Learning to Thrive Beyond Pornography use was the greatest challenge of our life and marriage. It had rocked my self confidence, tainted all of the most important experiences of my life and become the most impossible challenge I had.

With this podcast or at https://www.GetToThrive.com you'll learn about the struggle, how to overcome pornography use, and where to find additional resources to begin to thrive beyond pornography with your spouse.

At some point I took a step away from all the 12 step meetings and councilors and started to figure out my own brain, to look at my issue as something that I had the answer to and I was going to figure it out. Here I share those lessons and give you the power to start your own journey free. Whether you struggle with unwanted pornography use or are the spouse or partner, whether you feel stuck or just don't know where to start, here I will teach you principles, tools and skills that you can use today to change how you think and, in the end, what you do.

You'll hear interviews with my spouse, with experts on human sexuality and with former and current pornography users on how you can overcome your own struggle with addictive behavior.

The Thrive Beyond Pornography podcast will bring new perspective to your struggle and keep you coming back to improve all aspects of your life. (formerly, The Self Mastery Podcast: Overcome Pornography Forever)

Episode 254

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This topic is close to my heart because understanding it can be a game changer in how we approach self worth and our relationships with others, especially our spouses, but even those around us like our parents and girlfriends, boyfriends, fiancés siblings, work as well. These are all component parts of how we approach our validation and our relationships in terms of things like pornography and pornography doesn't usually creep into some of those spaces.

But the, the core aspect of this that we're going to talk about is something that will help us in those other relationships.

So let's start by acknowledging something fundamental. We all crave validation. I don't know anybody who doesn't like to hear, good job, or you're amazing, or I like you. I don't know anybody who is not looking at their social media likes and going, man, I wish I had more of those.

Whether it's compliments from loved ones or recognition at work, validation feels good. It's a basic human desire. I don't think it's a need, but it definitely is something that we desire.

But there's a pretty dangerous trap when we fall into seeking validation without really meriting it.

Pornography is a prime example of what I would call false validation, and, I don't often bag on pornography, partly because I don't think it's terribly helpful, but I want you to understand that porn never says no.

It's always available. It's always ready to please. It never rejects you. And rejection is something that most people try to avoid at all costs. We always like when people like us. We very rarely, if ever, are willing to say, listen, I'm okay if you don't like me. I can handle it.

And because porn never says no, it's never, it never rejects anybody, it's a really effective place to get validation.

And that's a pretty significant problem in the long run.

When you turn to porn for validation, you're setting yourself up for a superficial and ultimately empty experience. Porn gives you a sense of being desired and wanted, but you and I and everybody knows that it's not real. It's an empty experience. It's a one way street where you're not truly interacting with the other person. They don't really want you, even though their face on the screen might show you that they want you. Them sharing with you, , the most intimate parts of their sexual self might seem like they want you, but they don't.

There's no genuine connection there. You didn't really spark actual desire in them. And there's no acknowledgement from that person of who you really are. Meaning they don't have any intimacy with you. They're showing you their intimate selves, but they're not accepting and choosing you in any sort of real and intimate way.

And when I say intimacy, what I mean is they don't really know you. They don't know the parts of you that. They're sharing with you much less any other part of you. How you interact with your children or how you interact with your job or how you show up in life. So there's no intimacy there.

And if we break that down further, imagine you're looking for validation from a real partner, from a real spouse.

What does that involve? What does it cost you? It involves effort and you have to become vulnerable. You have to be willing to share the real person that you are, because if you don't share that, then you don't feel like you're desirable anyway.

I talk to clients all the time where they're like, I don't share who I am with my spouse. So they don't reject me and vulnerability, effort, intimacy, those all require facing rejection. They all require that our spouse actually get to choose us or say, I don't really like that behavior in you.

Even if I choose you broadly, I don't like that particular behavior. Your partner is not always going to be in the mood. They're not always going to say, yes, I want to have sex with you. They're not always going to say, yes, I want you to give me a back rub or whatever. That's a natural part of real relationships.

That's a natural part of intimacy. You can also carry that out into other relationships with your parents or with your siblings or with your, Your friends or co workers, you might say, Hey, this is an important part of my life.

And it doesn't necessarily have to be about porn. It could be, you know, I'm, I'm into Dungeons and Dragons or whatever. And they might go, Oh yeah, that's, I'm not into that. And that's a rejection, not necessarily of you, but it can feel like a rejection of yourself. And intimacy requires strengthening our capacity to feel rejection.

In the moments that you are sharing who you really are with someone, you are putting yourself in a place to be rejected, and that's where the growth happens.

When your partner says, "hey, I don't like that," or when your friends say, "hey, I don't like that, or that's not part of how I want to show up in the world," sometimes people regress and they go, "Oh, I'm, this is not my tribe. And I can't share who I am with this person."

Maybe I do. Maybe I don't care what other people think. When we share with other people, the parts of us that we often keep hidden, we position ourselves in a place to grow in the face of rejection. And we also position ourselves to be accepted and allow for intimacy.

Communicate more effectively, build deeper connections. So this is the difference between what a real relationship looks like and what pornography. Pornography offers no opportunity for growth. It's a shortcut that bypasses the essential aspects of one person interacting with another.

Porn always tells you what you want to hear without any real effort on your part. You just type in, I want to see this kind of porn and it shows up. It's like, "Hey, yeah, here you go." It never says "no." It's never like, I don't feel like it. This kind of false validation becomes, a way to deal with how you feel. And it's easy and it's always accessible. It's always on. And it never really contributes to your personal development or your sense of self.

