Now with today’s age where almost everything is sexualized, and everywhere you look there’s sexual implications on it. As a lonely teenager myself going through the “horny phase.” Things are not going good for me. How do you deal with impure thoughts? (No religion stuff plz lol)
If I were you, a few questions I’d ask myself would be: How often is “constant”? Does this frequency get in the way of other activities you enjoy? What do you find arousing and are those things dangerous to others or yourself? Does it make it difficult to engage others in a healthy manner? Is it interfering with your ability to have sexual relations with an existing partner? How does your activity shape your views of others?
If you are only releasing once a day when single and not interested in anyone in particular, spending between 10-20 minutes a day (on average) on the activity and it doesn’t prevent you from engaging in other activities, then I would say it probably isn’t causing too much harm to your lifestyle. Also, getting a regular release can help tone down some aggression that might occur due to a buildup of hormones. Just don’t get reliant on it, because that can descend into dependency and interfere with your quality of life.
If it does interfere with daily life activities, then you’ll likely want to find alternative activities to engage in. Working out, meeting people, mental stimulation, even gaming if you are engaged. Go for walks, get and care for a pet, cook a meal, something to get your mind engaged. However, the best way is to go out and meet someone. If you are a minor, try to find ways to hang out with the person (or people if you are all polyamorous, though make sure everyone is aware and consents before trying this, and seek advice from experienced polys engaging in healthy relationships!), or if you are an adult, go on dates. If there isn’t anyone in your current circle who you are interested in and who is interested in you, dating apps are worth a shot. I’ve had a number of very fulfilling relationships and encounters through dating apps, just beware of the ones that are just swipe this way or that or are otherwise just superficial picture boards. Meeting with people and engaging in fulfilling sex with others is probably the among the best ways to curve porn or masturbation addictions.
I’m a hardcore fetishist personally, into BDSM and a few other fetishes I won’t specify here. Safety and consent are a huge deal in my relationship as a result of this, since many things can dip into dangerous if we aren’t careful. As for porn, many renditions inaccurately portray BDSM and fetish lifestyles and can lead newcomers to dangerous or unhealthy conclusions about it (while also spreading misconceptions to outsiders as well, increasing discrimination against us).
For most fetishes and kinks there are healthy ways to engage with them, with the obvious exceptions of things like pedophilia. Also, if you find you have inclinations towards those sorts of things, seek help now! You’ll likely want to search for “kink aware psychologists” or those that specialize in those sorts of inclinations, but beware of quacks. There are some that will wave rainbow flags and claim to be kink aware but proceed to shame you or engage in other dangerous practices. If you don’t feel comfortable talking to a specific psychologist or you find yourself dreading the experience, change therapists right away. Bad therapists are extremely dangerous!
But if what arouses you can be done safely without exploiting others and you enjoy your kinks and fetishes like I enjoy mine, then you need to find ways to enjoy them in a healthy way. Get creative! Erotica (erotic writing) can be a good source for inspiration and can stimulate the mind far better than a video. Pictures would likely be next, but be careful about the exploitation potentially involved with that just as in videos, which I would resort to last. Sexual games are a mixed bag, but interactive novels are often good (and easy to make your own!).
When it comes to dealing with real people about sex, whether kinky in nature or not, honesty, openness, and consent are absolutely important. And if you have kinks, by the universe do not hide your kinks from your partner ever! If your partner tries to kink shame you after revealing it to them, leave them! Trust me it’ll save a lot of heartache later. And it has been my experience that most people with whom you have an established relationship will be understanding. It may not be their cup o’ tea, but they are usually nice about it. And obviously return the courtesy, regardless of the other person’s kink.
While you are single, take some time to imagine what you would like to explore with future partners and look up anything you can about kinks and fetishes, even if you yourself don’t have any as of now. You might meet someone with a kink and it will help you to already have some understanding about it. Just be careful when doing this if you are trying to reduce how often you masturbate or get arousing thoughts since it may trigger them.
If you are finding that you are viewing your friends in an exploitative or sexual manner when your relationship is platonic, then it may be time to look at how you are engaging with sex and porn, or your relationship with that person. Now, it is normal to develop attractions or occasionally have stray sexual thoughts about friends, but it should be an outlier, a strange event in your mind that you should be able to shake off. But when they are repetitive, they are problematic. That is when it shapes your behaviors around that person.
If you have a partner but are addicted to self sex, it will undoubtedly lower libido and your ability to engage sexually with that person. You will need to sit down and talk about it with that person, and if it can’t be resolved alone then you may need to seek professional help. The same advice applies here regarding your therapists as it did above, with the added caveat that it now involves your partner. Keep communicating and keep them involved. Listen to them, because they may be experiencing red flags with a particular therapist that you are not.
