Why Users Don't Know and What to do Instead Thrive Beyond Pornography (Formerly The Self Mastery Podcast)

Darcy - Webinar Thursday at 6 pm mt. sign up at zachspafford.com/freecall
Zach  - If you have a pornography struggle in your life, either as a spouse, an ecclesiastical leader, or the person who chooses pornography, you’ve probably run into this issue. 
I ask clients daily, “Can you tell me what happened the last time you chose porn?” The most common answer they give is, “I don’t know”. 

What is clear to me, over the many conversations that I have had is that those who are struggling because they choose pornography contrary to their moral values is that they don’t all have degenerative brain diseases.  

So, how can this be such a common refrain, why don’t these men and women know what is going on, when the fact is that they are the ones engaging in the behavior?

Darcy - As a spouse, you might find yourself frustrated with this kind of response.  

Zach -   But there is actually a really good reason why we say, “I don’t know” when it comes to our behavior, with this issue so often.  

Zach  - “In a series of experiments (conducted at the University of Chicago), participants were asked to evaluate the likelihood of themselves or others to do various moral or immoral behaviors. Respondents did not rate themselves more likely to do good works. Yet they regularly assumed they were more likely than others to avoid immoral acts. They also deemed instances of others’ unethical behavior as more extreme and memorable than their own choices.”

Darcy - All of us believe in our own inherent goodness and when our behavior does not reflect the sense of self that we believe to be who we are, we tend to both discount the facts and distance ourselves from them. 

Zach - I don’t know anyone who has not done this.  When we drive and cut someone off, most of us will justify our behavior or say it wasn’t that bad and actively try to put the incident behind us as quickly as possible.  Especially if we feel bad.  When, however, someone cuts us off, we, many times, ascribe malicious intent to the other person.  

In a real and meaningful way, this may be happening in your head around pornography.  

For those who are choosing pornography, the act of distancing ourselves from the behavior, putting it behind us as quickly as possible, and seemingly scrubbing our memory of the incident is an act of self-preservation in a way.  It helps us maintain our sense of self, in the face of behavior that contradicts our belief that we are “good”.

Darcy - I think it’s also really interesting how the research showed how when we see someone doing something and we don’t like it, we will assume we would never do anything like that.  

This really speaks to our desire to see ourselves in a certain way.   People want to see themselves as good.  

Zach - When we choose pornography, there is a tendency to do our best to distance ourselves from the choice because it contradicts the sense of self that we have and that we want to maintain. 

Darcy - as a woman I always saw myself as a brunette. I would dye my hair, color out my grey, and work to maintain my look as a brunette.  I had a sense of self that was not reflected in my hair color.  We’ve all seen that person who is not fooling anyone with their hair coloring.  In a way, this is what is going on for us when we fail to see our behavior and are unable to deal with it meaningfully.  

Z - Right, what we are doing is we are not seeing ourselves clearly. Almost a willful blindness to our choices. 

D - How can we mitigate this issue as we reflect on our choices?

Z - The three stages...