Previous articles in this series have established that pornography addiction is not an official diagnosis. However, applying a diagnostic label to identify and treat problematic behaviour is unnecessary. An individual can view a behaviour as a problem in their life, even if it does not have an official diagnosis.
For example, social media addiction is not an official diagnosis. However, people may view excessive social media use as a problem for themselves and try to change it. In this article, we will explore one approach for discontinuing pornography viewing: the SMART Recovery approach.
SMART Recovery is an evidence-based approach to recovery from addiction. What’s more, the SMART Recovery approach can be used regardless of whether the individual views a behaviour as an addiction or not. Therefore, it is a useful approach to porn addiction recovery even if it is not classified as an addiction. SMART Recovery is built on four pillars (SMART Recovery, 2015):
This article will examine the first three pillars. The final article of this series will examine living a balanced life in depth.
Finding and maintaining motivation is the first pillar of SMART Recovery for addiction. Men may choose different reasons and motivations for how to stop watching porn. Their reason will form the basis of their motivation to change. They must identify a value on which to base their choice to sustain this motivation. A value is a fundamental principle, belief, or standard that guides decisions, actions, and behaviour.
Some men hold values that are based on their religious beliefs. They see pornography viewing as a sin with potential consequences for their fate. When their actions are not in line with their beliefs, this can lead to moral incongruence, producing negative emotions, such as guilt and shame.
The disconnect between what they do and believe they should be doing is the source of their distress (Grubbs & Perry, 2019). In other words, it is not the act of viewing pornography that causes negative emotions, it is their judgement of themselves for that act that creates the negative emotional state.
Therefore, instead of focusing on pornography itself, their motivation should be grounded in a desire to live in line with their values. Living in line with one’s values as a source of motivation also applies to men whose reasons for stopping pornography viewing are not religious. For some men, their partner may disapprove of smoking, drinking, fast driving, or pornography. Therefore, their motivation to change could stem from the belief that they may sometimes have to change things about themselves to strengthen their relationship with their partner.
Once motivation has been established, the next step is to stop giving into the behaviour when the desire arises. This might result in short-term discomfort. However, over time, ignoring urges will make them weaker, less frequent, and easier to avoid (SMART Recovery, 2015). In the initial stages, this might involve simply delaying engaging in the behaviour when the urge arises. For example, instead of viewing pornography when the desire comes up, a man might decide to wait 10 minutes. Over time, he might expand that to 20 minutes, then 30 minutes, and then indefinitely.
Another option is to distract oneself by engaging in a substitute activity. For example, when the desire to view pornography arises, a man may choose instead to go for a walk, go to the gym, or do a chore around the house. Note that the ultimate goal is not simply to replace the behaviour. Replacing the behaviour is a means to stop giving in to urges. When urges are not acted upon, they will eventually lessen and disappear.
Responding differently to urges will not work in the long term without also paying attention to the thoughts, feelings, and behaviours that form part of the habit of viewing pornography. The way that we think about things affects our experiences (The Beck Institute, n.d.). Therefore, the greatest gains in behavioural change come from changing one’s mindset.
One area where mindset is important is when a man gives in to viewing pornography after deciding to stop. Self-judgement for this perceived failure is counterproductive to the process of change. From a psychological perspective, the antidote to self-judgement is self-compassion development. This is a core component of therapies that have been shown to be effective in treating problematic pornography viewing (De Alarcón et al., 2019).
For those who object to pornography viewing for religious reasons, it is important to avoid demonising themselves for this behaviour. Occasionally, giving in to anger or being unkind are also violations of religious tenets. Instead of focusing on mistakes related to pornography, it is helpful to accept that there are many ways that humans fall short of religious standards, and pornography viewing is only one of them. Forgiveness is a core tenet of all religions. However, it should not be solely reserved for others. Forgiveness should start with the self, i.e., with self-compassion.
This article outlined how motivation, coping with urges, and changing one’s mindset all support behavioural change as part of the SMART Recovery approach. The approach starts with identifying a source of motivation, developing impulse control regarding urges, and changing thinking patterns to be more compassionate. Ultimately, the goal of these changes is to leave the behaviour of pornography viewing behind to focus on something better. The final article in this series will examine the fourth pillar of SMART Recovery: living a balanced life without pornography.
