Be sure to also read to blog post as you will discover a lot of helpful anxiety tips there.
The video and the blog post complement each other.
If you like the video, consider subscribing to my YouTube channel for more NoFap videos.
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NoFap And Social Anxiety
So does NoFap help social anxiety, and if so, just exactly HOW does NoFap help social anxiety?
Short answer: yes NoFap can really help social anxiety. Fore some people even to the point of curing it altogether…
…however, of course it depends a bit on what's causing your social anxiety in the first place.
Make sure to read the whole article as well as watch the video as they complement each other.
You will also discover all kinds of helpful tools and tricks for reducing social anxiety throughout the article, and if you COMBINE NoFap WITH THE TIPS I share in this article, you will potentially be able to say goodbye to your social anxiety for good!
Sounds pretty cool, right?
Well, it is. So let's jump right in and take a look at the science behind nofap and social anxiety…
Does NoFap Help Social Anxiety?
The numbers are huge.
We are talking about hundreds of thousands of men reporting how NoFap has ben amazing for reducing their social anxiety. There is no longer any doubt whether or not NoFap can help social anxiety…
….however, the results are not the same for everyone!
How well YOU respond to NoFap depends on what caused your social anxiety in the first place…
Related posts…
Fapping to porn disrupts your dopamine system – causing social anxiety
Let's start with the biggest reason why men who go on a NoFap journey may experience a significant reduction in their social anxiety symptoms.
Reason: Porn causes brain changes that are linked to less confidence and more anxiety.
Supernormal stimuli
Porn is what biologists call a “supernormal stimuli”.
This means that it is something that is more powerful than our cavemen ancestors could ever find in nature and thus our reward circuitry in the brain is not capable of dealing with it.
This is how the damage happens…
When you are watching a porn clip your dopamine levels are elevated, but after a few minutes that clip is starting to become boring…
…and so, what do you do then?
Well, you click to a new clip and thus you get the dopamine to spike once again. But then that second clip is also getting boring and once more you quickly find a new clip, and BOOM, the dopamine shoots back up.
THIS is why internet porn is destructive for our brains. It's not the porn itself, but the way we consume it online. You see, by clicking from scene to scene, the way I just described, we are overriding our natural satiation mechanism…
…your dopamine is supposed to raise during sex, but it is also supposed to come back down after a few minutes. This is the way our brain respond during real sex. Think about it, you can't click a mouse button to get a new partner every 30 seconds when you are having real sex…
…but with online porn you can click to get a “new partner” as soon as you start to feel bored, and you can keep this going for a very long time, THUS you are overriding your natural satiation mechanism…
…IF you keep doing this, you are causing harm to your brain!
Downregulated dopamine D2 receptors and a disrupted dopamine system…
When you force your dopamine levels to be sky high for a long time, with click after click, the brain will automatically start protecting itself from all the high dopamine levels…
…it does so by reducing dopamine receptors!
In order for our hormones and neurotransmitters to be able to do their job they need to bind to certain receptors. This is how they do their magic. Well, if you suddenly have less receptors then you can no longer utilize dopamine they way you are supposed to…
…and there you go, you now have a disrupted dopamine system in your brain!
A disrupted dopamine system is linked to the following symptoms
When you have a poor functioning dopamine system you may experience some or all of the following symptoms…
- Lack of motivation
- Low energy
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Fear and shame
There are more, but those are the most common once. Now, look at the last three…
- Anxiety
- Fear
- Shame
Combine those three and what do you have? Answer; social anxiety!
Ok, so now we understand how fapping to porn can cause social anxiety on a biological level.
If you have developed these brain changes, NoFap WILL help your social anxiety!
If you have developed the brain changes I pointed out above, which is highly likely if you been fapping to online porn, then it's very possible that NoFap will completely cure your social anxiety if you keep going for a few months.
Remember though, it takes time to reverse addiction related brain changes and you have to be patient and keep going.
How long does it take to get better?
You can expect to feel A LOT better when you get to somewhere between 45-120 days without relapses, depending on how severe your addiction was to begin with.
But what if you had social anxiety tendencies BEFORE you started using porn?
In other words, what if you are genetically predisposed to social anxiety? Will NoFap still reduce your social anxiety then?
Does NoFap help social anxiety even if something else other than fapping is causing it?
