What many men call normal, for me always felt like an addiction. I was introduced to porn at the age of 12 when we found some magazines in the paper waste of a friend’s house.
We soon found out where his father had hidden more magazines and video tapes. We spent hours and hours looking at the pictures and never ever talked about how we felt about them. Each boy would be isolated doing his thing, no communication, no connection.
I remember feeling empty, with a sense of guilt and raciness after those experiences, yet I would crave for more because I didn’t have any intimacy in my life. No cuddles with my parents or friends and I was way too shy to enter a relationship.
So the images of naked skin gave me the illusion of people being close, meeting each other. In truth, I was craving intimacy – meeting people and being met by people – not sex.
When I had my first sexual experience at the age of 19, it was a disaster. I had all these ideas and images disturbing me and setting me up for how to act, what to think, how to sound and the reality didn’t match at all with what I had seen on screen and paper.
I felt lonely and not met, nor could I meet my partner.
My friendships had changed by that time and since we neither had Internet nor cellphones, I didn’t have access to porn for a couple of years. But when I had the opportunity of visiting a big town, I would sneak into a porn movie theatre and this then confirmed to me that I was addicted to watching porn.
On the outside everything seemed fine. I had finished my studies at University and was working as a therapist, my body looked healthy from daily Hatha-Yoga sessions; I was married and had a great, well-functioning social network.
But why was I still watching porn? I had tried countless disciplines to let go of this habit.
By this time, I could already clearly feel that porn was actually looking at people being heavily abused, although I would still fool myself and think it would be less harmful if I didn’t watch aggressive porn.
What struck me most was the fact that I was working as a therapist often with women who had suffered sexual abuse. Although many clients found a momentary release through their sessions with me, they never experienced true healing from the sexual abuse.
Physical symptoms, fears and suicidal thoughts would come back time after time. But how could my clients heal from sexual abuse when I needed to heal this within myself to then be able to truly support their healing?
Sometimes I would have watched porn in my lunch break and then returned to treat clients that had been sexually abused. The images of sex sometimes were so strong in my mind that I had difficulties focusing on what my clients were sharing with me in the sessions.
I felt ashamed to touch my clients because it felt like I was somehow harming them. I couldn’t help it, but even without touching, in the moment when we looked at each other’s eyes, the energy of the pornographic images I had let into my body flooded the room and I could feel that I had absorbed the energy of the porn by watching it and this was actually abusive to my client and myself.
Nobody had ever told me that this was possible, but it was so awkward and real that I didn’t need proof of this other than my lived experience.
I started questioning myself as a therapist and the modalities I practised (which were mainly new age, shaman, spiritual, alternative therapies). If I was neither able to let go of the addiction, nor able to prevent the harm I was causing my clients in an environment that I was responsible for holding – one that is meant to allow healing from abuse – then something was genuinely missing and going wrong in my life.
Soon after this I began to get to know Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine. Although porn addiction was never a topic of the Esoteric healing sessions, the addiction just fell off my shoulders within one year.
The more intimate I became with my natural self, the more normal it became to really meet people and be met by them, including other students of Universal Medicine.
I decided to let go of all the new age modalities I had practiced before I had experienced Universal Medicine at once, especially all shamanistic ceremonies and sessions and instead began only to work with the Universal Medicine therapies that I had learned.
After this decision I watched porn two times and both experiences were so disgusting that from that time on I never touched porn again.
It was clear everything had changed. I have experienced that the Universal Medicine modalities don’t work through mental explanations or behavioural regulation or discipline, they simply re-awaken the ability to feel and be energetically aware of everything that one engages with.
I began to realise that the modalities that I had practiced and experienced before I had come across those taught by Universal Medicine, all the new age, spiritual and shamanistic therapies, seem to work with energy in a way that casts a fog around our energetic awareness in the most deceitful and evil way to make us think we are dealing with the energetic root causes of our issues.
This goes on until our bodies show us the truth by displaying symptoms of exhaustion, illness and sometimes chronic disease and mental and emotional ill-health.
When I decided to become an Esoteric practitioner and applied for accreditation through the “Esoteric Practitioner’s Association” (EPA*) I found out that a prerequisite for becoming an Esoteric practitioner is to commit to never watch porn as well as a number of other prerequisites such as not drinking alcohol.
