Why Doesn't God Take My Porn Addiction? | Spirituality, Psychology & Praying to Quit Porn
- Jake Kastleman
- Feb 19
- 29 min read
Updated: Feb 22
Why doesn’t God take away your porn addiction? People tell you to give your addiction to Christ, and it doesn’t seem to work for you. Why?
I remember how frustrated I used to be by this concept of giving my porn addiction over to Christ. People advised me to simply surrender to Christ and that was the answer to get sober. But it didn’t work for me. I thought this might be because God didn’t love me, didn’t care, or that I was simply too sinful a person.
I’ve worked with men across the world who struggle with these beliefs, and I’ve helped them find success in porn addiction recovery.
The key is not to simply give your addiction to Christ, but to understand how to successfully integrate truths and approaches from spirituality, religion, and psychology to provide a powerful force for quitting porn. God can be an integral part of this as He inspires you to understand your brain, your addiction, and how to get sober from porn for good.
By combining methods from both psychology and faith, you can overcome porn addiction. I did it myself and I teach men across the world to do the same.
Empowering Recovery Through Effective Spiritual & Psychological Practice
Regular spiritual practice is a catalyst for growth in all other areas of your life. It acts as a driving force for positive growth in your sobriety, relationships, career, health, ambition, and more.
This article will give you insights into why spirituality and faith are so crucial for recovery, how to include both psychology and God in overcoming porn addiction, and common mistakes that addicts make when asking God to help them quit porn.
Why Spirituality Matters in Recovery
I believe that a quality, daily spiritual practice is the single most important thing you can do each day for your sobriety. Why? Because it addresses a fundamental aspect of what characterizes you as a human being.
If you want to recover, you must address the following critical aspects of what makes you you:
You must address all of these parts of you. Including your spiritual part. If you do not, it will be very difficult for you to stay sober.
Getting sober is not just about abstaining from your drug of choice, it is about transforming into a healthier, stronger version of yourself.
Religion has an amazing capacity to bring peace and power to your life, but only if your belief in that religion is not founded on things like fear, shame, perfectionism, and self-judgment. It must be something that adds to your life, rather than takes away, and it must be something that is personal for you.
If you are simply attending church and saying prayers for a couple minutes each day, this is not going to be sufficient to empower your recovery. Spirituality can only lead you to stop porn addiction if it takes a central role in your life and is founded on gratitude, love, service, and a belief that God has your best interest in mind.
How Spiritual Growth Strengthens Porn Addiction Recovery
Addiction isn’t just about physical or emotional cravings—it’s often tied to emotional wounds, fear, loneliness, and a lack of purpose. Spirituality helps you:
Find deeper meaning beyond pleasure-seeking behaviors.
Address unresolved pain with compassion and self-forgiveness.
Develop inner strength that isn’t dependent on external validation.
Spirituality also replaces destructive coping mechanisms. Instead of numbing pain with porn or unhealthy habits, you can turn to meditation, prayer, or mindfulness to cope with stress. Switching your coping mechanisms to these mild, positive outlets can sound impossible at first, but over time it can become your go-to.
Instead of seeking control, you can trust in a Higher Power to guide you. You can learn to rely on this power in everything you do, and it can become the bedrock of your sobriety.
Religion vs. Psychology in Porn Addiction Recovery
Many people argue for either religion or psychology in their effectiveness for stopping porn addiction. Some say one is better, and other people say the other.
Neither is true, because they are inseparably connected.
Using psychological frameworks for processing thoughts and emotions (such as CBT or IFS) is crucial for sobriety. These do not take the place of religion and spirituality. Instead, spirituality and religion can make these frameworks truly effective. Reliance on Higher Power breathes life into psychological techniques.
Without my reliance on God and my education in religion and spirituality, I never would have developed my porn addiction recovery program. I believe that God’s light and inspiration are the forces that brought me out of darkness, taught me how to understand my brain, and motivated me to learn about psychology, healing the brain, and how to quit porn.
This doesn’t mean I’ve had no work to do on my end. Quite the contrary. It’s meant more work. As I come to understand sobriety better and better, I reach toward higher and higher heights, because that's what God's Spirit inspires me to do. It’s hard, but a much better “hard” than being addicted.
