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 as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

With this podcast or at https://www.zachspafford.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)

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You are listening to the Self-Mastery Podcast, where we break through barriers holding you back from becoming who you wanna be, whether you're struggling with pornography, overeating, social media addiction, or just wanna get better at succeeding at life. This podcast is for you. Now, your host, Zach Spafford.

Hey everybody, and welcome to another Majestic Mastery Monday. You like how I use that one right there? Majestic . Hey, today I am really excited. I wanna talk about what it means to want versus what it means to be fully committed to something. And I think this is a really important one because the biggest thing that you can do is make a commitment to changing.

The habit that you are dealing with. So whether you're dealing with, overeating or excessive spending, or if it's pornography, whatever that habit is, and you're like, I am ready to change this. And you commit to that, that's very different than wanting it. So let's just dive into this. Do you really want to, or is there a part of you that really isn't ready or willing to let it go yet?

And choosing to do this on purpose is really important. Saying, I'm doing this and not waiting until you never look at pornography. To have the confidence to really be a free person or whatever it is that you're dealing with. And commitment is really important. Versus wanting like the difference here is really important to note, right?

If you want something, that doesn't mean you'll be able to get it to want, is to desire or to wish for something. There's no action required. It's totally passive. Wanting is really super easy. All you have to do is think I want this or say I want this. And there's no risk involved. It doesn't require anything from us saying, I wanna stop looking at porn, isn't gonna get it done.

It just increases that desire without necessarily giving you any positive results, which can create a negative result in that you think you're doing something. Without achieving anything. So you end up looking and feeling like, oh, I'm not accomplishing what I said I wanted to do, which feels bad, right?

That's totally uncomfortable. When we think we are doing something without results, we're creating failures. This, again, this like this proves something in our heads. It's proof to us that we are failing when we want something, but we aren't doing anything to get it. We're creating a gap in our brain that

it tells us is insurmountable. When we're committed, we basically, we promise to do something and then as my mother likes to say, come hell or high water, it's getting done. Have you ever said to somebody, I am going to get this done, you know what? Whether it was going into a certain profession or building something that you had no experience doing, you just say you laid it out there and you said, this is something I'm going to complete.

And as you go through that process in your mind, you never, ever even waver. You're like, Nope, I'm gonna figure this out. No matter what it takes, I'm going to figure this out. And you know it's gonna happen no matter what. That's commitment. Action is required until you get to the place where you want to be.

You aren't waiting for it to happen before you believe in it. It's being uncomfortable, right? It's being challenged. That's what commitment feels like. It is also getting results. You begin to do things differently and you think about circumstances differently, and you have to see that world that you're in differently than you do now to make the thing that you're trying to make happen.

A really simple example of this in my life, Has been becoming a podcaster. I had no idea how to podcast when I first started it. It really wasn't even on my radar when I became a coach. I was like, oh, maybe I should do that, but it really wasn't there. Then at some point I said, I wanna be a podcaster, because I thought it would be a great way

To get this message out there and help as many people as I could so that they could find their way through coaching and find their way to stop looking at pornography. It was a way for people to get some help when they're struggling. , and, but that didn't make me a podcaster, right? I was like, oh, yeah, I totally could do that.

And then for months, and I'm not kidding you, it was months before I really committed to doing it. I wanted it, and I thought about it and I just didn't do it. I kept saying, yeah I need to get that done. I want to get a podcast going. I want to get a podcast going. Then I sat down and I went through

The how to get stuff done, course that I learned from Brooke Castillo and that I coach my clients on. And in that process I committed to getting my first podcasts done and anybody can do this, honestly. So as I sat down and I actually laid out what I was committing to in a very specific way, I change from just wanting.

Which is easy to do to being committed by really defining what it would take to accomplish the goal of publishing my first three podcasts, a hundred percent commitment is easier than 98% commitment because if you're wavering it all, if you think if I don't get it done all the way there that'll be fine, then you really, you've already lost in a lot of ways, especially when it comes to overcoming pornography, because if you're like, oh if I'm 98% of the way there, Yeah, that's probably just enough and my wife will be okay with that.

