Is Mb ok?

[Yechezkel]

What are your thoughts on Mb
(short for um, you know..)

If your single, and dont have s*x, and as long as you dont look at P, is it ok?

[Borrowed Hope]

"There are sex therapists who recommend masturbation as a way of increasing sexual desire, not lessening it. This creates a vicious circle, like the junkie who craves a "fix," but is only temporarily satisfied. The more he indulges in his dependency, the more ensnared by addiction he becomes."

In fact, an older definition of masturbation is "self-abuse." Although more modern dictionaries may no longer carry this definition, they are still linked together under self-abuse:
Self-abuse noun¹

1. Abuse of oneself or one//'//s abilities.
2. Masturbation.

That's the non-biblical answer. It pretty much holds true. If you MB you're just delaying a craving just to make it much worse.

[Phil413]

What are your thoughts on Mb
(short for um, you know..)

If your single, and dont have s*x, and as long as you dont look at P, is it ok?

The root of both P and MB is the same: lust. When you look at P or you MB, you feed and strengthen lust within you. Also, MB is itself addictive, and just like P use it requires ever-greater stimulus to give the same effect. That's why most of us graduate to P use in the first place. After awhile, MB by itself just doesn't cut it. Adding P to the mix gives us the level of stimulation we crave, that MB alone used to give us. Of course, after awhile, MB and P together don't give us enough stimulus, so we have to do them more frequently, and use more depraved forms of P.

P and MB are strongly linked, and they're both deeply unhealthy behaviors. I don't think you will ever recover from the compulsive need to use P unless you starve the lust that drives it, and you can't do that if you're feeding it with MB.

And don't worry, you won't explode or anything if you don't have s*x. It's been two-and-a-half months since I've had any kind of s*xual release, and I'm doing just fine. I know guys who have gone for many years without it, and they're quite healthy, too. The claim that you "need" s*x is a myth that's become deeply ingrained in our hyper-s*xualized culture, but it's not true.

Phil

[hyperion]

Hi guys--

Brand new member here; I've been meaning to post under "New Members", but just haven't yet. I don't mean to start on a contentious note, but I did want to offer a perspective different from the two in this thread so far.

Everyone needs to find their own path, and by no means am I trying to criticize whatever works for Borrowed Hope and Phil413. But there are other views as well, and for me, equating MB with "self-abuse" and calling it a "deeply unhealthy behavior" feels archaic and unfair. My understanding is that, to the contrary, there aren't any peer-reviewed studies suggesting that MB is anything other than natural and healthy. The same can definitely *not* be said for P.

Of course, anything can be abused, especially if you have an addictive personality. So you'll have to find your own answer for this. I guess that's why the 100-day challenge has different colors.

But take everything I say with a grain of salt. I'm new here, I only have one week clean, and I'm just learning about it all. :)

-hyp

[Yechezkel]

Thank all of you guys for your input, I struggle with Mb, as my faith tells me it is a sin.

I fear the loss of my salvation.


I know that G-d will always be there for me, even when I fall, but I can't help but struggle with this issue.....

I feel at times that I need it. Sometimes I go on autopilot and it happens before I realize it, and then it's too late to stop, or at least it feels that way.

I get bombarded by urges to Mb, they come in waves, so strong at times that I fight with myself just to keep my hands away.

I am fearful to share this, not because I do not trust you guys, but because what if I am not supposed to tell these things?

What if I get in trouble for talking about it here, is this ok to talk about?

S*x was NEVER spoken of when I was a kid, no one bothered to tell me anything.

I am confused at times, and I feel lost, even scared.

the shame of Mb'ing haunts me but I feel it is something I need to do. I will be honest, once a week I Mb, sometimes twice, but usually no more than that.

I'm sorry if this was not appropriate, I just felt I needed to talk about it, and if the moderators want to remove this post it's ok with me, Guys, if it was wrong to talk about this here i'm sorry, I just really don't have anyone else to ask about it. :(

[mell]

Y,

It's fine to talk about here, as long as there is no triggering material involved. I see no problems with this thread. As a matter of fact, the subject has been brought up by others in the past.

There are two schools of thought on the subject. One that it is ok, one that it isn't. For me, it is not ok. It feeds into my fantasy and isolates me from reality (I am married).

Glad to see others contributing to the thread, hopefully you will get some good feedback from other single members.