Some people have social anxiety that is caused by other factors. Like inflammation of the brain, food allergies, bad experiences in life or genetic predispositions…
…can NoFap help social anxiety for those people?
Answer: yes, for some of them, but not for everyone.
Those people might still experience reduced social anxiety from doing NoFap, but the reduction will probably not be as pronounced as in the group that has developed brain changes.
NoFap may still help these people though, and during the rest of this article we are going to take a look at why that is.
I'm personally one of the guys who are predisposed to social anxiety, meaning I had social anxiety even before I started using online porn. Social anxiety has been with me pretty much my entire adult life. In fact, there was no internet back when I started experiencing symptoms of social anxiety (yes I'm really that old, born in 1976)…
…so I really know what I'm talking about here…
…to make the article more interesting to read, I'm going to sprinkle in some helpful anxiety tips as we go…
Social Anxiety Tip # 1: ProVanax
As I already told you, I have been having problems with social anxiety pretty much my whole life. This is also why I have tried literally every natural anxiety supplements you can find on the market…
…and my absolute favorit anxiety supplement I found so far is a product called ProVanax.
I'm not going to go into details about the product in this article, as the main theme is about NoFap and social anxiety, but I just need to let you know that ProVanax has literally been a lifesaver for me during the years I suffered the most.
Out of all the anxiety tips I share in this post, this one is the most effective one, and if you are struggling with social anxiety, or any form of anxiety for that matter, I highly recommend you give it a try.
To discover more details, click here to read a full Provanax review I made a while back. In that review I share my full experience with the product and exactly how it works.
-Back To NoFap And Social Anxiety-
No Matter What Caused Your Social Anxiety
NoFap Can Still Help!
NoFap Increase Testosterone Receptors Making You More Confident?
Remember that hormones and neurotransmitters need receptors in order to do their magic. Well, testosterone also binds to receptors and those receptors are called “androgen receptors“.
Research on rats show that frequent ejaculation causes downregulated androgen receptors. This happens even if you are not addicted to porn, after all, rats don't really use internet porn that much 😉
Here's the deal…
If you start doing NoFap, those androgen receptors will grow back and not only that, they might even grow denser than they have ever been in your entire life…
…this means that your brain and body are now suddenly much better at utilizing whatever testosterone levels you happen to have in your blood. The net result from this may be the same as if your testosteron levels themselves were higher.
Wait a minute here, the net results would be the same as if testosterone is higher?
Yes!
And what are some symptoms of high testosterone levels?
Well, these are the most common ones…
- Increased drive
- More aggressiveness
- More confidence
- Giving less of a f*ck about what others think of you
Can you see how those traits could help a person who suffers from social anxiety?
Even if that person happens to be in the group that is predisposed, and even if masturbating to porn did not cause his social anxiety, he could certainly notice a drop in his social anxiety symptoms if he were to get more of those traits…
Thousands of guys are reporting how NoFap makes them more confident and more aggressive…
…this is something I have noticed myself as well, and sure, those traits really help with feeling less socially anxious, no matter what's causing the social anxiety.
Anxiety Tip # 2: CBD Oil
Some people find CBD oil to significantly reduce their social anxiety. Even to the point of getting rid of it altogether.
The results seem to divide people into two groups though with non responders being about 40% and then about 60% get phenomenal results. Personally, I happen to belong in the group that don't get that much anxiety reduction from CBD, but many of my friends use it with great success for their social anxiety.
There is this particular CBD brand that is packed with a wider variety of cannabinoids, terpenes, and other vital nutrients creating a synergistic effect that makes it especially effective for social anxiety.
With the help of my friends I created a review of that CBD product, and if you are interested you can click here to read that review and find out what brand I'm talking about.
-Back To NoFap And Social Anxiety-
NoFap makes you more alpha!
When guys embark on a NoFap journey, many of them find that they start to feel much more “alpha”.
Why does this happen?
Well, when cutting out the supernormal stimuli and your brain starts to grow more dopamine D2-receptors, interesting things start to happen.
Dopamine receptor density correlates with social status…
We are now talking about something that is backed by real science. Studies on both animals and humans have shown that higher social status correlates with more dopamine receptors in the brain…
…ok, sounds cool and all, but how does that help social anxiety?