And that's really not it. I know that sounds like dire and dramatic and you're like, yeah, but 98%, that's pretty good. But let me just put it to you this way. Nobody climbs Mount Everest to say, I got 98% of the way there. , right? Being committed means that you are willing to do whatever it takes to accomplish the goal.

That often means sacrificing something else in the process. People who climb Mount Everest lose fingers and limbs and even their lives in that pursuit. You don't have to lose a limb to overcome pornography, but that is still the kind of commitment that you want to bring to the table because it is the only way to make it all the way to the goal of being pornography free.

The idea, "I will do this regardless." Being able to say that and believe that and put in the effort that requires, right? There's no just like half measures when it comes to I will do this re regardless, it's gonna happen. No question. And if you have to climb that mountain 98% of the way there, 10 times until you get it done, and on the 11th try, you're a hundred percent there.

That's what commitment looks like. Jack Canfield said, once you make a hundred percent commitment to do something, there are no exceptions. It's a done deal, non-negotiable case closed over and out. Now, the important thing to notice there is that he didn't say it would be done tomorrow. You're not gonna succeed on the first try, usually for almost anything that is both important and difficult to do.

What it means is that you will think about, write down, analyze, share, and execute everything that you can think of to get there. Then when you fall short, you do it again, and when you fall short again. You try again over and over until you succeed making adjustments all the way along. 'cause you can't do the same thing every time and expect there to be a different result.

You gotta figure that out. And that was my mindset when I be, when I started like looking at my pornography differently. I, I think I've said this on the podcast before. I was dealing with my pornography for years before I really took a step back from 12 step groups and counselors and ecclesiastical leaders, and I said, I'm gonna figure this out.

And I knew I was unlearning something that I had taught myself over the course of a lot of years. And so I knew it wasn't just gonna come undone in a day or two. I also knew that the only way I was gonna fail is if I stopped trying to succeed. So I got smart about it and I got really curious about it, and I got committed about it.

That's what you have to do. You take some time. You don't make just some sort of snap decision. You think about the cost, you think about the benefits. You write all of it down. What is it that I'm getting from pornography? What is it costing me? Write it down. And be earnest about this. Pray about this. Pray about whether you want to actually commit to this, because it's not necessarily gonna be easy.

It's not just gonna jump out there and be done for you. There's not a moment where the magic happens and all of the sudden your fairy godmother turns a switch and it's like, oh, now you're done with pornography. This is a thing where you gotta figure it out piece by piece. That's what people come to me to get coached on.

They're like I'm 99% of the way there. I've climbed this mountain about four times, and every single time I end up back at the bottom, unable to feel like I have gotten anywhere near the summit. That's what I help people with. I help them with that last percent, that last 1%, where they're like, I'm not sure how to get there.

Be vocal about this too. Let everyone that you can, I. in on that commitment. Be somebody who's actually talking to people and having these conversations. And I can guarantee you, and I've said this before on the podcast, I can guarantee you that when you open up to people, they will support you. They'll rally around you, they'll come and they will be someone who is in your corner.

And if they're not in your corner, let's be honest, they're not your people. That they, that says more about them than it does about you, and be clear about it to yourself and to others. Be clear about what you're working to achieve. That is what commitment looks like. That's what being ready looks like, and that's something that you are gonna have to dig deep to find and dig deep to achieve.

Is this sense that it's not just, oh, I'm stuck here. A lot of the language of the 12 step program is . I'm an addict, which to me sounds a lot like I'm a victim. And also we were powerless against our addictions. If you're powerless against your addiction, do you have the capacity to change what's going on?

I. Or do you have power and do you have agency and do you have the capacity to choose something different and become something greater than what you are right now? And I think that the truth here is you have that, you just need to commit to it and be ready to execute on that to its fullest extent.