It’s also meant a great deal of practical learning and implementation on my part. I needed to deeply understand my own mind and why I kept going to porn addiction. My research into psychology has been a tremendous and irreplaceable way to do that.
God and psychology are not opposites, but work in tandem. God has been there to inspire and facilitate my learning, point me down effective roads, and strengthen me as I’ve learned how to live sober. Without Him, I would not have the motivation to stay clean from porn. Without psychology, I would not know how.
God has not simply taken my addictions, but instead inspired me to actions that have enabled me to learn through them and overcome them.
The Psychological Benefits of Spirituality
How does spirituality help you psychologically?
Helps Fill the Void Left by Addiction – Addiction often replaces deeper spiritual needs. Reconnecting with presence, peace, and Higher Power fills that emptiness with something meaningful.
Improves Response to Stress – Spiritual beliefs and practices give you something to lean on when cravings and struggles arise.
Encourages Letting Go of Control – Addiction thrives on self-will and compulsive behavior. It is all about a mentality of control. Spirituality teaches surrender, trust, and humility.
Reduces Shame and Guilt – Spirituality can foster self-compassion and the belief that you are worthy of healing.
Creates a Sense of Belonging – Whether through a spiritual community or a connection with a Higher Power, spirituality works counter to the isolation that fuels addiction.
Foster Long-term Commitment to Recovery – Connection with Higher Power can give you a higher purpose and motive for staying sober.
How Spirituality and Religion Can Either Help or Hinder Recovery
Many people associate spirituality with religion, but in the context of addiction recovery, spirituality is much broader.
Spirituality is about connection—connection to a Higher Power, to a deeper sense of purpose, and to inner peace. Religion, on the other hand, often involves specific doctrines, rituals, and organized beliefs.
Is it Better to Be Spiritual or Religious for Addiction Recovery?
Many in modern Western Society debate between being religious or spiritual, claiming one is superior to the other.
Some say it is best to be religious, as God has certain requirements and if we do not meet them then we will be punished, or we will not receive the blessings of heaven or be saved in the afterlife.
Others say that we need to abandon religious beliefs as they are old and foolish, made by men who want to manipulate and control people. They state that being spiritual, rather than religious, is more evolved.
I would argue that it depends on how you are living religion or observing spirituality. Is it bringing you peace, purpose, resilience, and a focus on the good of others? Or is it fostering something else?
Fear vs. Faith in Religion and Spirituality
Many of us may say that religion makes people happy. But, if you are living religion out of fear that you will be punished if you don’t, and judging others who don’t live your faith, is that really making your life better?
Does religion bring you feelings of the need to control others, look down on them, and feel ashamed of your mistakes? Does it feed perfectionism, which fuels your need to escape with destructive behaviors like pornography in order to feel some relief?
If you are spiritual but not religious, on the other hand, are you actually living by a code of ethics that keeps you rooted and connected with others? Or are you subject to the whims of your “spiritual intuition” and “personal truth”, disabling you from feeling a sense of commitment to a higher way of life?
Religion can fuel porn addiction if it fills you with fear, shame, perfectionism, and judgment for others. On the other hand, it can fuel recovery if it centers you on a life of compassion, service, gratitude, and reliance on God as your companion and friend.
Spirituality can fuel porn addiction if it is uncommitted, subject to delusion, or isolated from a greater community. It can keep you in the darkness, unaware that you are not sticking to anything other than your own personal preferences, having an unwillingness to choose a spiritual path that could be found in religion. This is aligned with a susceptibility to addiction.
On the other hand, spirituality can fuel recovery if it is a dedicated practice that is centered on specific, sound, and universal principles for the way you live, treat others, and connect with Higher Power every day.
Living By Commitments and Strong Values
I am both spiritual and religious. I believe that each are important for recovery. Taking my individual spirituality seriously and building a personal relationship with my Higher Power has been crucial for my recovery. In addition, commitment and connection to a larger religious organization serves as an anchor for positive living, and helps me aim for higher truths I can base my life on.
Addiction is founded on self-centered values. Being addicted doesn’t make us self-centered, but it does mean that some of our actions are not reflective of what we may see as important and worthwhile.
I believe that religion can be a powerful support and anchor to live by higher values. But simply being a member of a religion, or stating we are “giving our addiction to Christ” is not sufficient for recovery in my experience. Quitting porn requires a more involved approach.
