We Go to Porn When We Need TLC

Paul had a hard day at work. His rear end hurt. His eight hour shift at the call center was long and boring. He thought about his buddies who still worked at the car wash and longed for the good old days. He came home and slumped over the kitchen table and unloaded all his complaints to his mom.

               

“Oh, honey,” she cooed. “It’s so hard to make these kinds of transitions. Life’s not nearly as fun as it used to be. I can see how hard it is right now to hold the course, even though you thought it would be the best way to pay tuition.”

               

After a couple of minutes, Paul got up from the table, nodded an appreciative look to his mom, and walked downstairs to get ready for his workout.

               

Paul has learned to check in about what he’s feeling. He has discovered that when he spills his emotions in this way and senses that his mom’s heart is going out to him, he feels some relief. It helps him “reset” emotionally.

               

When we find ourselves disoriented by unsettling emotion, we are genuinely in need. Fortunately, the human nervous system has a way of getting us what we really need when we need it. Our attention narrows to the one thing our survival seems to depend on. We become extremely motivated to seek it. The brain becomes like a pit bull that won’t let go.

               

Our genuine survival needs are all that way. We need oxygen, and if  we are ever deprived of it, the brain makes sure nothing else matters until we get it. We have more leeway when it comes to sleep and food, but if we’re deprived long enough, eventually we become single-minded and driven until those survival needs are satisfied.

Our need for compassion and support when we’re struggling emotionally is just as essential to our well-being. Connection with a loved-one at such times is our emotional oxygen. Take a deep breath of it, and we our brain resets and we can move on with life. When we’re denied it, we can’t easily turn our focus to other things. We stay narrow-minded, shut down, and function at a much lower level than usual.

If we can’t acknowledge what we feel, reach out to someone close, and sort it out with them, then we fail to reset in the most fitting way. We remain emotionally distraught and cognitively compromised. And, unfortunately, primed for a relapse. The brain is craving relief from the distress, and porn provides a powerful distraction. But it’s only a pseudo-reset, not a genuine solution. Soon the original distress returns, and with it with the added bite that we let porn into the driver’s seat of our lives again.

That’s how it used to go for Paul. Fortunately, he takes a better path now when he’s feeling downhearted.

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