And by the way, this to me is emblematic of the difference between what the atonement is and what our agency is. And I've talked about this on the podcast before, how your the atonement is actually something that is, it's completely amazing and it's wonderful, and it's this thing that gives you the ability to become the person that you want to be, right?

The l d s Bible dictionary puts it this way. It says, the purpose of the atonement is to correct or overcome the consequences of sin. Now, I've never found anywhere in the scriptures the idea that the atonement makes us stop choosing our sins and weaknesses. Rather what it does is it bridges the gap in our ability to pay for our own consequences when we do sin and when we have not exercised our agency in ways that are in concert with God's laws.

The Bible dictionary doesn't say that the atonement will remove sin from our lives. It doesn't say that it will make it so we choose not to sin. It does say that it overcomes the consequences of sin. What are the consequences of sin? The Bible dictionary provides the answer here. It says, by transgression, man loses control over his own will and becomes a slave of sin.

And so incurs the penalty of spiritual death, which is alienation from God. So in other words, it overcomes so the atonement, it overcomes and corrects the consequences of being a slave to sin, spiritual death, and alienation from God. So I think that really provides us this. Massive incentive to change because now we know for a fact that all of that really difficult stuff has been taken care of for us.

We are no longer, we don't have to be a slave to sin. We don't have to endure spiritual death, and we don't have to be in alienated from God because the atonement has taken care of that for us. So now we have this incentive to change, and it allows us to know that we're not lost forever because our actions

Aren't permanent, but it does not change our behavior directly. And this is the component where you have to get out your agency and make a decision. So I want to give you an analogy, and I've probably used this analogy on the podcast before, but I wanna give this analogy again because I think it's really important.

Imagine you're on a boat called life, traveling from the place of your birth to the place of your death. And anytime you get off the boat and dip in the waters around you, you're disobeying God's law. You can stay in the water as long as you want, and you can get outta the water whenever you want. . That is what your agency is.

That is the part that you have control over when you get out of the water. However, you are always gonna be wet. Like the effects of your actions will remain with you. And we as people, we will, we'll try to do stuff right. If you grab a towel, you dry yourself off as best you can with a towel. You never come completely dry until the sun warms your clothes and removes the last of that water from you.

That part, that last part, the part that you can't get to, that's the atonement. That's the part you can't complete without something from outside of you. The atonement won't keep you outta the water. It won't make you use the towel to dry off. The atonement gets you dry, but it can't keep you dry if you exercise your agency to get in the water again after you get dry.

Now, in this particular analogy, the , I would love to go boating right now. And the warmth of the sun that is super enticing. So there, there's no right or wrong in this analogy, but I think you can see my point, which is your agency is yours and you get to exercise it however you want, and the atonement is there ready to back you up the entire time.

So if you will just commit. And take the commitment that you have right now and put it to work. Put it to action. Put it into continuing to figure out, okay, what am I doing? How can I adjust what I'm doing? What are the cues that I'm dealing with right now that are taking me down the rabbit hole?

Commit to learning that. Commit to figuring that out. Commit to understanding the process that you are, walking down that takes you to a place where you don't want to be. And then commit to figuring out, okay, if I did this last time, maybe I can adjust it to do that next time and continue to commit to change and continue to commit to learning.

And eventually you will figure this out. You're a smart person. That's what I love about people. They're smart. And if you want some help with that, feel free to gimme a call. Feel free to like, Set up a free consult it. They're free. Go to zachs bradford.com/work with me and I will gladly help you out as best I can and help you figure out, okay, how do I go down this path in a way that is going to make my life better and make me

Become closer to the person that I want to be. Okay, so finally, I wanna give you an example that I think is really appropriate here when it comes to wanting versus being committed. Now, the there, there's this idea that I have been noodling around that, when we overeat and when we overspend and when we use pornography, there's not a whole lot of real difference in our brains when it comes to what we're doing.

There's a cue, which we often call a trigger. There is . A pattern of behavior, right? There's what we do, that process that we do, and then there's a reward, and which essentially means that we feel better at the end of that pattern of behavior. Now, I want you to think about sitting at your desk if you work.

