Six Exercises to help find what contributed to becoming PA

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Just wanted to share some exercises from a book I'm reading.

Exercise 1: As you think about your first exposure to pornography, think about your age at that time. Can you recall your feelings? How did early exposure impact your childhood? If you had not seen pornography at such a young age, how do you think your life would have been different up to this point?

Exercise 2: When you consider your parents' parenting style, would you consider them involved or uninvolved? Controlling or lenient? Caring or uncaring? Did your parents' style of parenting contribute to your involvement with pornography?

Exercise 3: Have feelings of loneliness contributed to your viewing pornography? In other words, have you turned to pornography because you feel lonely? When you look at pornography, what percentage of the time do you look because you are
lonely? Do you feel isolated by others, or do you isolate yourself because of your involvement with pornography? If you isolate yourself, what can you do to become more involved so that isolation doesn't lead you into relapse?

Exercise 4: Do you feel like you saw a good model of how a relationship should work growing up? Please explain your answer. Is there any link between your viewing pornography and feeling or sensing relationship stress in your home of upbringing?

Exercise 5: How would you say the social system (TV, Internet, movies, etc.) has impacted your perception of pornography? How has the media contributed to your viewing pornography? Would you agree or disagree that the availability has contributed to your problem with pornography? If you could change the availability of pornographic material, would that help you, or do you think you would still seek out pornography?

Exercise 6: If you experienced some form of early childhood sexual abuse or childhood sexual experiences, do you feel this impacted your involvement with pornography? If so, how? Did you feel an increase in your curiosity and desire to experience or see sexual things? Please explain your answer.


From Treating Pornography Addiction by Dr. Kevin B Skinner. Amount quoted is fair use and does not constitute copyright violation.