Well, if you grow more dopamine receptors by doing NoFap, and research show that higher social status correlates with having more dopamine receptors, then it would not be far fetched to say that NoFap makes you more alpha…
Alpha males have more dopamine receptors…
…the alpha male of a group has the highest social status, and guess what, studies on monkeys really show that the dominant alpha male monkey has significantly more dopamine receptors than the other monkeys.
Do you think that a dominant alpha male monkey has problems with social anxiety? Maybe, but if he does it's probably not as bad as for the other monkeys.
Also, guess what, an increase in dopamine receptors and increased dopamine signaling can cause an increase in testosterone production.
Yes indeed, several studies have found that dopamine promotes high levels of growth hormone and testosterone, and I'm sure you remember from earlier how high testosterone levels can help with social confidence and not giving a f*uck about what others think of you.
Social Anxiety Tip # 3: Maximize You Dopamine and Testosteron At The Same Time
If interested, you can click here to check pricing at the online vendor
If you've read this far, by now you know that NoFap alone will help you, but if you really want to take it to the next level then you could combine NoFap with the product I talk about in the video above…
…this will boost your testosterone AND dopamine at the same time and if you combine it with NoFap, your social confidence and “alpha feeling” in a social setting could potentially reach an all time high.
Watch the video for more details, and if you are interested in the product, you can click here to check pricing at the online vendor.
-Back To NoFap And Social Anxiety-
Slay The Urges And Grow Self Respect!
The strongest force in the human nature is the sexual energy. When you embark on a NoFap journey you will quickly realize that it is far from easy…
…in fact, you will probably relapse many times before you get the hang of it.
However, when mastering something difficult, there is always a reward and when it comes to NoFap, the reward is particularly valuable.
You can >>Download<< my Quit Porn Guide for FREE right now!
You will feel proud of yourself…
When you DO start to master the urges and you successfully start slaying them, one after the other, you will quickly develop a strong sense of self respect.
If you stop relapsing you have mastered something that is actually very difficult, and as a result your self confidence will grow significantly.
It's difficult to explain to someone who hasn't felt it, but you'll get a feeling of some kind of core masculinity deep inside you that LIFTS your whole self-esteem…
…it's an amazing feeling really.
Now, what do you think increased confidence, increased self respect and increased self-esteem could do to your social anxiety?
I don't even think I need to go further here. We all know that those traits could potentially get rid of your social anxiety altogether, even if porn didn't cause your anxiety it in the first place…
…but again, if you have been a heavy porn user, it is very likely that porn has caused your social anxiety. If not, fapping to porn can at least make it a lot worse.
Social Anxiety Tip # 4: Slow Breathing
When you are feeling anxious in a social situation, how often are you trying to slow down your breathing?
Be honest now, how often?
Most anxious people have heard that slow breathing helps to reduce anxiety, but most of them have not practiced it enough to start noticing the results.
This is how you do it…
When you start feeling anxious, do the following pattern…
- Breath in through your nose for 3 seconds
- Breath out through your mouth for 6 seconds
Keep your shoulders down and try to keep them as relaxed as possible.
When people get anxious they always start tensing their shoulders. This creates a negative feedback loop as it sends signals to your brain that the situation is really a dangerous one…
…in addition to this, the tension will spread to the rest of your body and tense muscles does not go hand in hand with feeling relaxed.
The breathing pattern will activate your parasympathetic nervous system. This is what we want since the parasympathetic part of your CNS is the one that is responsible for relaxation, while the other one, the sympathetic part, is responsible for fight or flight.
-Back To NoFap And Social Awkwardness-
Reduced Shame = Increased Confidence!
Your subconscious mind is more powerful that you know.
If you are addicted to porn, you know by now that normal “vanilla porn” becomes boring after a while. Because of the desensitization, the addict starts to escalate into all kinds of weird hardcore stuff…
…often to the point of masturbating to crazy stuff that he would not even want in real life.
This will affect your subconscious mind. Even if you logically don't feel ashamed, it is still there inside your subconscious mind whenever you try to talk to a pretty girl…
This is another reason why fapping makes you socially awkward…
…and socially awkward menas more social anxiety.
This one is so easy to understand that there is no need to go further here.
Related post: Does fapping make you socially awkward?
Social Anxiety Tip # 5: Stand Up Straight And Use And Open Posture!
We all know that what goes on inside your brain affects your body, but not many people know that it works the other way around as well…
…the way you use your posture affects your brain and your feelings.
