25 Reasons To Quit Porn Today

Photo by Anwaar Ali on Unsplash

There is a lot of controversy surrounding the potential harm of watching porn.

Luckily, more and more people are recognizing the detrimental impact of unlimited access to porn. The community Nofap on Reddit, dedicated to supporting those dealing with porn addiction, has 1.1 million members.

Esteemed scientists such as Professor Andrew Huberman are also shedding light on how damaging it can be.

Whether or not you consider yourself addicted, the decision to avoid porn extends beyond moral or religious considerations.

Simply avoiding the unnecessary dopamine spikes from porn can make your life more exciting and enjoyable.

In my early twenties, I struggled with depression and social anxiety. For long periods, I had almost no motivation to accomplish anything.

Eventually, I started reading online, and it became clear that watching too much porn could be a contributor to many of the issues I experienced. Fortunately, a growing number of researchers have started looking into the repercussions of watching porn.

Here are 25 reasons to stop watching it:

1. Getting Hooked on Porn

According to scientists, porn addiction is not real. Forget the technicalities — whether the researchers have slapped the addiction label on it or not.

For those struggling with it, the consequences can be downright disastrous. And watching too much porn can be both negative for your health and addictive.

And hey, I get it. Some experts might still be dancing around the term addiction, but let’s talk numbers. Down under in Australia, 4.4% of men and 1.2% of women self-report that they are addicted to porn. That’s not a negligible statistic.

Across the pond in the US, a survey of about 2,000 people revealed that 11% of men and 3% of women admitted to feeling a bit too cozy with the phrase, “I am addicted to pornography.”

Extrapolate those numbers globally, and you’re looking at a staggering number — hundreds of millions dealing with porn addiction or problematic porn use. A study from Cambridge University found that people who watch porn compulsively have brains that react similarly to porn as drug and alcohol addicts do to their drug of choice.

2. Watching Porn Rewires Your Brain

Watch too much porn, and suddenly, your brain’s tuning into a different frequency for arousal — one that’s not exactly in sync with the real deal. That might sound like harmless fun until it starts causing ripples in relationships, especially in the bedroom.

Our brains rewire themselves based on every experience due to neuroplasticity. It basically changes based on experience. So, choose your stimuli wisely; your neural wiring depends on it.

If you watch a lot of porn, your brain will change. This can lead people down a path where authentic intimacy loses its appeal and is overshadowed by the allure of a screen.

3. You Get More Energy and Drive if You Quit

Your reward system is responsible for your motivation and drive to seek out rewards such as:

• Money

• Sex

• Food

• 
  

A study found that the more someone watches porn, the smaller their striatum was — a part of the reward system. Essentially, it seems that watching porn numbs the reward system.

A lot of our motivation for accomplishment stems from sexual drives. When this energy is redirected to watch pixels on a screen, no wonder our drive in life takes a hit.

The antidote is to go out there, cultivate resourcefulness, and connect with people.

When I quit porn, I got much more energy and drive. I took up new projects, became more outgoing, and simply more engaged in life!

Countless other people report similar stories, too. Quitting porn can be a powerful catalyst for reclaiming the vigor buried inside us.

4. Watching Porn Impacts Our Commitment to Spouses

And it increases the chance of getting divorced. According to this study, people who start watching porn are around twice as likely to divorce in the following years. The researchers didn’t think they saw these results because people started watching porn due to being unhappy in their relationships. Instead, they pointed to the potential damage caused to intimacy when one or both partners in a committed relationship watch porn.

If you watch a lot of porn, you will get less turned on by your partner.

• Anime

• HD

• Plastic surgery

• Different angles

• Super hot models

And many other things contribute to this.

Watching porn can affect the emotional connection you have with your partner in a very real way. This study which looked at data from over 3500 people in committed relationships, found that any porn use consistently influences romantic connections negatively.

Some people think that watching porn might be an outlet that either curbs infidelity or adds spice to the relationship. For some, it can be.

The stark reality is that, in most cases, it elevates the risk of couples parting ways and has a net negative effect.

5. Watching Porn Thwarts Your Expectations

What you see on the screen is not how sex really is. In addition to creating unnatural expectations, it can make you too focused on your pleasure. Sex is the interplay between your own and your partner’s pleasure. In porn, it is typically not this way. In addition, porn might thwart performance expectations and foster insecurities about appearance.

Building a relationship with someone is very different from having a fantasy world always there to please you. When you’re in a relationship, the person you’re with can’t be a constant source of pleasure like the fantasy realm of porn. One of the reasons why porn might be problematic is that it gives pleasure without any responsibility.

If you have a sex life, you will probably have children at some point, and you will have to consider a lot more than just yourself and your own pleasure. The seductive notion of pleasure devoid of responsibility might seem appealing, but it stops us from having the experiences that build emotional resilience, resourcefulness, care, love, and the fortitude to navigate life’s challenges. All of this is part of growing up.

Watching a lot of porn rather than going out there to try to meet a partner is stopping us from having these experiences that make us grow.