It requires us to practice spirituality in our everyday life. Not just in scripted prayers morning and evening, but on-going practices throughout the day of mindfulness, presence, gratitude, focusing on the good of others, and relying on Higher Power.
Why Doesn’t God Take My Addiction Away?
I think one of the most common mistakes I see in religious individuals who are trying to quit porn, is the constant focus upon asking God to make them sober.
What I’ve come to understand after over a decade of sobriety, and through my professional work with others, is that fixating on addictive behavior in prayer - even if it’s with the intent of asking God to end the behavior - often leads people to obsess over their addiction, and this can actually fuel porn relapse.
Instead, I’ve found it is far more effective to ask God to teach me what to focus on, where to place my time and efforts, good things I can do to feel fulfilled, etc. so that I can stay sober today.
I focus my prayers on those things that match what a truly great person who was sober might focus on, such as:
Gratitude
Making a difference in the world
The well-being of others
Outcomes or goals that benefit my loved ones or community
Characteristics I want to develop
By centering my focus on these things when I pray, I am training my mind to fill the space that addiction has occupied with better things. I am replacing the darkness with fulfillment, positivity, and love.
In many ways, I believe God can only give you what you ask for. You must first imagine and request it. If you’re not specific, His hands are tied.
Now, just because you pray for it doesn’t mean it will happen. That’s not because God doesn’t care, but because He cares a great deal. He wants you to grow and become stronger as an agent and individual. If he simply gave you what you asked for instantly, you wouldn't need to take the journey that will one day bring deep meaning to your sobriety.
If you ask, focus, work, and pursue then you will be far happier in the long run. If things are simply given to you, this does not build your sense of confidence and esteem. You must work for it, solve problems, and overcome obstacles. Only through this stretching can you feel a sense of purpose, which in turn brings happiness.
God will be with you every step of the way if you invite Him to be, but that doesn’t absolve you of the growth and work necessary to earn whatever it is you are praying for.
He can be your guiding light on the hill, but you need to steer the ship through the choppy waters. He can be at the helm, but you need to navigate the storm.
You are the one who must purchase the ship, train as the captain, hire the team, and go on the journey. Then, you need to keep training, keep journeying, and eventually purchase a fleet of ships.
God is your consultant, your mentor, your motivator, your friend, and your confidant, but you need to make the choices and build the skills needed for sobriety.
When you slip up, relapse, or experience hardships, don't blame God. Instead, look at yourself and ask, "What can I change?", "What did I learn from this?", "How can I prevent this in the future?", or, "What is the next right step?"
When life gets hard, it is not because God is cruel or careless, it’s because that’s the way the universe works. We are meant to suffer in this life, and we are meant to grow from it in one way or another. We suffer not because God is against us, but because, out of necessity, reality includes suffering.
It hurts and it's hard, but if we did not suffer there would be no meaning to our lives. It is only through challenge that we grow, and if we so choose, this growth can eventually bring a sense of self-worth and a compassion for others. And through this we may become happy.
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Episode 86 Transcription: Why Doesn't God Take My Porn Addiction? | Spirituality, Psychology & Praying to Quit Porn
Why doesn't God take away your porn addiction? People tell you to just give your addiction over to Christ and it doesn't seem to work for you. Why? I remember how frustrated I used to be by this concept of giving my addiction over to Christ. People advised me to simply surrender to Christ and that was the answer, to get sober. But it didn't work for me.
I thought this might be because God didn't love me, didn't care, or that I was simply too sinful of a person. I've worked with men across the world who struggle with these same beliefs, and I've helped them find success in overcoming porn. The key is not to simply give your addiction over to Christ, but to understand how to successfully integrate truths and approaches from spirituality and religion, and to combine them with psychology.
provide a powerful force to quit porn. By combining methods from both psychology and faith, you can overcome porn addiction. I did it myself and I teach men across the world to do the same. Before we dive in today, my friend, if you are looking for help with porn addiction, I encourage you to check out my program on NoMoreDesire.com.