Anyway, I hope this helps. I know not all of what I said will apply to you, and that is okay. But it is good to make sure all bases are covered and I don’t know how many comrades here engage in alternative sexual lifestyles or even have safe words (which you should get some safe words even for “vanilla” sex, and encourage partners to as well. It is just good healthy behavior.). Of course, a lot of my advice is based on personal experience. I am not a professional. Lastly, I tried to make my advice a little more broad because porn and self sex if only a part of a whole, and the whole influences to part just as the part influences the whole.
If you have any questions, let me know! I enjoy talking about this kind of thing.
Thank you for the info! A lot of it helped me out, especially the point about “sexualizing friends.” Due to me coming from a toxic household, being a loner most of my life, and dealing with both during quarantine, I often found myself gathering feelings for anyone that showed me the slightest amount of kindness, even eye contact. You did mention that it could be an outlier, which I agree! Because I would lose those feelings within two weeks.
My biggest problem is sexual thoughts. And one of my biggest triggers it is when I see two people arguing or fighting. It’s even worse when it’s two of the same gender, which I feel guilty of because it’s clearly blatant sexualization.
Are there books that give knowledge on kinks and how to be healthy with them? I do have a few kinks that have come from childhood trauma. I heard that it’s normal, though I’m not sure.
This response answered a lot of the questions I had in my head for some time about the future. Like what should I be looking forward to when discussing sex with a partner? I was a bit worried about a few things but you cleared them up! :)) I will save this comment for the future, thank you comrade!
Of course comrade! I’m relieved you were able to get something from what I said.
This isn’t abnormal, especially with the effects of COVID as you yourself have experienced. I suspect meeting people will help alleviate this over time, even (or perhaps especially) normal non-romantic interactions in neutral settings. If you are spiritual, a place of worship may help, or for secular options local clubs for activities you are interested in. Book clubs, music lessons or bands, exercise and athletic groups, comedy clubs (just beware of reactionary venues), activist and political circles (get some praxis in too, bonus!), and other similar gatherings will likely resolve some of this. Of course do so safely, but meeting people frequently in a platonic environment will likely alleviate some of this as your mind makes new associations with friendly behavior.
Given your earlier context of having experienced traumas in youth, it sounds like talking with a “trauma aware psychologist” may help. Also, depending the severity of your mental health situation, there are some books that helped me with a variety of issues:
So you can probably see that I have a particular author who has helped me a lot in understanding my mind and emotions, but I like her vulgarity and crassness (which I won’t be offended if you choose to avoid the books or find they aren’t helpful because of this factor, it just hits well with me is all), her sense of humor, and the way she explains things is pretty down to Earth. Also reading some books like this can help you prepare for meeting psychologists and hopefully learn a few things to look for in a therapist. It did for me, anyway, so I hope you can benefit as well.
It is relatively common, yeah, though I can’t say whether it was birthed by trauma or if you found certain things to assist with coping. For example, in middle school I was severely bullied and still have traumas from that, and for me pain became a coping mechanism. I used to punch walls made of durable materials like brick and stone specifically to bloody my hands and engage in flagellation. Was it because I was a masochist that I found those cathartic or might it be that I found that cathartic which made me into a masochist? I’m not sure which direction the relationship flows with that one, and it is the same for many in the kink community I’ve talked to.
As for reading material about kink, I’ll need to wait until I get home to get my titles and authors and all that, especially since right now I am at work and can’t go around searching certain things. I’ll edit this post and ping you in a comment to this post once I’ve updated it though.
Biggest thing is to be honest and open while being receptive to your partner’s kinks. And if that partner lists a surprising kink, it is best to not kink shame, even in the extreme cases. If there is a chance there might be a victim if left unaddressed, it might help to encourage a person get help and support them on their journey. If there are victimless ways something can be explored, then it might help to explore those routes. I once allowed a partner to play with me while I slept under the conditions that we are both sober when they did. I trusted that person a lot and we had a good relationship, so I gave consent which they understood could be rescinded at any time. This was after a long period of time developing this relationship and felt safe with this person. This allowed them to explore aspects of certain kinks and I learned a lot about myself as well. That said, consent is very important in a situation like that. I was very specific and the terms of our relationship was in writing in detail, which is common in BDSM relationships. It was document over 20 pages in length with everything we could think of that was okay and not okay, our safe words, how we addressed one another, hard limits, acceptable punishments, what is and is not punishable, how we communicate, etc. The document was constantly being changed, added to, and edited as we explored more and discovered more about each other, ourselves, and kink as a whole. Though the relationship ended due to life circumstances, I hold no regrets about any of it and would change nothing about that time, and have heard from them the same feedback. Our relationship is now platonic and we are comfortable confiding in each other when needed.