This is a really easy one to think about, but if you don't work, imagine sitting in an office desk. And you want a chip. Now, is wanting chips going to make them magically appear at your desk? No. , if that have, if that worked, man, there would be a lot more very heavy people in this world, right?

And I would have a lot of chips in my room, in my office right now, wanting chips doesn't make it happen. Let me show you what commitment looks like. Commitment looks like this. You have to stand up from your desk. And then you have to look around and make sure that check your pocket and make sure you got your money in your pocket, right?

And then if you don't have it in your pocket, maybe like rummage through your desk, this is what commitment looks like. You're rummaging through your desk and you like find the three quarters that you need and then you go downstairs to the vending machine. You leave your desk, you walk down the stairs, you walk into the cafeteria, and then you put the quarters in the machine.

You still don't have the chips. You are still committed though. I. And you make your selection, and then you put that chip bag, you reach into the thing and you grab the chip bag out. Now you have your chip bag in your hand. Have you eaten it yet? No. But you're committed. And so the next step is you walk back upstairs to your desk and you sit at your desk and then you set the bag of chips on your desk and you still want that chip, but you're committed to making it happen.

So you open the bag. at this moment. Think about this. If you said, okay, I really only want these chips, I'm, but I'm not committed to making them get into my mouth, , making it so that I actually eat them. You can see how at this moment before you open this bag, you could diverge and you'd be like I just want them, but I'm not gonna actually eat them.

I'm not gonna put the effort into this. I've done a lot of effort up to this point, but I'm not gonna put the final effort into opening this bag. I just, I only want them. Commitment is about taking steps, making action happen within your sphere of control. And whenever there's something you don't quite get or you haven't learned how to do it yet you figure that out.

So you open the bag and then what? You still haven't eaten the chips, so you have to reach in the bag. You pull the chip out, what do you do next? You put it in your mouth and then you chew a couple of times, and at this point you still haven't even really eaten the chip. You're just chewing it. You could spit this out, right?

This is what commitment looks like, is actually taking all these steps, which is a lot of steps, and this is the same thing that happens when we use pornography. We take all of these little tiny steps and sometimes we don't even know they're there. We don't realize these steps are happening because they're automatic.

That doesn't mean that we're not making them happen. , that means that they are just something that our brain knows to do automatically. So I want you to look at that commitment, like the amount of effort that it takes to just get a bag of chips and then put that up against your desire to quit using pornography.

What are all of the steps that you're gonna need to get all the way there? Are you prepared to execute on every single step all the way along until you finally kick this habit? That's the question you gotta ask yourself, and you gotta be prepared to put all of this into play until the moment that it's actually 100% completed.

That's what I'm talking about here. A hundred percent commitment. It's so much easier than just doing it halfway or 98% of the way, getting a hundred percent of the way there. And when you get there, I promise you it is totally worth it. It's gonna be amazing. And you're gonna be like, oh man, that is the hardest thing I ever did.

But now I am free and I'm amazing. I love to say that. I'm amazing. You should probably say that to yourself a few times a day, every day. I'm amazing. All right, listen everybody, I love you guys. This is always fun to do this, and I love doing this podcast because it gives me this moment to just tell you guys how much I have learned on my journey and how much you can learn.

If you just get ready to do it and get committed and take that, every single step that you don't know is in front of you, but you've gotta take that next step. All right. Hey guys, have a great week. We'll talk to you next week. Hey, thanks for listening to the Self-Mastery Podcast.

Every day I get requests from people who are looking to change something in their life. If that is you, if you need help overcoming your addictive behavior like pornography use, sign up for free mini session@zachstaffer.com slash work with me. That's zach staffer.com/work with me. I'll put a link in the show notes for you to follow.

Also, it would mean the world to me if you were to leave a review for us. Wherever you get your podcast, it'll go a long way to helping others find us. Thanks again.

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