I also encourage you to go to my free workshop, The Eight Keys to Lose Your Desire for Porn, or my free ebook, The 10 Tools to Conquer Cravings. Excellent resources that are completely free to you and will help you on your journey. And again, if you want to check out more episodes on overcoming porn addiction or you have a loved one that needs help, please follow this podcast, rate this podcast, and hit that notification button. With that, let's dive in.
Hey my friend and welcome to the show. Today we're going to be talking about something that's near and dear to my heart. Something that I find very important, central to porn addiction recovery and really to recovery from the different substances that I was on, the different behaviors like video games and internet and TV, all sorts of things that have struggled with addictions too. And I really wanted to address this today because I think that there are pitfalls that we fall into with spirituality and with religion and with using these to overcome addiction. And I think that we can use religion, we can use spirituality, we can utilize our relationship with God and with higher power in amazing, beautiful ways.
And then also I see that there are so many people for whom religion is really this driving force for shame and for fear and for self judgment. And that really actually drives their addiction. And I want to talk about the differences in that today, why spirituality matters for recovery. Talk about religion versus using psychology for overcoming addiction.
and how all these things come together and you know, what about spirituality versus religion? How do these things compare? So regular spiritual practice is this catalyst for growth in all other areas of your life. That's the best way that I've come to understand it and how I've used it in my life. Spiritual practice, practices like
Reading of scripture and inspirational words, holy words, right? For me, I'm a Christian. So those are specific texts that I'm reading on a daily basis and prayer on a daily basis, not just, you know, a couple minutes in the morning and evening, but real dedicated prayer that is meaningful and personal for you. And it's centered on things that matter and that actually fuel recovery.
It can act as this driving force for positive growth in your sobriety, your relationships, your career, your health, your ambition, and so much more, everything in your life. And I think one of the people that I'm talking to here that I hope are listening are people who hold bitterness against religion or against spirituality or think that it's outdated or they've outgrown it or it's...
it's unnecessary, or maybe they hold this this anger, right? They feel that it's been the source of judgment in their lives. And I think what I really want to just drive home here is it doesn't need to be that way. And so we'll talk a lot more about that. So this this episode, I hope we'll give you some great insights into why spirituality and faith are so crucial.
to include God in overcoming porn addiction and common mistakes that addicts can make when asking God for help to quit porn. So first let's let's talk about why spirituality matters in recovery. I believe that a quality daily spiritual practice is truly the single most important thing that you can do each day for your sobriety.
And I'm not just saying that. For me, my program has four pillars of recovery. That is physical or biological, and then neurological, relationships or social, and then psychological slash spiritual.
And I put psychology and spirituality together as one for a very specific reason and I'll tell you more about that. But I teach my clients in the program and have them do specific practices in all of these areas in the program. this is addiction is and porn addiction specifically is something from which I've come from multiple angles.
and have looked at many different philosophies and many different paths for overcoming addiction. And there is so much wisdom to be had in neuroscience and in fitness and in psychology and in faith and religion and in multiple sects of psychology or from Eastern or Western faiths. We can pull from so many different avenues for recovery.
So why would I say that spirituality is specifically a daily spiritual practice is the single most important thing that you can do? Because it addresses a fundamental aspect of what characterizes you as a human being. It can't be ignored. If you want to recover, you must address the spiritual aspect of who you are. You also need to address the physical aspect and the mental aspect and the social aspect.
Right, and the neurological aspect. All of these parts of you are crucial. But I believe in what I've seen for me in my life and what I've seen for others is that the spiritual aspect is really this catalyst for all others. You must address this part of you. You must address all these parts of you. If you do not, it's very difficult for you to stay sober if you leave out any of those parts. So.
Getting sober is not just about abstaining from your drug of choice. It's about transforming into a healthier, stronger version of yourself. And religion has an amazing capacity to bring peace and power to your life. But only if your belief in that religion is not founded on things like fear, shame, perfectionism, self-judgment, it must be something that adds to your life rather than takes away. And it must be something that is personal for you. It's meaningful.
If you're simply attending church and saying prayers for a couple of minutes each day, this is not going to be sufficient to empower your recovery. Spirituality can only lead you to stop porn addiction if it takes a central role in your life and is founded on things like gratitude, love, service, and a belief in God, a God that has your best interest in mind.
If you believe that God is a punishing God, or He's always looking down on you, or He's terribly of you, or He's just waiting for the moment that you're going to mess up, that can really fuel your addiction.
