by Anonymous
Thirty plus years ago I was seven years old when I found a huge pile of pornographic magazines at our family home in the UK. They were stacked in a fireplace behind an old welsh dresser. I was assisting my mother in cleaning out the old dresser that was no longer wanted in our house. When we found them there was no discussion, no normalizing of the situation, but ignorance and a quiet ‘they’re your father’s magazines’. Submissive really, and yet something in me was fascinated. I was hooked and wanted to see and read more. The challenge was getting back to the magazines in secret! How is it possible that at the age of seven I knew that I could get something from them? It wasn’t that it was sexual at that stage: a fascination it could be dubbed. However, there is something much more sinister here looking back… there was already an inbuilt program wanting to be refuelled for this lifetime. And it started so early.
And so it continued, I would read and look and formulate and contemplate all manner of things. I remember this need then to have sex as soon as I could. To fulfill all of those desires that other men had fulfilled with sexy full breasted women. Interestingly, whenever I saw women in public places displayed in such a way, e.g. in the Sun Newspaper that my father would buy every day, the page three made me cringe. There was a lot here to be with, there was a secret growing inside that only I could know about. So externally there was a different card played. Sneaky, huh?! And yet this feeling was so strong that this was all wrong and yet I could not get myself out of the way. It felt overpowering.
Growing up then, the magazines disappeared over time and I felt more normal about girls. Teenage years brought up more tangible wants and needs and these were never going to be filled by the girls at school. Note that this could not be true, but I had had my every thought and ideal about women and what they would bring me and how I would make love to them so well. I had no idea of the consequences of what my early years’ exposure to this material would bring. This distortion of a whole gender would affect me deeply.
I knew women through images and stories made from men’s minds and so those mental images, pictures, stories of sexual conquest would start to surface, very subtly, disrupting and colouring the relationships I had with young women throughout school.
My first real sexual experience at the age of sixteen was with a girl whom I stayed in a relationship with for three years. Interestingly, I allowed the girl to dictate the pace of the sexual relationship, again a theme here, like being mothered along. It felt great to be wanted and there the nail was hit. It was the need to be wanted that led to the way my relationships formed. In observation, the sexual part of the relationship disintegrated for me very quickly – there was a time in the relationship that it became ‘pedestrian’, boring and underwhelming. It did not live up to the images I had formed in my head from the many images and stories I had read and viewed. The physical could not keep up with the mental stories I had been playing out. So what then was dictating my love life, which was never enough it seemed? It was not love of the person or indeed the person at all, but other energies that had me by the balls (pun necessary).
It exposed over time this dependence on mental pictures, thoughts and constructs on women; what sex was, lovemaking, relationships, how did women look, did I like that? Why not? She looks nice? Categorizing their ‘do-ability’ with other men, living in the pack that literally was only judging a woman by how much she would give out or give up. Would she live up to what we had all seen on a porn screen or in a porn magazine?!
This whole perspective on life felt dreadful, yet at the time was accepted and lived by all I knew. Regular contact with people in my line of work was so prevalent that even female customers were judged and given priority depending on attractiveness, how they looked, the attention that was potentially there, to have fun with, to control. Who they truly were was not considered!
It was all about what they were; a body, and a potential sexual conquest. Connections built on imagery and one-train thoughts, not from a loving space but a headspace corrupted with stuff I carried around with me day in and day out from a very young age.
The understanding that a man could just ‘be’ a man with a woman based on truth did not exist in my world. The connection to love at that time had been completely severed, or so it seemed.
Marriage came, and yet my life was still running a lie. When I needed to deal with something I chose alcohol and/or drugs, and was still falling back on porn to bolster an image I had of a man, that he could do whatever he wanted as he was the king.
This out of control way of life just kept rolling on, and yes it was dramatic and crazy, but not in a good way. Sadly, I recall saying that I would keep ‘going out and living this way throughout my life’, perpetuating the lie that living this way was free and easy and no-one could tell me what to do or how to behave. The key was that notion – thinking that I was thinking – when in fact I was not and had no idea what was making me, or propelling me through constant misery with a little ‘high’ scattered here and there, like crumbs to satisfy and keep the ‘dream’ alive.
Right through my marriage I was using pornography: sporadically yes, but it was there as a ’go to’ relief and problem solver. There was a recent article written that describes how this must feel for a woman in this situation (The Harm of Pornography). It is to a tee an exact copy of what went on. I recall the pressure that comes with bringing this energy into a relationship and imposing this onto the other person. How they must feel to be manipulated into using such imagery on the basis that it will make the partner happier, easier to be with, and all the stories – ‘not really my thing, but harmless enough’. At one point my wife explored it with me; however, this was short lived and not a great point in our lives.
