How Do You Stick To NoFap?

Many relapses on NoFap should not even be called relapses, as in its true sense of the word.

By this I mean that a lot of those “instances” are merely a lack of commitment and about the individual just stopping to “give a damn”.

So, how do we stay committed?

How do you actually stick to NoFap?

#1 Why were you drawn to NoFap in the first place?

If you belong to the group of guys who constantly lose the desire to continue, and you find yourself giving in over and over, you might start thinking you no longer care about this whole NoFap thing.

But is that really the case?

Realize that something made you gravitate towards this journey in the frist place. And since that's the case, there must be something there inside of you that really would like you to stick to NoFap. At least for a long enough time for you to figure out if there's any benefits out there further along the journey waiting for you.

Site down at your kitchen table and go through these two questions…

Why did you decide to try NoFap in the fist place? (this is your”why”)
How did you feel the day you decided to try it for the first time? (try to really go back in time and see what you saw, hear what you heard and feel what you felt…Vividly!)

By doing this you may be able to reignite your drive.

Unfortunately, however, this is not going to be enough for you to stick to your NoFap journey. Especially not during tougher days, where you are ridden by anxiety, stress and urges.

This is why we need a step #2 as well…

#2 Create a daily routine of reminding yourself of your “why”

This is something I always talk about with my coaching clients.

Now, the idea of having a brief daily reminder can seem kind of pointless. I mean, after all, most people already know why they do what they do. But trust me when I say…

…when it comes to doing something hard (like NoFap really is), having a daily routine where you refresh your memory is going to be super helpful for you.

Think of it like this…

I think most of you have experienced the following…

When you set goals for yourself, and you go about your daily life, after a while those goals start to pale a bit (even if you do remember them).

This is not good, because after you've been slapped in the face by a trigger and you're having powerful cravings, your mind's eye is not going to see those goals and intentions if they are the least bit pale and vague.

Indeed, in the heat of the moment, it is very easy to just get dragged along in whatever powerful desire you happen to have. So you're going to need tools and tricks to have on your side when those moments come.

By regularly reminding yourself of all the reasons for why you're doing NoFap in the frist place, your “why” will pop up automatically when you're hit by a trigger. Obviously this is going to make your chances of staying strong much much better.

Do it in the bathroom…

If you're have trouble creating a habit of reminding yourself, then one helpful tips is to use a so-called “habit stack”. I.e. you stack your new routine of reminding yourself on top of another habit that you're already doing on a daily basis.

For example, every time you go to the bathroom and you lock the door behind you “click!”…that's your cue to go through your “why” once, right then and there, inside your bathroom. No need to spend the whole bathroom time on it, but just go through it once in your mind. All it takes is one minute…

…literally just one minute.

And since you go to the bathroom 4, 5 or 6 times a day (at least if you're a normal functioning human being), it will program your mind in a very effective manner.

Try it out and let me know what you think, for example in the comment section over at my YouTube channel.

#3 Come up with a couple of good replacement activities

You have probably heard that it's difficult to change a habit without replacing it with something else. Well, this is absolutely true.

Now, don't get me wrong, it is fully doable, but when it comes to bad habits and addictions -especially- it's so much easier to replace a habit than to just snap your fingers and stop doing it.

Acute and long term replacement activities…

There are two kinds of replacement activities that you need to put in place; acute and long term replacement activities.

A long term replacement activity is something that you use to fill the void after you give up masturbating to porn. I.e. if you spent 15 hours a week on masturbating to porn, then you'll need to find 15 hours of something else to fill the the hole that are left in your schedule once you've removed your fapping sessions.

An acute replacement activity is something that you can quickly resort to in the heat of the moment to help you avoid a nasty porn relapse.

Now some of you may be thinking: can my long term replacement activity also function as my acute replacement activity?

The answer is, yes by all means. But a long term replacement activity can more often be something like: developing a new skill, working on a certain goal or finding a new hobby.

In contrast, a short term replacement activity is something that absolutely must be done away from your computer (or phone) and only takes a few seconds to go do, so that you can quickly leave the danger zone.

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Some examples of good short term replacement activities…

Going for a walk
Going out for a cup of coffee
Taking a cold shower
Meditating for 10 minutes
Reading 5 pages out of a physical book

As you can see, all of those require you getting up from your computer and taking some kind of “non-digital” action.

A good short term replacement activity should always be something that you can quickly resort to, is pretty easy to do and something that you do away from a screen.

Does my long term replacement activity have to be something I do away from the screen as well?

That would be beneficial, but it does not necessarily have to be.

For example, since you're left with all that extra time, you might want to suddenly explore new things in your life like…

Starting an online business
Starting a YouTube channel
Taking an online course
Learning a language
Starting a blog
Doing some kind of online studying

All those require a screen and they are obviously all good things.

That said, if your long term replacement activity does involve a screen, then be very careful not to start blurring the line between aimless surfing online and working on your project. If you don't set up some kind of rules for yourself, starting to drift becomes very is easy to do.

Now, I'm not saying we can't have any form of online recreation, but I'm definitely saying that if you spend several hours a day aimlessly browsing the web, you can almost forget about being able to stick to NoFap.

#4 Practice doing your replacement activity (even when not having urges)

We all know that if you’re a musician, you don’t show up to a super difficult gig without practicing your musical instrument. And even though rebooting is hard, yet somehow guys expect that they're going to do a perfect reboot without any practice or rehearsal at all.

What you need to be doing is actually practicing in advance for that moment when you are faced by a powerful craving.

Sound strange?

Well, maybe so, but the fact is, it helps!

Several times a week you should be putting in small “practice sessions” where you pretend that you get hit by a strong craving, and then you strongly remind yourself of your “why”, after which you go and do your replacement activity…yes, even if you're not having urges for real.

You see, every action you take in life is forming small pathways in your brain.

If you practice in advance then of course it's going to be easier for your brain to do it when it happens for real as well, simply because you have now been logging in “anti-relapse” reps. So all the brain has to do, in the heat of the momen,t is to follow those rehearsed pathways one more time.

By practicing your anti relapse routine in advance you are basically plowing out the new pathways in advance, so that all your brain has to do in the heat of the moment is to follow those freshly plowed paths.

#5 Create or join a support group

This one is perhaps the most important one of all.

One of the biggest things I regret from my own reboot journey is that I didn't seek support during my first years of struggle. Yes, I said years, because I actually spent more than 7 years relapsing back to porn. Hence it's one of my biggest regrets as well.

So I strongly recommend that you either…

Create your own support group with like-minded people in your local area…
Seek out coaching or therapy from a skillful coach/therapist…
Join an online course / support group

Take a look at a >>good online course for quitting porn<< right here…

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