So let's, I also want to talk about how spiritual growth strengthens porn addiction recovery specifically. So addiction, again, it isn't just about physical or emotional cravings. It's often tied to emotional wounds, fear, a lack of purpose. And so spirituality helps you find that deeper meaning that's beyond pleasure seeking behaviors. It helps you address that unresolved pain with compassion and self-forgiveness. At least it should.
This is what spirituality and religion should be doing for you. And it helps you develop inner strength that isn't dependent on external validation. You get that center, you get that core. Spirituality also replaces destructive coping mechanisms. Instead of numbing pain with porn or unhealthy habits, you can turn to meditation, prayer, or mindfulness to cope with stress. So, switching your coping mechanisms to those things though?
these mild, these positive outlets, these mindful outlets can sound impossible at first. I know for me, for years, it used to just be like, how do I even do this? But over time, it can become your go-to and you really can move into it over months of time. If it's something that you are willing to pursue and willing to put effort into, can be, and then these things can become your go-to and they're so much better for the mind, so much better for recovery.
So in addition, instead of seeking control because so much of addiction is about this controlling mindset, I teach my clients that's one of the main drivers of the addictive mindset is control. So instead of that, you can trust in a higher power or you can rely on this power and everything you do and it can become the bedrock of your sobriety. And for a lot of people that, you know, it sounds pretty cliche or it sounds pretty
I've heard that before, but I want to give you a bit of a different way of looking at that by talking about religion and psychology in recovery. So many people argue for either religion or psychology in their effectiveness for stopping porn addiction. Some say one is better and other people say another is better and neither is true because they are inseparably connected. That's what I want to drive home.
It's not religion versus psychology when it comes to porn addiction recovery. It's religion and psychology. It's spirituality and psychology. Using psychological frameworks for processing thoughts and emotions, it's one of the main tenets of what I do with people. Using CBT, using IFS, it's crucial for sobriety, using these principles and these frameworks.
Religion spirituality do not take the place of practices like this instead spirituality and spirituality and religion are the lifeblood of These mental and emotional processes. They are the fuel that keeps them running Without my reliance on God and my dedication in religion and spirituality I never would have developed my porn addiction recovery program. I believe
that God's light and inspiration are the catalysts that for me personally brought me out of the darkness, taught me how to understand my brain and motivated me to learn about psychology, healing the brain and how to quit porn. This doesn't mean I've had no work to do on my end in order to quit. It doesn't mean that I haven't gone through a great deal in growth in order to quit porn. Quite the contrary, it's meant more work.
me. As I come to understand sobriety better and better, I hold myself to a higher and higher standard. This is how it goes for people and people that have had many more years than me who have spoken with. This is the path. You hold yourself to a higher and higher standard, which brings you further and further away from that line of addiction. It's hard, but it's a much better hard than being addicted. I can say that. It's suffering, it's pain, right? In its own right.
because it's difficult, but it's a much different pain that's actually fulfilling and leading to something good, rather than just this self-centered and shame-filled and this pain that comes from addiction that just drags you down into the pit of hell, right? Hell being this feeling, this overwhelming feeling of suffering. So it's also meant a great deal of a practical learning and implementation on my part.
I'll say that because it's not just simply something that you can ask God to take away your addiction. It means you have to learn, you have to implement. I've needed to do that. I needed to deeply understand my own mind and why I kept going to addiction. My research into psychology has been a tremendous
irreplaceable way to do that. God and psychology are not opposites, but they work in tandem. God has been there to inspire and facilitate my learning, point me down effective roads, and strengthen and motivate me as I've learned how to live sober. God has not simply taken my addictions, that never happened for me, but instead inspired me to actions that have enabled me to move through them. So I want that to be understood because
I think that often, especially what's in Christianity is give your addictions over to Christ. I've heard that so many times I can't count the amount of times. Look, that never happened for me. I prayed many, many times, God take my addiction, God take my addiction, Christ take this addiction. I did that so much for years until I said, this is not working. This is not getting me sobriety.
And so then I learned about really the tenets of psychology and I learned about how spiritual outing and psychology were really two sides of the same coin in so many ways. And that's again not to negate the involvement of God because God is behind that. But I believe that our psychological health and our spiritual health are intertwined. They're interlocked. I think that there is a spiritual
end of psychology and a psychological end of spirituality.
