I like porn:
[A]
- I like looking at the photos
- I like watching the videos
- I like making up and elaborating porn-based sex fantasies
- I enjoy masturbating
Disgusting and shameful to admit declare these things explicitly — I daren’t say “confess” — but it’s no good to lie about it either. It’s a problem that I do these things; it’s perhaps more of a problem that I want to do them, I enjoy them.
I like other things just as much, if not more:
[B]
- I like the feeling of power when I am on form
- I like the warmth of people smiling at me
- I like the full-body sensuality of yoga
- I love the feeling of being alive when I am plugged into a good book
Indulging in set B pleasures has no effect on my ability to enjoy set A activities, but indulging in set A pleasures weakens my ability to enjoy set B activities. On that criterion alone I should avoid set A and prefer set B.
More generally, enjoying set B strengthens me, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually. I am happier and better company.
Over-indulging in set A weakens me. It erodes my ability to concentrate or follow a path. I become bored, irritable, depressed. The very definition of a vice.
My ability to enjoy set A activities seems very robust, and always available. The slightest trigger will set my mind or my eyes or my hands wandering.
Set B seems harder to hold. Either I put it off because I think I don’t deserve it (there is always work to be done), or it seems beyond my power. I noticed after making up these two lists that A are voiced actively and B passively — really it is the other way around.
Conclusion/CTA
- how can I envisage B as active? As creating myself (rather than expending myself, in A)?
- gravitate towards B
- find B substitutes when I am triggered towards A (diary exercise: given a specific trigger that led me to A, think of a B that might have answered)
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