If you hold your head up high and walk, or stand, with an open posture you are sending signals to your brain that everything is ok and thus the brain will slowly but surely send less signals to the alarm center in your brain.
In addition to this, a dominant posture INSTANTLY increases the amount of serotonin you produce and more serotonin menas less social anxiety. So there is indeed a real biological reason why you want to use a good posture.
Taking up as little space as possible ==> more anxiety
Now, think of the opposite, if you hunch over and close your body, taking up as little physical space as possible what kinds of signals do you think that will send to your brain?…
…that's right, that the situation is not safe and that you need to protect yourself. Well, the brain will respond by instantly sending signals to the alarm center, and anxiety will follow.
Also, when taking up little space with your body, on a psychological level you are really telling yourself that you are not good enough to show to the world…
…the opposite is of course true when you take up a lot of space with your body.
Related post: Does NoFap make you more assertive?
-Back To NoFap And Social skills-
NoFap Will Increase Your Social Skills
NoFap will improve your social skills.
So how can this be?
Well, one reason is because semen retention increases creativity. More creativity menas better social skills.
Don't really believe me?
Well let me ask you this, have you ever been in a social situation thinking, “Man, I can't really find anything clever to say” ???
My guess is you probably recognize those thoughts. Now, creativity means, by definition, to be able to form or invent something new, like for example something cleaver to say. This is why increased creativity helps with your social skills.
Ok, but how does semen retention increase creativity then?
Good question, and I honestly have no idea. But the fact is that countless of successful men e have been using semen retention to help them become more creative throughout history.
Just a few examples…
- Leonardo Da Vinci
- Sir Isaac Newton
- Nikola Tesla
- Ludwig van Beethoven
- Sigmund Freud
- Steve Jobs
- Socrates
Those fellows were creative geniuses, and all of them practiced semen retention.
Now, will this work for everyone?
It works for a lot of guys, but not for everyone. The only way to know if NoFap will increase your creativity is by trying it out for yourself.
NoFap And Social Anxiety Conclusion
NoFap can indeed help with social anxiety, but how much it helps depends on the person.
If masturbating to porn caused the anxiety in the first place, then obviously giving up porn and going on NoFap can probably eliminate the social anxiety completely.
Another thing to note is that, even if something else is causing your social anxiety, fapping to porn will most likely make it much worse, for the reasons I outlined in this article.
Lastly, even if porn never was the cause, NoFap can still help reduce symptoms of social anxiety for several reasons, but probably not as much as if porn was the real cause.
Ok, so there you have it. My take on why NoFap can help Social anxiety.
Thank you for reading!
-Scandinavian Bob-
Related post: The link between porn addiction and social anxiety (study)
P.S. Are you struggling? Click here to go to my contact page to discover what kind of help I’m currently offering.
Discover a >>high quality webinar<< for quitting porn right NOW!
F.A.Q's About NoFap And Anxiety?
Q: Can I still be socially anxious after nofap?
A: Yes of course. Anxiety is a normal biological respons. That said, there is a good chance that NoFap helps reduce it to the point of it no longer being a big issue. Or shall we say, to the point of a person no longer having to be diagnosed as having a social anxiety disorder. But, remember, it depends on what caused the social anxiety in the first place.
Q: Can NoFap help panic attacks?
A: Yes, NoFap can also help anxiety attacks and here I believe the biggest reason is because we heal the dopamine signaling system in the brain. I personally noticed my own panic attacks get so much worse whenever I had a period of a lot of relapses, back when I was doing my PMO reboot several years ago. Just keep going and it is very likely that your anxiety attacks get better on NoFap.
Q: Can nofap reduce social anxiety even if I relapse once a month?
A: Probably, but it's almost impossible to know for sure since almost all guys on NoFap are responding differently. I would guess that you will still probably see improvements, even with relapses once a month, since the amount of porn use is far lower than for the average user.
Q: Will masturbation cause social anxiety for everyone?
A: No, especially not if we are talking about masturbation without porn. Even masturbating to porn does not cause social anxiety in everyone, but for a huge number of guys, fapping to porn causes social anxiety, and for some, masturbating to porn causes SEVERE social anxiety.
P.P.S. You could perhaps also be interested in the article Does NoFap Get Rid Of Anxiety?