6. Stop Supporting a Problematic Industry

Drug use and abuse happen in the industry. When you are watching it, you can’t necessarily distinguish between scenes that are consensual or not or scenes where sexual trafficking victims are filmed. Both kinds of films end up on the big sites, although in small numbers.

7. Your Porn Use Might Escalate

You might end up watching more “extreme” content gradually. Many people report that things they were disgusted by in the past have become their go-to thing to get aroused. So, why is this happening?

Watching porn depletes dopamine levels. As dopamine levels decline, you might have to watch more extreme, intense, or arousing porn to get the same amount of pleasure.

You basically need more to feel the same way. This is prevalent and can happen with any addiction or highly stimulating activity. Watching porn is no exception. Obviously, the more you watch it, the worse it will be.

8. Your Emotional Health Suffers

The more someone watches porn, the more likely they are to experience negative emotions such as:

• Anxiety

• Depression

• Social issues.
  

I certainly felt these side effects myself, and although not all of my issues were caused by porn, several were.

When I stopped watching porn, I got the strength to start working on myself properly. With that, many of my struggles went away.

9. Improve Your Charisma and Social Skills by Quitting

There is a lot of anecdotal evidence that quitting porn is helpful for your social skills.

Our emotional health is also closely connected to our communication skills for natural reasons. And, as you know from reason number 8, watching porn is bad for your emotional health.

Don’t you find it much easier to communicate with passion and warmth if you are in a good mood than if you are feeling down? I have certainly experienced that avoiding the unnecessary dopamine spikes from watching porn has helped a lot with my social skills.

10. Save Money by Quitting Porn

Some people spend money on various porn subscriptions or cam girls etc.

Onlyfans have become very popular, and people are spending big money on access to content. But this is the minority. Maybe the biggest monetary impact watching porn can have is reducing your earning potential.

To make a lot of money through a job or starting a business, we need qualities such as:

• Charisma

• Drive

• Enthusiasm

• A strong work ethic

• The ability to connect with people
  

Watching porn can undermine all these qualities. The result is that our earning potential is eroded by watching too much porn.

11. Experience a Deeper Connection With Your Partner by Quitting

Many people watch porn regularly and view it as a private matter detached from their relationships. But it is pretty common that their significant other harbors discontent with this choice.

A review of 30 studies found that watching porn is negatively associated with nearly all relationship outcomes. It can create a void in relationships and decrease intimacy.

12. Stop Fueling Loneliness

When you are watching porn, you are essentially choosing to put up a vote for a lonelier future. With every action you take, you vote for a future you decide. Do you want to experience some pleasure from pixels on a screen that only hurt you in the long run or close connections to the people around you and your partner?

13. Find Better Ways To Spend Your Time

If you stop watching porn, not only will you get more time on your hands, but you will also unlock newfound energy. Suddenly, you have the time and energy to pursue that business project that has been lingering in your mind or take up another hobby.

14. Watching Porn Can Make You More Emotionally Numb

Many people who stopped watching porn report that it almost felt like they awoke from a trance. They suddenly started feeling again after being emotionally numb. Here, you can read some people’s experiences with this.

Many people watch porn to numb uncomfortable emotions like:

• Loneliness

• Sadness

• Anxiety

• Boredom

The problem is that you cannot numb one emotion selectively. Watching porn can numb your pain, but it also numbs every other feeling and emotion. When I quit, I started feeling emotions much more intensely. At times, I would also feel strong negative emotions that I had suppressed for years, but that was a good thing as I was finally feeling something again.

If you constantly soothe unpleasant emotions with porn or other pleasures like video games, TV series, junk food, or alcohol, it will result in an undercapacity for dealing with stress and uncomfortable emotions.

The ability to cope with life’s curveballs is one of the most important life skills. The way many people use porn, it directly undermines their self-sufficiency and resilience.

15. Stop Objectifying Others

If you watch a lot of porn, it is really easy to start viewing people as sex objects rather than seeing them for what they are beyond their looks. And there is an association between porn use and objectification.

Objectification affects our connection with others, and for people who get objectified, it is bad for their mental health. The more we watch porn, the likelier we become to view others through the distorted lens of objectification.

16. You Experience Lower Arousal and a Higher Chance of Sexual Dysfunction

In a study, researchers made an online survey that 3419 men answered. The researchers analyzed the answers in order to determine the association between online porn use and sexual dysfunction.

They found a significant association between watching porn and erectile dysfunction.

Here is perhaps the scariest statistic I know about this topic. The prevalence of erectile dysfunction in young men has increased by insane amounts in the last two decades. In 1999 and 2002, the rates were at 2–5 %.

In recent reports such as this one, these numbers have ranged between 20 and 30 %! Keep in mind easy access to porn came with the porn tube sites, which became prevalent around 2007. Of course, it is not entirely clear that porn is the reason, but it is probably a big contributing factor.

Engaging with porn shapes new pathways in the brain for arousal, which might affect the natural pathways for genuine sexual attraction. Some people find it easy to get excited by porn, but they struggle to feel the same way with a real partner.