It was the first time in my life I had heard of this or come across an organisation that considered how what the practitioner does will directly impact upon the quality of healing that is offered to a client.
No healing modality that I ever came across, neither at University nor around the world during my studies of alternative medicine, ever asked that I not watch porn, or engage in other activities, because of the harm it would cause me and my clients.
This made sense of my experiences of the Universal Medicine therapies and the power of healing that they brought to me and others. It was the final confirmation for the stupendous quality, care and space that Universal Medicine and the EPA* offer, something that is not seen or matched anywhere else worldwide.
My experience has informed me of how important the quality I live in is to offering healing.
I would want such a safe space for every single person on earth, so that nobody ever again has to suffer unseen energetic abuse through the side effects of their practitioner’s lifestyle choices.
More and more men are starting to talk openly and honestly about porn addiction and the effects they observe it is having on their lives and on their loved ones. This is the way to end the illusion we have allowed the porn industry to abuse us with.
It was the true love I had for my clients and for myself that allowed me to ask the right questions that brought me to meet Serge Benhayon. And it is his enormous love and care for humanity that allowed me to change and create a safe space in my clinic.
The women and men that now come to see me, some of whom may have been sexually abused, can now finally start to truly heal in my clinic because they are never going to be imposed upon by an abusive energy that was there before I understood what my porn addiction was doing and they are offered an environment where they can feel safe and supported through the loving ways I now choose to live every day.
* The EPA (Esoteric Practitioners Association) is a branch of Universal Medicine. It was instigated by Universal Medicine to monitor and accredit the modalities that were founded by Universal Medicine.
By Anonymous, Germany
Further Reading:
Porn addiction – what are we missing out on?
Behind Closed Doors
Our secret medical history
643 Comments
Our standards of decency and respect have slid so far that what we now may consider as normal is very abnormal, eg porn, which means – how dramatically will the standards then slide if decadence and/or depravity are our normal way?
It’s a great reminder for us all too that there are no private or secret moments, even in our thinking, as everything adds up to the collective energy we live and express in, which affects others.
“More and more men are starting to talk openly and honestly about porn addiction and the effects they observe it is having on their lives and on their loved ones. This is the way to end the illusion we have allowed the porn industry to abuse us with.” It’s great for everyone to openly discuss the realities of porn. We have a tendency as human beings to override what really feels true, that first mouthful of alcohol tastes disgusting, likewise the first puff of a cigarette feels like poison to the body, and when we seen porn we also know in some way its trashing something pure within ourselves and within all of us. But, we repeat these things even though we don’t like them. Great to uncover what was lacking in your own intimate relationship with yourself (and earlier with your family) that created the void to fill with some other kind of false ‘closeness’ – porn.
This article clearly shows that the integrity in the way we live is felt by everyone we meet.
Understanding how our thoughts and words are what we take into everything we do or energetic awareness is the start of our evolution back to being connected to our Essences, Inner-most-hearts / Souls so that True healing comes through us then we do not impose ill energy on others.
There is an energy in this world that is pure, innocent, amazing, pure love, glorious and true – the energy that porn is is the complete opposite to all that.
It is a dark tunnel to embark, one which may seem to not have any light or other people for miles. You can feel completely isolated and alone. The thought of it may make you feel disgusted, but you drop into it again and again, time after time. It is worth exploring, seeing why it is that way, why do you rush to your computer for the relief. Although the relationship may be an unhealthy one, it is worth exploring and seeing why it exists. Judging and condemning ourselves for it will never do anybody any good.
There is a lot of shame around pornography and people engaging in the privacy of their space, we cast judgements and criticism but do we ever look at the root cause to bring understanding and support a healing process? Our society has a lot of flaws and the fact that we criticise one other is actually one of our biggest ones.
Having done some research recently I was shocked to find that it is now more common for violent and extreme porn to be consumed. Porn will never fill the void where a lack of intimacy lies and in response the drug has to up the dose or it’s potency in a failed attempt to fill that void.
Listening to the knowing we have of when an energy is dodgy is our guide back to what’s true and pure. I’ve done all sorts in the quest for intimacy and now I am connecting with my sacredness I am able to say no to what I once allowed.
Esoteric healing sessions are amazing, I know my past has no hold over me what so ever anymore mainly due to the help and support I have received via Esoteric healing practitioners.
