Try The NoFap Challenge
Let’s face it. Adult imagery is everywhere.
As the internet has taken over our modern age, so too has NSFW content. This doesn’t mean just the films you find on free streaming sites, but the mature visuals found through other avenues.
From scrolling through Instagram and seeing an “Instagram model” flashing his or her behind to watching an episode of Game of Thrones and seeing characters taking off their clothes. There is adult imagery everywhere. It seems that you can never escape the stuff.
Unfortunately, some men have fallen for the adverse effects of overexposure. Some have become attached to all of this content around us. Ironically, we all know that everyone’s watching it but we don’t talk about it. And because of that unspoken taboo around discussing it, we don’t realize when others need help.
A recent study from earlier this year acknowledged that everyday use of adult content “is on the rise, with a potential for addiction considering the ‘triple A’ influence (accessibility, affordability, anonymity). This problematic use might have adverse effects in development and functioning, especially among the young population.”
That said, the study also realizes that there’s not enough information on the topic to truly profile when engaging in mature content consumption becomes pathological. AKA, when it becomes an addiction.
NoFap Redditors
Keep in mind, this isn’t to say that porn and adult content is bad. Virtually nothing is inherently or independently good or bad. The point of this article is to say that the overconsumption of them is bad. The addiction to them is bad. And many agree.
Over on Reddit, there’s a subforum of men discussing how addiction has taken over their lives. Redditors discuss losing relationships, losing time in long view seasons, and feelings of dissatisfaction with life.
“I lost my girlfriend today to a car accident,” wrote one Redditor in a post from the past month. “The hundreds of hours I spent could have been spent on her instead. But now, I’ll never have the chance to do this anymore.”
“It doesn’t matter if you’re single or not, use these hours to instead spend with your loved ones, your friends. Life’s too short to be beating off to pixels.”
Another Reddit user decided to give her perspective as a woman who dated an addict.
“I felt so much pain & heartbreak for several reasons after discovering that he had been watching videos consecutively every single day for over 2 years,” she said.
“Being with him was degrading, lonely, and empty. It always felt like I somehow knew he was thinking of some other girl while he ignored all my needs and just ‘put it in,’” she later stated.
“I felt like a failure. I felt like I would never be good enough. Like it was all my fault. I felt like I would never recover, I would never trust again,” she added before stating that the relationship eventually ended.
Related: Video: ‘What If You Stopped Masturbating?’
What Is The NoFap Challenge?
But is there an option to fight this addiction? There just might be one in the NoFap Challenge.
All of the above redditors are a part of a NoFap community trying to reclaim their lives after addiction. The goal is to give up adult content for 90 days in order to rewire the brain, detach from triggers that put men on the path of addiction, and reestablish a healthy passionate expression.
As the NoFap website explains:
“NoFap® is a comprehensive community-based recovery website. We offer all the tools our users need to connect with a supportive community of individuals determined to quit adult imagery use and free themselves from compulsive behaviors. With our website, forums, articles and apps, NoFap helps our users overcome their sexual addictions so they can heal from dysfunctions, improve their relationships, and ultimately live their most fulfilling lives.”
“We refer to the process of recovering from addiction as ‘rebooting.’ Research has shown that heavy adult visuals use can change the neural pathways of the brain causing addiction, hormonal changes, and bodily dysfunction. The rebooting process is intended to restore these neural pathways to factory settings, so to speak.”
You may have heard about the NoFap challenge before. While the challenge is ongoing, it revamps itself at the start of every month for challengers who’ve relapsed. The challenge then gained significant popularity in November thanks to the alliteration NoFap November.
Ultimately, the organization, forum, site, and service are all built on bettering the mental and reproductive health of men once addicted to mature visuals.
Happy, Healthier Men
Again, this entire challenge and website are not built on an anti-NSFW agenda. It’s built on an anti-addiction initiative.
The goal is a happier and healthier life for men (and women) addicted to adult imagery. The very basis of this challenge is to fight for a better, less distracted, self. In order to do that, NoFap was made into a challenge and game to help make the uphill climb a little easier.
Many men (and women) who have succeeded in the 90-day rebooting challenge have shared stories of several benefits, such as increased self-confidence, having better times in bed, enjoying heightened self-control, mental clarity, and more. Then, some chose to return to NSFW content once they’d rewired their brains to not depend on them and some chose to keep their distance. The choice is theirs.
But Should You Join?
If this article has made you question whether you need such a challenge, even if you don’t want to admit it yet, maybe those benefits are the solution you’re looking for.
The NoFap challenge isn’t the end all or be all for addiction recovery, but it’s an option out there for people in need. An option worth trying.
If you feel like the modern world is full of NSFW content that’s triggering, you’re spending way too much time-consuming mature images, or you’re personal life has been affected by your constant consumption of the stuff, maybe NoFap is the right option for you.
At least, consider it.
Day 1
Well if only it were that easy. Let’s challenge the cocaine addict to take the “No Doing Lines” Challenge or admonish the heroin hunny to the “No Shooting Up” Challenge. I will admit right here in front of the whole woeld that I am a slave to this habit and there seems to be nothing I can do on my own to stop it.