So how does spirituality help you psychologically? It helps fill the void left by addiction. Addiction often replaces deeper spiritual needs. And reconnecting with presence, peace, higher power, fills that emptiness with something meaningful.
It also improves your response to stress. Spiritual beliefs and practices give you something to lean on when cravings and struggles arise. It encourages you to let go of control. Addiction thrives on self-will and compulsive behavior. It's all about a mentality of control. And spirituality teaches surrender, trust, and humility. And these things are necessary for recovery.
And hopefully reduces shame and guilt. Spirituality can foster self-compassion and the belief that you are worthy of healing. And that's huge, because shame is at the core. It's one of the greatest cores of fear, shame, and distrust, or at the core of addiction.
It also creates a sense of belonging, whether through a spiritual community or a connection with higher power, right? Spirituality works counter to the isolation that fuels addiction. And it fosters this long-term commitment to recovery because connection with higher power can give you this higher purpose and motive for staying sober. And I believe that that, again, that's a spiritual power.
that is given as a gift to us. It's a gift that we earn through action, but nonetheless a gift that wouldn't be present without God giving it.
So, and then just to talk briefly about, I guess not briefly, I'll talk about it for a bit, but spirituality versus religion in sobriety. There are many people that associate spirituality with religion.
But in the context of addiction recovery, spirituality is much broader. Spirituality is about connection, connection to a higher power, to a deeper sense of purpose, and to enter peace. then religion, of course, often involves specific doctrines, rituals, organized beliefs. So is it better to be spiritual or religious for addiction recovery? Many in modern Western society debate between being religious or spiritual, claiming one is superior over the other.
Some people over on one side say in today's world, it's best to be religious as God has certain requirements and if we don't meet them, we'll be punished or we will not receive the blessings of heaven or be saved in the afterlife. And then other people say we don't need religion. We need to abandon those religious beliefs. They're old, they're foolish, they're made by men who want to manipulate and control people. And they state that being spiritual rather than religious is more evolved. It's new agey, right?
So I would argue that it depends on how you are living religion or observing spirituality. Is it that, and that's the major part. It depends. It depends. A lot of people will say, well, religion makes you happy. Religion doesn't make you happy. It can. It's certain it can add to your happiness a great deal, but it can also make you miserable. It depends on how you're observing it.
Same thing with spirituality. Is it bringing you peace, purpose, resilience, and a focus on the good of others, or is it fostering something else? So, and that really comes down to, in a lot of ways, fear versus faith in religion and spirituality. Many of us may say that religion makes people happy, but if you're living religion out of fear that you will be punished if you don't do what God wants you to do, you're judging others who don't live your faith, is that really making your life better?
Does religion bring you feelings of the need to control others, look down on them and feel ashamed of your mistakes? Does it feed perfectionism, which fuels your need to escape with destructive behaviors like pornography? You're trying to get some relief, because all the perfectionism, all the shame, all the expectations of yourself are just loaded. They are weighing you down.
If you're spiritual on the other hand, but not religious, are you actually living by a code of ethics, I would ask, that keeps you rooted and connected with others? Or are you subject to the whims of your spiritual intuition, quote unquote, or your personal truth that people talk about today? Is this disabling you from feeling a sense of commitment to a higher way of life?
Religion can fuel porn addiction if it fills you with fear, shame, perfectionism, and a judgment for others. But on the other hand, it can fuel recovery if it's centering your life on compassion, service, gratitude, and reliance on God as your companion, your friend. Spirituality can fuel porn addiction if it's uncommitted, subject to delusion, or isolated from a greater community. It can keep you in the darkness, unaware that you're not sticking to anything other than just your own personal preferences.
and having this unwillingness to choose a spiritual path that could be found in religion.
That's aligned with the susceptibility to addiction. And that's because that impulsivity, that I have a sandy foundation, I don't know which way I point, I don't know what's important to me, what's not, you have to have some rock hard, rock solid values and some things that you live by always, period, in order to overcome addiction. And that's not everything.
