed with each one of the addications, there was a shift in me. Once this shift happened I easily gave them up. It was surprisingly easy, and haven't gone back to any of them after years. The the second set is a lot harder. 

But do you have any advice? Would love to hear peoples on here ideas 

Edited May 8, 2017 by Huz

[Shin]

Quit porn first, simply brute force yourself to not watch porn and masturbation altogether. You don't need to masturbate, you'll have wet dreams every 1 to 2 weeks, your body will do the job all by itself.
Don't add or supress anything to your life untill this has been dealt with, otherwise it will be quite easy to backslide.
You can do it in one go, don't listen to people who says you can't (If I did it, anyone can ).

Why quitting masturbation too ? Because every time you'll masturbate, you'll think of porn, this goes together in your mind right now.
Even if you weren't addicted to porn, you should stop masturbation anyway, cause it sucks you A LOT of energy (and like I say, the body will ejaculate when it needs to anyway).

Overthinking is dealt only after a long sitted meditation and mindfulness (watching your thought and trying to be present at least 5 minutes a day) streak. So do that after having dealt with the above addictions