So what was the motivation to continue? It had gotten so out of control that at one point it was not about gratification at all but about getting relief from the world, my days, the constant and endless pushing through and not coping. Not enjoying getting up and working, not loving being at home in my marriage, not handling the abuse I perpetually put myself through. I just needed out of all of it, and could not find another way.
It took a lot to one day say ‘I am never going to drink coffee again’. It started with that claim, and then started to slowly grow. Next it was alcohol and drugs. This took a while but it happened because I committed to it. Then, as if I had opened the door just ever so slightly, the light darted out. It was shining as brightly as it could through all the stuff I had layered on top of it, and I knew that it could all be so different. That light gave me the access to a couple of healing practitioners who really started to help me heal myself, to show me that there was a loving way of simply being in my body, in my life with all of these thoughts that essentially were not me. ‘Incidentally’, pornography was one of the last things to go. It was as if it had become so normal that I did not consider it an issue, and yet with my closest friends I could not admit the extent of the problem that underlined my every move.
It isn’t that pornography is bad per se, it is that it gave me the images and ‘fantasies’ I then expected, no, I demanded of the opposite sex to live up to, to fulfill as if it was their duty to do so.
I remember sitting in front of my healing practitioner at the time and just crying and sobbing, because when I named that pornography had been with me since age 7 I could feel the hold over me and how much I had let it control me, no different to addictive, illicit drugs. I was frightened that this had been exposed.
And yet it wanted to own me, control me as a man, what a man looked like, thought like, talked like. How that man was in relationships with women, with men, with children, with my family. Everything was tainted and nothing really me at all. I was constantly worrying about what others thought of me because this part of my life was not right on any level. Yet at the same time I could be the great friend, or the steadfast, achieving employee. Ticking all the boxes in a world full of boxes.
With this honesty came an opportunity to accept that what I really wanted all of that time that I was using pornography was the intimate knowing that I am enough. That I am a loving being that has the great capacity to love and be loved. That the love I have for myself needs to be felt and valued, honoured and cherished by me first… and then taken out into the world so that others get a glimpse of the love that they are.
My marriage at the time ended not because of pornography, or alcohol or drugs, the arguments, the disagreements or the marital abuse that I let myself be under for ten plus years. No, the marriage ended because I started to clean out all of that which I no longer wanted in my life and the other person could not accept that this could be true or possible, and that life could not be like this – actually loving and truly tender. They struggled with the fact that it is absolutely possible to turn everything around with a choice.
There has been much support in this growth over the past years by Universal Medicine. The workshops and healing courses presented by Serge Benhayon and Universal medicine have allowed me to feel absolutely how loving we all are as a human race and how glorious it is to feel the possibility of everyone accepting that love. The work on self continues in a loving exposé of that which is not love, gently and without perfection or judgment. It’s not that Serge Benhayon tells anyone what to do – that he certainly does not. It is a case of fact that the whole basis of the teachings Serge presents are there to support your innermost truths. It is like the inner-wrestling is over and the need for vices to justify our hidden turmoil no longer has its un-admitted control over you.
So what is it that leads a person to be born into a house where there is already a use of pornography as a foundation? Where there is loveless-ness already present? Could it be possible that the person had used sexual imagery, abuse and control through sex before, and was potentially picking up where they left off?
I can’t help but acknowledge that there have been many unloving ways to feel and learn from in this lifetime, made up of so many different lives, that this has helped me to break a momentum that was not allowing harmony in me and therefore the potential of harmony out there in the world. Not a huge jump, just one person accepting that change is possible, when there are so many who do not. But that’s the point; we all have to start with one small step, and sometimes that’s hard when all we have done is walk the other way many, many times over.
The advent of smartphone technology and computers, internet and seemingly instant access to the world, has given rise to the rife and despicable invasion upon all ages of pornography and images that depict sex in its most base forms. There is no illusion here that the world is under moral attack.
A recent article in the UK via the Independent newspaper highlighted this issue and the groundswell of this industry to such proportions that it appears that the world is being bombarded with such material in order to ‘normalize’ it. Effectively, the amount of pornographic material constantly washing over the world has for some time started to stick. And how is the fabric of our society coping?
How is it possible that internet pornography can be so common that the average age of a child when they see their first pornographic image is eleven? Some as young as eight are exposed! Did you know that the Internet, that tool we so heavily regard as part of our lives, is used 25% of the time to trawl for porn. And according to statistics 30,000 people are looking at porn at any given second.