Certain things might be important to you that you're breaking over and over again and that's where psychology comes in so you can have some compassion for yourself and understand why that's happening. There are spelled out reasons for why that is in psychology. Psychology is brilliant. I believe it's inspired by God in so many ways. So on the other hand, spirituality can fuel recovery. If it is dedicated practice, that is
centered on a specific sound and universal set of principles for the way that you live, the way that you treat others, and the way that you connect with higher power every day.
So for me personally, I'm both spiritual and religious, right? I practice, I practice my faith, it's organized, but spirituality is very personal for me and it's something that I started emphasizing 10 years ago, every single day, no matter what. I believe that each are important for recovery. We need to be religious and we need to be spiritual.
Now, I know not everyone's religious. That's okay. This is the way that I see things. If I can take a serious, sacred and personal approach to my relationship with my higher power, this fuels recovery. That commitment, that connection to a larger organization has served as an anchor for a positive way of living, seeking for selflessness and
vision for what I'm aiming for and higher truths that I can base my life on. I can't really establish those myself, and if I think I can, quite frankly, I think that's ignorant. How can you yourself establish those values? How can you yourself establish a personal truth? You really think that you are that intelligent? You're more intelligent than thousands or millions of people or billions that have come together to form these
universal truths and these codes of ethics, you're gonna go off on your own beaten path and try to figure out what your own values are.
These values are universal and by living according to a universal value and by the way, I've studied every major faith, Eastern and Western. They all have way more in common than they do different. And those underlying core streaks of living a life of meaning, living a life of love, serving others, taking good care of your body and your mind.
peace and presence, mindfulness of the moment.
These are all throughout all faiths and religions.
So.
Addiction is founded on these self-centered values and being addicted doesn't make you self-centered but it does mean that some of your actions are not reflective of what you may see as important and worthwhile and that's that again, that's hell to live in that space. I believe that religion can be a powerful support and anchor to live by higher values, but simply being a member of a religion or stating we are
Giving our addiction to Christ is not sufficient for recovery, in my experience. Quitting porn requires a more involved approach. It requires us to practice spirituality in our everyday life, not just in scripted prayers morning and evening, but ongoing practices throughout the day of mindfulness, presence, gratitude, focusing on the good of others, relying on higher power.
And I want to answer this question directly now. Why doesn't God take my addiction away? I think one of the most common mistakes that I see in religious individuals who are trying to quit porn is the constant focus upon asking God to make them sober. Make me sober today, God. Make me sober today. Help me to stay sober today. What I've come to understand after over a decade of sobriety and through my
professional work with others is that fixating on addictive behavior in prayer, even if it's with the intent of asking God to end the behavior, often leads people to obsess over their addiction even more. And prayer is a personal thing. It depends on how you're approaching it personally, but this has been what I've witnessed for myself and others. This can actually fuel porn relapse when we are always praying about addiction in our prayers.
I've found it's far more effective to ask God to teach me what to focus on, where to place my time and efforts, good things I can do to feel fulfilled so that I can stay sober today. In my prayers, I've learned to focus on things that match what a truly great person who is sober might focus on.
What are those things? The best I've come to understand it simply put it's gratitude and the good of others. Gratitude and the good of others. Making a difference in the world, the well-being of other people, outcomes or goals that benefit my loved ones or my community, characteristics that I want to develop to be a better man. Praying for those things, centering my focus and prayer on those things every day.
By centering my focus on these when I pray, I'm training my mind and that's, for me, I see it uniquely. think that psychology and faith come together in one. Psychology and spirituality come together in one. And so the way that I pray, it's probably more formulaic than a lot of people. Maybe it'll become more flowing, more expressive in the future, but the way that my mind works, it's...
I am very conscious about what I'm praying for so that I'm praying in such a way that I am also training my mind at the same time to focus on, again, gratitude and the good of other people, focus on things that fuel my recovery and that fuel my overall mental well-being and help me to do more good in the world. I'm training my mind to fill the space that addiction has occupied with
better things. I'm replacing the darkness with fulfilling, purposeful, positive, and loving matters. In many ways, I believe, kind of one of the reasons that I say this is I believe that God can only give you what you ask for. You must first imagine and request it. If you're not specific, his hands are tied. All right, knock and it shall be open to you. Ask and ye shall receive.
