Porn and masturbation not only causes physical and mental damages but also changes your brain structure. In this article, I’m gonna explain how porn and masturbation screw the “Reward System” of your brain.
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What is “Reward System” of the brain?
The brain reward system is a brain circuit that causes feelings of pleasure when it is “turned on” by something we enjoy like eating good food, having sex, watching porn, masturbating, etc.
Whenever this reward circuit is activated, our brain notes that something important is happening that’s worth remembering and repeating.
What is Dopamine?
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter made in the brain. It acts as a messenger between neurons.
Dopamine is released when your brain is expecting a reward. It also excites and motivates you to do activities that cause pleasure.
When you watched porn or masturbated for the very first time, you felt pleasure, your “reward circuit” got activated, your brain noted that something important has just happened and it remembered the activity which caused pleasure (porn or masturbation).
Now, whenever you think about watching porn or masturbating, your brain releases dopamine, because it knows that in the past your “reward circuit” got activated and you felt pleasure because of it. That dopamine excites you and motivates you to watch porn or masturbate. That’s why you feel excited at the thought of watching porn or masturbating.
Now, why does our brain releases dopamine whenever we think about watching porn or masturbating? For that, we have to know a bit about human history.
History
Our ancestors were hunter-gatherers. Food and sex were a necessity for them and were scarce. Food, to fill their stomach, give them energy and keep them alive and sex, to reproduce and pass on their genes to ensure that human species don’t go extinct.
It was necessary for them to feel motivated enough to look for food and sex. So, our brain created a mechanism to motivate them and reward them whenever they accomplished those things. Whenever food was around them, they were excited and motivated to eat it and whenever a potential mating partner was around them, they were excited and motivated to mate with them.
That’s why still today, whenever you smell or see delicious food, you feel excited and want to eat it or when you a hot woman, you feel excited and want to get to know her.
Now, your brain can’t differentiate between having real sex or watching virtual sex(porn). Whenever you watch porn, it thinks you’re having real sex and releases dopamine to reward you and whenever you masturbate, it again releases dopamine to reward you, because it thinks you’ve just passed on your genes.
Desensitisation of Dopamine Receptors
Every time your brain releases dopamine, your dopamine receptors get desensitized a bit and will need more amount of dopamine to feel the same level of pleasure.
That’s why people keep searching for more and more aggressive porn to keep feeling pleasure. After watching one type of porn for some time, they stop feeling pleasure and they’ll need to watch more aggressive porn to keep feeling pleasure.
You can also keep your dopamine levels high by clicking on new videos every few minutes. Since there is no shortage of porn online, you can keep your dopamine level high for as long as you want.
By forcing your brain to reward you for doing nothing, except for clicking a button, you’re basically hijacking your “reward system” You’re forcing the reward system of your brain to reward you by releasing an unnatural amount of dopamine
The more dopamine your brain releases, the more desensitize your dopamine receptors become. As a result, activities that can’t provide you with the same level of dopamine as that of porn and masturbation no longer excites you. Activities like studying, exercising, working become boring and you keep going back to porn and masturbation to satisfy your dopamine needs.
That’s why porn and masturbation addicts can’t find pleasure in any other activities except for porn and masturbation.
To know more about how porn and masturbation damage your brain, I recommend reading the book “Your Brain on Porn” by Gary Wilson. It’s the best book I’ve read on the topic. It is available on Amazon.
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