Pornography has been around for a long time in various forms, so what is the fascination with this subject matter, and why now is there seemingly an explosion throughout all age groups for its use? What is happening in people’s lives that we need to view the sexual acts of strangers in order to feel something, even if that thing we feel is a different stimulated state of being, an arousal of a base nature?
Is it possible that over time and with the access to technology that ‘real human behaviour’ is now available for us all to feel, see and reel from. The fact that we have access to this stuff now is no different from times before, although seemingly more accessible because of TV, phones, DVDs etc. Has human behavior shifted, or are we seeing the truth more clearly?
Is it possible that the truth of the situation has become more ’ballsy’ (pun intended), ‘out there’ and ‘in your face’, because over time we have saturated ourselves with a need for our ‘individual’ rights to cover up our ills?
Is the issue that we fix an ill already in place that has not been identified? The ill that hides the true state of the human being and one that needs constant quelling through behaviours that in their conception are anti-social, yet if you get enough people championing them, their unacceptability is eventually eroded and they become weaved throughout the very fabric of society. Accepted, not by all and yet accepted all the same.
Is it possible that throughout the ages we have chosen, as a collective, to distort this societal fabric? The lack of responsibility from one generation to the next has over time compounded and essentially created a new foundation for this subverted and ‘monster like stuff’ to have its place, however low down the chain it may appear to be. The masses allow it. Does this not then speak more about us not dealing with our inner turmoils than it does about being liberal on sex? Yes, I am all for freedom of expression when making love, sex is deeply beneficial for us when it is making love, but that freedom to sexually express ought to come with the true honoring of the partner involved. They are not our source of ‘relief’ and neither are they our source of justifying our needs, whatever they are for each of us.
And, whether it be ‘porn’, drugs, alcohol or sexual slavery etc, is it possible that if this occurs in our world, are we not missing the actual point that over time this compounding state of human degradation is actually a reflection of all of our individual choices, day in day out and moment by moment? Have we all truly chosen what we felt to be true, or have we contributed by not speaking up, not having our say, not saying NO?
Related Reading
PORN – An Addiction Worth Talking About
Pornography: The Impact on Women
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
It’s a vital conversation, reading this again I can see the very real need for articles like this to be available on a broad scale, as it’s heartfelt, real, and covers the way it rolls out over childhood and adult life and how the healing happens. It was so obvious reading today that when something is present that’s truly harmful, like the behaviour of porn addiction, then we have rejected something that would instead be very real and healing, such as sharing the fullness of our being in an intimate and transparent way. A fellow commenter below, nails it with this quote – “With porn like all other addictions it can control you as think you are getting the intimacy / stimulation without the having to be open, transparent, truly intimate or challenged by another in the flesh so to speak.”
With porn and soft-porn becoming so normalised, as is the sexualisation of children, we have to ask what’s going on at a deeper level in society that is allowing this, what part of our true nature is being rejected so that we have created a demand for sexual energy to enter every part of life and be considered a normal foundation? When we have pole dancing classes for girls (children, not just teens) and clothing at the local well known chain store that can dress your daughter (under the age of 10 years) like a sexual object we can see how deeply embedded and normalised porn and sexualisation has become. Instead of the delicate and deep beauty and love we can share in relationships we are reducing ourselves to a physical exchange with sex as the primary currency, and attraction and stimulation of each other from bodies that meet an image. We have let go of the depth and breadth of our inner qualities and the values we can bring to human relationships for the lowest common denominator. And it’s not ’empowered’ to sell out to sex this way, in fact we have disempowered ourselves deeply at a being level.
That fasincation and curiousity to start is a dangerously slipperly slope. Where I currently stand on the subject is understanding that it cannot be within a loving relationship with another. As you mentioned that energy controls the man to think he is in control of women or even vice versa. There is no love in control.
When humanity as a group turns something thoroughly indecent into a normal no one questions it.
This blog highlights how porn is not without its consequences, even if we are looking at it secretly behind closed doors.
“I just needed out of all of it” – this really sums it all up, and in seeking ‘out’ we choose numbing, distraction, escape, withdrawal – and instead of ‘out’ we are getting ourselves even more deeply trapped.
A great example of how even as children we innately know when something does not feel right, but how our curiosity and fascination can take over and before we know it we can become hooked on something that leads us down a wayward path of destruction and disregard. But as you say, its clearly a choice that we can make to either stay on that path or return to what we know is true, and once that decision is made to stay with the truth of what we feel inside, then there is nothing to question.
Nailed it Elizabeth – we are offered opportunity after opportunity over and over again so that we may learn to bring the amazing love that lives within us and express it over and over again.