[likeafish34]

I don't look upon it as a sin (not really important in my religion), but having tried to giving up porn at the same time as continuing mb, I can say that I found it too difficult to control.
MB lead to more MB, lead to viewing a little bit of porn, lead to getting right back into full blown porn addiction.

Do whatever you need to do, but be careful not to get dragged back into porn.

Simon

[Phil413]

Thank all of you guys for your input, I struggle with Mb, as my faith tells me it is a sin.

Mine, too (I'm Catholic). But you see, that tells you something right there. G-d would never withhold something from you that you really need. The things He commands us to avoid are always things that will either hurt ourselves, or our relationship with Him, or our relationship with others.

I feel at times that I need it. Sometimes I go on autopilot and it happens before I realize it, and then it's too late to stop, or at least it feels that way.

I get bombarded by urges to Mb, they come in waves, so strong at times that I fight with myself just to keep my hands away.

We are much alike in this respect. I've experienced everything you just described.

I am fearful to share this, not because I do not trust you guys, but because what if I am not supposed to tell these things?

What if I get in trouble for talking about it here, is this ok to talk about?

I'm not a moderator, but as far as I know this is an appropriate topic.

the shame of Mb'ing haunts me but I feel it is something I need to do. I will be honest, once a week I Mb, sometimes twice, but usually no more than that.

I know what you mean when you say you feel that it is something you "need to do." Like any other addiction, it's sometimes hard to imagine there is happiness outside the addiction. In this case, the urge is so primal it seems impossible to resist.

I won't kid you, it's very difficult to resist, especially at first. But I'm living proof that it can be done. I MB'd every day for almost 25 years. Talk about a habit! I couldn't even imagine not doing it.

Well, it's been 73 days since I last did it. Sometimes the urges still come, but they're more manageable now than they used to be. And to be honest, most days I don't even think about it. Sometimes four or five days will pass without a single urge.

What I'm discovering is that the longer you go without it, the less you feel the need for it. My body feels better, and my spirit, too. It's really wonderful to finally have a clear conscience in this area.

Phil

[Teemo]

I have had the same question for years. "Experts" say MB is natural and healthy. Churches and many wise traditions say it is not. I think at some early point in our lives it is natural and healthy, but is an immature and very incomplete way of dealing with our desires. Harmful? Not at that early time in our lives. But at some point, if we keep feeding the lust that brings us back to MB over and over, it is no longer natural or healthy. Then it becomes a habit. Then we keep feeding it with P until it is an addiction. How can I go back to the innocent days of youth when I was curious, exploring, etc.? I can't. It is all way out of balance now. If I am going to be healthy and whole again, it will have to be without MB. Life is tough. I hope that I can soon say, like Phil, that it gets easier the farther I leave it behind.

Teemo

[Daniel]

mell is correct, this issue is perfectly good for our forums just so long (as has been pointed out already) we do not stray into the details of stimulus etc., but this point is true for all of our posts.

Yechezkel, I do not know from what spiritual path you approach the subject, so I cannot provide independent analysis on your thoughts of "lost salvation" because of MB.

From the evangelical Protestant Christian perspective, while there are many different approaches to the discussion of MB, and suffice to say it's not the Sermon of the Sunday in 99.98% of churches, I submit that there are no Biblical doctrines that deal in a direct way with this issue.

MB is the leaf on the tree while the root is lust and thought-life, as Phil pointed out.

So MB is not automatically a problem (my own opinion).

Soteriology, the study of doctrines effectual to eternal salvation (within Christianity), does not involve MB period.

But I would offer that the most rewarding and fulfilling life, full of zeal and happiness and sunny days -that life is one that does not center on the next fix from MB.

For many of our PAs here, their MB and P use were all tangled together and for one to go the other had to hit the road too.

Like Phil, I would also agree that to play it maximally safe, Cold Turkey quitting is the ideal. Half-measures in my own experience tend to half-committments which wind up in the junk pile of discarded experiments.

I can remember back to my teenage years, learning that I wasn't the only one but all my closest friends were doing it too.. If someone told me to STOP I would have told them they were crazy.

Of course I am functioning on hindsight now. I can see how the unbridled following of every urge that came down the pike set me up for some very bad thinking habits that led to actions that I would come to regret in a gigantic way.

Daniel