If we don't knock, if we don't ask, if we aren't specific, his hands are tied. Now just because you pray for it doesn't mean it will necessarily happen. That's not because God doesn't care about you, but because he cares a great deal about you. Why? He wants you to grow. He wants you to become stronger. He wants you to be an agent, an individual. Anytime someone blames God for something, I...
I get surprised by that. I understand it very well from my own life and from thinking that way. But I try to practice seeing things differently. I'm an agent. I have agency. I make my own decisions. God does not make them for me. God can help me. God can guide me. God can strengthen me. But he cannot make my decisions for me, nor will he make my life work out in a certain way.
I differ from a lot of people in this. Some people believe in divine destiny and in meant to be's and that God is leading their way every day and leading all these things that happen. For me, I see that differently. I've had some very poignant experiences in my life that have led me to believe that we can have many different timelines, many different paths that we can walk down.
I believe that there are some key things that we're here on earth that we are meant to do. But I think that the way that we get there and the way that we do those things really is up to us. And that can feel really uncertain. It can feel really scary. It can feel not as controlled. It can put a lot more up to me. man, now it's all in my hands. I can't blame God for what happened. So I can't say, you know, I give you the wheel and now you take care of everything.
And I think there's a difference between that faith of that surrender, right, and giving it over to God and allowing him to work through you versus saying, God, why did this happen? You know, why have you done this to me? Or God made this happen in my life. It was just meant to be when I think often we really, really need to look at why did this happen? And if there's something that has gone wrong in my life,
How can I take accountability in order to change my circumstances? If something didn't work out with work or school or my family or whatever it might be, some dream that I had, I need to ask, what did I learn from this? Why didn't this work out? Not just say, well, God's will. God's will, it's over and done. Again, people see that differently depending on who you are. I just think we have to have an empowered perspective and say, I'm an agent.
made me to be able to choose my path, to walk that path. And I can reach out to him for guidance and instruction and help and strength, but he's not going to do it for me. And ultimately I do not believe that it is him that directs my life. I believe it is me that directs my life. And I can choose as I direct my life to align it with what he would want for me.
with what his intelligence, his love, his light, what he would want for me.
And that's still me that needs to direct that path. If I ask, if I focus, if I work, if I pursue...
then isn't that going to make me far happier in the long run than someone simply giving me the answers? If things are simply given to me, this does not build my sense of confidence, my sense of self-esteem. I have to work for it. I have to solve problems. I have to overcome obstacles. Only through that stretching can I feel a sense of meaning, which in turn brings happiness. And I've, I used to
believe in this life where I could just ask God for whatever I wanted and I didn't need to do the work or the learning or go through the mistakes or make the, the, you know, if I'd hit pitfalls or I do things unintelligently, I thought, well, God will make it all work out because my intentions are good. Not necessarily God's going to allow me to fall. God's going to allow me to make mistakes. God's right. God, as you're recovering, he's going to allow you to relapse. He can't stop you from doing that.
But he certainly, if you'll ask him and consistently reach out to him, he can make you aware of pitfalls that are coming or give you little instructions or little nudges. Hey, don't go down this path. Don't don't do that or do this. All right. We can easily conflate that with other voices in our head, I think. But we can really receive a lot of guidance. I believe that God
has been with me every step of the way as I've invited him to be. But that doesn't absolve me from the growth and the work necessary to earn whatever it is that I pray for. He can be my guiding light on the hill, but I need to steer the ship through the choppy waters. And not only that, I need to be the one to first buy that ship that I'm driving on the choppy waters. I need to train to be a captain. I need to hire a team. I need to go on a journey.
and then I need to keep training and keep going on more journeys. And eventually I need to buy a fleet of ships. God's not the captain of the ship. I can invite him to be my right-hand man. I can invite him to guide me. I can even invite him to be the captain, but he is going to refer back to me and let me know you have your agency. You have your choice. That is how things are set up.
God's my consultant, he's my mentor, he's my motivator, he's my friend, he's my confidant. He can walk with me, but I need to be the one to make the choices and build the skills needed for sobriety.
He's not going to take my addiction from me. And that's not because God is cruel or careless. It's because it's the way that the universe is structured. It's the way that the world works. And I believe it's what we came here to do, to learn by experience. I hope this episode's been helpful for you. God bless and much love.
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