We are so much more than just a body for sexual relief – and gender is here not the focus. All men and women can potentially be handled as objects when there is a disconnection from our essence. The pain of disconnection from the essence can be so strong, that when the pornography or the degradation of another comes up as an option or a choice, it is simply a relief from not feeling the pain of disconnection OR indeed it can act as a distraction from this pain. Connect, and you cannot handle another as an object, Connect, and you cannot handle yourself as an object, Connect and you get to feel the love that you already are and know you are ready to be held in that same way. However, before connection we need to realise the disconnection we are in, and give permission for the connection to our essence. These all feel like words until such time that we recall the connection we had from an earlier age.
Amazing blog expressed with such honesty that it opens up the flood gates for everyone around. Thank you Anon for this intimate sharing about a taboo topic – the topic not being pornography, but rather an intimate understanding of how this has affected you in its miriad of ways in your relationships.
Very strong statement and an in depth honest appraisal Anonymous. It has certainly made me ponder where I have been involved. . . The same as Anonymous has exposed you want to keep this as a secret. I was not into it much but it was so common around me. When I feel this the first thing I do is not want to be honest that I did partake in it. I did porn to relieve and distract myself from feeling and being intimate with my sexiness not understanding that my feminine moves are natural as a man and fully sexy in my body. This is certainly a lot to write about, the bombardment of these images.. and I agree with how overpowering these images are .. “And yet this feeling was so strong that this was all wrong and yet I could not get myself out of the way. It felt overpowering.” HOWEVER it’s so true we do have a constant choice that is honouring of You and all in every moment “They struggled with the fact that it is absolutely possible to turn everything around with a choice.”
The creation of an inner ring and an outer one , where the inner one (secret) has the upper hand in terms of its power to mobilize us, is a true killer. Not only create separation from others, but also from/within ourselves.
Isn’t it interesting how we can feel a lack of intimacy, and seek to have this, but what is offered – like with porn – is not intimate building at all but is just a momentary form of relief from not feeling intimate or having intimacy in our days. Wouldn’t it be far more logical to stop and see what is happening and seek to change what relationships we have got and to bring more intimacy there?
I have so much respect for your honesty here, what I find fascinating is that porn changed the way you saw women and what you expected of them. Imagine how rife porn is and how many men are equally effected by the same misconception. It seems to me that things like porn or alcohol are not as innocent as we like to make out and that they could actually deeply effect not only all our relationships but our fundamental perception of the world.
I remember at about the same age being at a friend’s house and coming across her father’s collection of porn magazines in an old dresser in his office, which I might add he kept under lock and key. My friend had caught a glimpse of these in her office and hatched a plan when I was visiting to investigate. We snuck the key off her father’s keychain when he wasn’t looking and waited for him to leave. We then snuck in and began to immerse ourselves, as young girls, into a world of images that scream at you to deny your own sacred femaleness and perform instead to the dictates of a society that has been led astray from the divine preciousness we each in essence are. It was a life changing moment but not in a good way. It is only now as a 42 year old woman and mother to two young girls that I am beginning to reconnect with this sacredness and listen to this inner voice instead of the external voice that seeks to shape us into all that we are not.
The moment we make love about anything less than the love we know it is and can be then we are accepting less. We are essentially saying I am ok with a lesser version of love and then we get it caught up in the mix with sex and physical attraction and relief which have nothing to do with love. I know for myself the moment I come back to the love that I am nothing outside of this love is any greater, sure it is amazing to share this with a partner intimately but it can be done at any and every moment in the day not just the bedroom. But because we do not live this level of love we then get tantalised by things like porn as we override what we know and we then can easily get a desire and a sense of wanting relief from the tension of not living the love we are.
Since reading this yesterday, I have a strong sense of how we are changed as children when we come across pornographic magazines, and how this can affect us as women and men and how we see ourselves. It could result in disconnection to our own body parts and the relationship we have with them. When I was ten years old, I had access to a medical book all about the human body. Couples having sex were drawn in this book but what I remember most was how compelled I was to look at the pictures when my parents were out, and this in itself came with a thrill of being found out. There was always a sense of hiding, not getting caught and a guilty feeling. Not a good start in life.
Our society is so saturated with pornographic images, is it any wonder that young men and young women get the idea that this is what you do and this is how you behave. In reality, being with someone else does not live up to the images we are fed and run with. As a result, we avoid a true connection based on love.
It was great to name the sneakiness, the addictiveness and the shame that surrounds pornography use. With this melting pot, along with all the pictures it feeds us about how intimate relationships should be, we are doomed to be unfulfilled and live way less than the love that we are in relationship.