TTF community forums - Why do you relapse?

I am writing this thread following Bolt's Thread "Dealing with relapse"
What struck a chord with me was the fact that this is reactive thinking. One should not really focus on how to pick oneself up following a relapse, but focus on not relapsing at all.

I fully appreciate it sounds so much easier than done, but I myself and many others have taken this journey on and been strict with our strategies which in turn make the journey that much easier.
YOU CAN BE P FREE, if you are PREPARED to DO and CHANGE what is necessary.

So Why do we relapse?

Definition of 'Relapse' :-

To fall back again
to recur
to worsen

If you relapse, quite simply you haven't prepared well enough.
So how do you prepare effectively? To explain this, I will start of with an extreme, then break it down.

Task: Never see P again

Current ways to view P and provocative images/videos:

Internet
Magazines
TV
Access through friends
DVD shop

I have now identified all the ways I can view P. So now, All I need to do, is work out, how to prevent myself from accessing those points.
Actions to take to prevent viewing P

Disconnect Internet / broadband / Telephone line
Do not leave room / house
Sell TV
Do not meet friends
Do not leave room / house

As stated earlier, this is extreme, however, I have countered points 1 to 5.
Now, what were not addressing here, is all those temptations, all those thoughts. This is the real test of will power.

If you were in Ethiopia or Rwanda now, where your primary concern is to survive, It is highly unlikely your sxual urges, temptations will come to surface.

So the next part of you planning, should be to address these temptations and triggers.

example 1: If you are usually start to think about P, when you visit a store and see loads of magazines on the rack with scantily clad women. You can prepare in a number of ways. 1) Dont go to the store again, Acknowledge the location of the untoward magazines and when entering store physically look in the opposite direction.

example 2: If you usually think about P, when you at home or in your room all alone for hours, again you can prepare in a number of ways. 1) you know when you will be alone, why not plan a meeting with friends at that time, why not do some chores at that time 2) Have an internet filter, managed by someone else 3) Dont stay at home, go out untill someone else is home.

Will power is usually the biggest issue, but what were trying to do, is give you the best chance, by reducing the amount of will power needed. To do this, I beleive there are number of factors that you need to be clear about:

1) Know why you want to be P free
If you are doing this for anyone else but yourself, you will fail.
If you dont know why you want to be P free, you will fail.

2) Be honest with yourself
We have lied to everyone, You will be shocked at how many times you can lie to yourself to convince yourself its not that bad.
Be honest, in your planning, be honest in identifying your weaknesses. If you lie to yourself, you will fail.

3) Preparation is Key
If you dont prepare, you dont really care.
Do not react to situations, Try and proactively run through scenarios before they happen, so you can adjust. This requires total honesty with yourself. If you dive in to this journey without some form of preparation, you will fail.

4) Knowledge is power
Know thy enemy. Learn about how one has hurt others through this addiction. Learn how it affects our characters, and actions. By gaining this knowledge, daily, weekly, monthly, you make yourself stronger, better prepared, more honest, and ultimatley stregnthen your reasoning to why you want to be P free.

If through all this, you still slip up, thats fine, because we are human and we make mistakes, but with all the points, you should have the sense and knowledge to work out what went wrong in your strategy, then ammend your plan to that it cant happen again. If it keeps happening again, ultimatley you are lying to yourself, or you are unclear in why you want to be P free.

In January 2008 I could have not written this with such clarity or confidence. But through daily reading, and gaining knowledge, I know anyone can do this, if they REALLY WANT TOO.

Best of strength to all.

Make a fresh start: More about ThroughTheFlame.org

FM