Think about it. Having sex is a way fuller experience than watching porn due to the connection with someone else, but it is less visual than watching porn. Since porn is so visual, it can affect the desire we feel for a partner.

17. Boost Your Performance at Work or School and Enjoy Clearer Thinking

In a study, researchers in Belgium looked at 14-year-old boys’ academic performance twice and compared the two scores. They found that increased use of Internet porn decreased the boys’ academic performance six months later.

Dopamine is paramount to our ability to concentrate and our willingness to work hard — both important attributes to excel at school or work.

Due to the power of dopamine, anything you can do that will optimize your dopamine levels will result in better cognitive functioning, and avoiding porn is one of these things! After all, common study drugs such as Vyvanse and Adderall work to increase dopamine and norepinephrine. So, behaviors and habits that benefit your dopamine system will also benefit your cognitive performance and vice versa.

18. Watching Porn Can Result in Poorer Decision Making

Increased porn use correlates with a decreased connection between the reward center and the brain’s prefrontal cortex (the area responsible for decision-making). This is associated with an inability to control impulses and poorer decision-making.

19. Experience More Pleasure in Your Everyday Life by Quitting

Watching a lot of porn is correlated with reduced gray matter in the reward circuitry. A side-effect this can cause is a reduced ability to feel pleasure (numbed pleasure response).

Porn has unlimited novelty (new content). And the brain simply loves novelty. You can keep your dopamine levels unnaturally high and for unnaturally long by watching porn if you constantly see new scenes and images.

This can cause a bad process in the brain, which is a numbed pleasure response. The result is that the brain downregulates dopamine receptors, and you feel less pleasure and excitement from other things.

20. You May Experience More Empathy for Others by Quitting

This might be a bold claim, but bear with me. Objectification and empathy don’t exactly go hand in hand. When viewing porn, we are essentially looking at others as sex objects.

The brain adapts to what it takes in, and the result is that we are priming our minds in a bad way.

This study found decreased empathy in men with problematic porn use. I am not saying that watching porn occasionally will turn you into an empathyless monster, but watching a lot of porn will certainly not benefit your ability to empathize with others either.

This is perhaps the most damaging side-effect I experienced. I got too focused on myself and didn’t care that much about others. This is a common side effect of addiction, as people tend to prioritize themselves and their desires over others.

21. Get Treated Better by Other People.

Many people report increased confidence when they stop watching porn. What we do when nobody is watching has consequences.

If you experience feelings of shame from watching porn, this will stay with you and affect how people treat you. Some people don’t necessarily experience this as they see nothing wrong in watching porn, but their dopamine levels can still be affected.

The collective impact of instant gratification habits — like watching porn, eating junk food, mindlessly scrolling social media, or binge drinking can really sway your dopamine levels.

If you lean too much toward instant pleasures, your dopamine system can become desensitized, leading to lower energy and increased apathy. The outcome? People might treat you differently.

Conversely, a healthy lifestyle with less instant gratification brings more energy, a better mood, and many other benefits. The result is that people will treat you better and earn more respect from others.

The behaviors we engage in when nobody else is watching determine the respect we get from our peers, colleagues, lovers, and so on. Ultimately, you can’t hide anything; it all reflects in your demeanor, confidence, and mood.

22. Be More Interested in Sex and Experience Deeper Intimacy

This one should come as no surprise. It’s no surprise that watching porn and masturbating shortly before meeting your partner can dull the experience for both of you. If you quit watching porn, you will experience a deeper connection with your partner.

23. Get Fewer Viruses on Your Computer By Clicking on Weird Links To Chase Dopamine

A nice little perk.

24. Avoid Having To Worry About People Seeing Your Search History

This may not be the most important benefit, but it is a nice little benefit that can make you avoid potentially embarrassing situations.

25. Build Your Willpower and Self-Discipline

If you manage to stop watching porn, your willpower can become a lot stronger. It is hard to quit, and this can increase your willpower. The newfound willpower can be transferred into other areas of life. This will aid you in numerous ways. Since porn is so accessible, there is no other way to stay away from it but to build strong willpower.

Increased willpower can assist you in your career, motivate you to push yourself harder in the gym, and make accomplishing tasks more effortless. Some people watch porn and don’t experience negative side effects. Everyone is different, and that is great.

Even though some people can get away without noticeable side effects, simply avoiding the unnecessary dopamine spikes could make their life experience more exciting and enjoyable.

I know unhappy people that don’t watch porn. Avoiding porn is not a magic pill that will fix everything.

It is a great foundation, however, for building a better life, and for some people, avoiding it can make a world of difference.

For young people trying to build their lives, watching porn can undermine their drive, enthusiasm, and connection to others, virtually all the things they need to build their social alliances and life in other ways.

When you are young, it is a time to take risks, invest in building a fulfilling life, establish meaningful connections, and relentlessly pursue your goals. That becomes much easier when you break the shackles of soul-sucking habits such as watching porn.