The demand for porn is huge, as a society we need to ask why this is and what is in our systems, education, society that means so many people go looking for such a thing.
I remember a number of years ago on my way home from a Universal Medicine retreat stopping to pick up a few essentials in a local shop. Standing in the checkout queue with another person ahead of me, I was observing the man ahead of us paying for his groceries. Reading his energy was like walking onto the set of a porn movie. I felt how his every move was governed by thoughts of porn and how it oozed out of every cell in his being. I felt how this trip to the shops was like an intrusion into his world and his only thought was to get home as quickly as possible to return to his porn. I remember focusing in on his face and being surprised at how normal he looked, as if he was just another customer doing his weekly shop.
What a beautifully honest blog and exposé on the energetic effect and affect imposing energies have on not just the person themselves, but everyone they come in to contact with.
When we do not consider the energetic factor we are at loss of what is truly going on. We can be impeccably dressed and so forth but when we don’t consider the energy we are in this does not make any difference.
Porn is an often-undiscussed topic and the fact that you have been so openly honest about your experience is breaking the mold. With kids being exposed to it younger and younger through their devices and developing a warped view about sexual relationships, we need more than ever for this topic to be discussed.
It must be quite confronting for a survivor of sexual abuse to then go and see a therapist who is addicted to porn. This is a great example of how we affect others and that it is our responsibility to present ourselves free of such things.
Absolutely, we have a huge responsibility to heal ourselves and live a life of integrity, truth and love.
There are quite a few people who prey on the guilt around pornography – currently there are spam emails that (falsely) claim they have filmed people (using their own computer-attached cameras) masturbating and now demand substantial amounts of money to keep quiet.
“how important the quality I live in is to offering healing.” This a truth we all know as it is like visiting a doctor who tells you to give up smoking when you can smell cigarette smoke in his breath.
The more we heal ourselves, the more we are able to assist others to heal themselves.
The most powerful healers are those who have healed themselves in truth and there is nothing that they need to do to promote the healing of others, other than to live their lives in full.
When we don’t have true connection with another we crave something else, this something else can come in many forms – chocolate, alcohol drugs or porn, all will offer a quick release but will ultimately take us further away from our true selves.
Porn harms the body, it harms psychologically, it harms society and it harms relationships.
The impact of pornography has become a normality in main stream movies. Offering us another flavour on romance that is sold as the norm yet the ramifications are far harming when we are led to believe these.
I was told today that there is a movie company who are trying to make a film on a space ship, in space. This is the new thing, and it kind of makes sense, because as life gets more intense and extreme, industries – even pornography – will need to work very hard and try to create what can keep up with the increasing demands of an ever dissatisfied clientele.
Yes, and after a while pushing certain forms of extreme behaviour stop working so that extreme behaviour gets abandoned and everybody moves into a new direction as these activities are inherently tiring and unsatisfactory.
This is such a powerful blog. It really needs to be circulated more widely so that teenagers have access to it. By the time they have finished school, many teenagers have already embarked on this addiction and to have an insight as to why, would indeed be the beginnings of true healing.
In the national paper of the country I am visiting, the headline news on the front page is that the Government is going to introduce mandatory blocks on web sites because in a recent survey it has been found that boys are inundated on their phones and other electronic devices by porn sites so much so it has become a huge social issue for the country. This has to be a great first step and may be the next step is to find out what is it about our current culture that we feel the need to have these sites. Could it be that the way we are bringing up our children devoid of love and affection leaves them with a inner loneliness, that they then try and fill through other means?
I love the image to this blog, that there is always light at the end of the tunnel. No matter what and how dark it gets or twisted the addiction we can always make the choice to come back to the light as it never leaves us.
A beautiful highlighting about the image, that there is always light at the end of the tunnel, and we can choose that at any point.
There are few who have the courage and honesty to put themselves and their behaviours under the microscope in the way that you have in this article. It is deeply inspiring to read your words and observe the process you went through discarding the false layers of ‘self’ that shrouded the otherwise pristine truth from your eyes. We are One and as such what we do to ourselves is done to another and whether that be healing or harming, it is all felt by us all, all the time. As a collective, we are still way off the mark of living with the energetic responsibility required to wipe all abuse off the face of the earth, but experiences such as yours show us it is possible to enable this to occur by the way we each choose to live. Thank you for that which you have reflected for us all to consider.