One of my clients shared an experience with me this week that really highlights this point.

He would turn to porn whenever he felt down or rejected.

This became his go to source of comfort because it never said "no." And then over time he realized that This was the thing that was preventing him from dealing with, one, his real issues of why do I feel bad, and two, actually making a connection with another human that he wanted to know and be a part of their life.

Instead of learning to cope with rejection and building genuine self esteem, he was masking His problems with a quick fix. He was saying, "okay, I'm just going to not feel bad right now." In the face of this rejection or in the face of not feeling like I'm being fully accepted.

So how do we break free from this cycle of false validation? Well, the first step is recognizing that true self worth comes from within and from our real life interactions. That means we have to face rejection head on and we have to learn from it rather than avoiding it through escapist activities, escapist means, right?

So that's not doom scrolling. That's not viewing porn. That's not playing video games because you're just avoiding your real life. That's not overeating. Those are the kinds of escapist activities that don't match our values, yet they allow us to feel good in the moment.

So let me give you five practical steps to get started. First thing you want to do is acknowledge your feelings.

Whenever you feel the urge to seek validation through porn, so I don't feel good, whenever you feel Like your brain is offering you porn. What you want to ask yourself is how do I feel? What am I feeling? Why am I trying to avoid this feeling? Do I feel lonely, rejected, inadequate, whatever it is, identify that emotion and start practicing feeling it.

All the way through. You don't have to, you don't have to beat yourself up. You just have to be able to sit there for about 90 seconds and feel that feeling.

Then of course, if you remember the detour cycle, you want to go back to what's the underlying story there. Why do I feel this way? And what is the story I'm telling myself? And can I address that story more meaningfully? The next thing you want to do is seek genuine connection. This, it sounds easier than it probably is because in a world where people are very much not calling each other, not meeting face to face, where there's a lot more texting, there's a lot less, Interaction in the real world.

This can be difficult, but you, you can do it. And if you are willing to do it, invest time in building a real relationship, whether that's with your spouse, whether that's with friends, whatever it is.

Genuine connections, provide true validation because they involve real interactions and mutual understanding.

The next thing you want to do is develop a little bit of self compassion. Learn to validate yourself. Self validation is key.

now this doesn't mean going into that, like, "I never do anything wrong, and I'm a good person no matter what" kind of idea.

This means recognizing that you are worthy of love and that your worth is, Independent of any external approval.

Practice self compassion, remind yourself that you're valuable regardless of whether anybody else thinks so.

Be capable owning your positions solidly and say, "I like who I am, and if I don't like who I am, I'm going to work on that honestly and compassionately, but I'm not going to beat myself up because I'm not perfect yet."

The number four thing that you can do is face any of the rejection that you are eventually going to receive.

I don't know anybody who goes through this world without facing rejection, face it with resilience. Understand that rejection is just a part of life. Instead of avoiding it, use it as an opportunity to. Get grounded, get centered, stay calm, start getting good at feeling bad, and then ask yourself, "what are the thoughts that are making me feel bad about this rejection?"

Ask yourself, is that who I want to be? How can I shift my own mentality from one that where I'm always out there trying to close my wife's browser tabs and get the house clean so that she will feel obligated to have sex with me versus. Do I want the dishes done? Is doing the dishes for myself because I want it done more important than obligating my wife to have sex with me or making it so that she feels obligated.

The last thing I want you to do is set realistic expectations. I know this sounds so silly. It sounds so basic. I recognize that, but remember. You're not perfect. You're not going to be perfect. And no relationship is perfect. So often people come to this process and they're like, I gotta have this solved tomorrow and I can't ever go back.

Otherwise I'm going to lose everything. Whoa, tiger, just bring it down a peg. Set a realistic expectation for yourself and put yourself in a position to say, I'm going to learn from this and it's probably going to take me a little while to unlearn some of the old ways that I've been dealing with my own self rejection, my coping mechanisms around seeking validation.

I want you to understand breaking the cycle of false validation from pornography is not easy, but it's totally worth it. And when you can seek real connections and build genuine self worth, you can move beyond superficial validations and start really self validating to the point where you become more desirable.

That's really, when I think about someone who is self validated, who doesn't need me to tell them that they're more awesome, they actually are a more desirable person in my eyes. They're more desirable to hang out with because they're they're not trying to become an energy vampire to me.

I don't know if you've ever heard that term, but basically someone who's always needs you to tell them they're enough. That's kind of an energy vampire. Someone who is. It's totally self validated or self validated to a large degree. That's someone you want to hang out with because you don't have to make them feel good.

They feel good. And that brings a great feeling to any interactions that you have with them. That's what you're trying to create is a sense of self. That's solid enough that when people are with you, they're like, yeah, I like hanging out with that guy. Cause he doesn't need me to make him feel good. He just is pretty good dude to hang around with, which by the way, when your wife looks at you and she says, "Oh, I'm Yeah. I don't have to validate him. He's self validated. I can actually choose him."

You see the difference? And that's really where this becomes so much more interesting is that when your wife desires you, or your partner desires you, not because you just quit porn, but because you're self validated and you're more capable of being okay in the face of rejection, then you become somebody that they, Want to choose, want to be with, want to create more with.

I hope this episode is giving you some valuable insights. If you're ready to take the next step in your journey, sign up for a free consult, go to get to thrive. com slash work with Zach. Together, let's work toward building the self worth and the relationships that you deserve.

Thanks for joining me today. I love you guys. And I'll talk to you next week.