Any addiction; porn addiction, alcohol addiction, gambling addiction, food addiction and so on, by definition has a self- destructive aspect.
Gabor Mate writes on addiction:
“The aching emptiness is perpetual because the substances, objects or pursuits we hope will soothe it are not what we really need. We don’t know what we need, and so long as we stay in the hungry ghost mode, we’ll never know.”
In the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts, Gabor Mate’
Mate uses the image of the hungry ghost to describe the problem of addiction. This image comes from Buddhist psychology to explain six different styles of hell we get caught in as human beings.
For example the hungry ghost is insatiable. He has a long skinny neck and a huge belly, he cannot get enough down his throat fast enough. We have all felt this kind of craving to varying degrees…..more on addiction and hungry ghosts.
Definition of addiction: a strong and harmful need to regularly have something (such as a drug) or do something (such as gamble). Webster’s
Instinctual Confusion
Instincts are basic needs or hungers that all humans have as being part of nature. Human instincts are much broader than we normally assume. They include the need for love, affection, partnering, emotional intimacy, the hunger to mature or develop and many others.
The instinct to know when my “belly is full enough” has been repressed, lost, injured or never developed to a degree that body, mind and spirit are at odds with each other.
This valuable part of ourselves, the instinct of “enough” is gone or has not been developed. This is why addictions make us feel so helpless and powerless. A fundamental need for survival assumes “more is enough”. That’s confused. That’s addiction territory.
Instinctual confusion is when hungering for anything, food, sex, drugs, etc., overrides the instinct of “enough” which is an aspect of the instinct for self preservation.
C.G. Jung writes on instincts: “The forlorn state of consciousness in our world is due primarily to loss of instinct, and the reason for this lies in the development of the human mind over the past aeon. The more power man had over nature, the more his knowledge and skill went to his head, and the deeper became his contempt for the merely natural and accidental,”
Addiction is an extreme confusion around instincts living together in the same body and mind.
We need to eat, have sex, have fun and take a few risks sometimes but hurting ourselves through excess indicates the hungry ghost has taken over. We are not inhabiting our own body fully. We are listening to the insatiable ghost instead of our own instincts. We feel our instincts in the heart and the gut. Sometimes the whole body knows at once: ENOUGH.
Mate’ is pointing out an instinct: to “know what I need”. Then how to take care of that need. This is part of the instinct for self preservation. We are confusing what we need with the wrong thing and/or the wrong amount of that thing, whatever it may be. Therefore, we need to cut back or stop the addiction so we can recognize “what I need” and the instinct of “enough”.
“so long as we stay in the hungry ghost mode, we’ll never know.” Mate’.
Love and Emotional Intimacy Perceived as the Enemy
Our basic nature wants happiness, love and meaning. All healing traditions recognize these basic needs. Not only are they basic needs but they are the medicine to heal an addiction. We could see them as emotional and spiritual food.
However, if we have been taken over by an addiction these fundamental instincts are seen as the enemy. We are not aware of the true enemy. Therefore, pornography becomes the “fixation” because love with someone and emotional intimacy are perceived as too messy, too awkward and too complicated to learn.
Love and emotional intimacy are rejected because they were never experienced or learned from the family or culture when growing up. Or, these natural longings were corrupted through negative parenting styles, abuse or trauma.
Like any other addiction, porn addiction is held in place by fear and confusion. The fear of underlying emotional pain and the confusion of how to deal with it. How to think about it? and How to talk about it? These questions need to be worked on. 
Porn Addiction Help and How to Stop Porn Addiction
This is where psychotherapy and a porn addiction support group can help. As a therapist, I am repeatedly shown how addiction is a cover for painful fear, confusion and hurt. These need to be talked about, felt about, thought about and digested.
Slowing down or stopping the addiction and working on the underlying confusion and fear is the best way to approach the problem.
Here is an excellent article from the NY Times about Alexander Rhodes, 26, (dealing with porn addiction) and how he and many others started working with the complexity of porn addiction treatment.
From his website
“Our reward system was not built to handle the current widespread availability of pornography. This is not a flaw of our brain. This is a flaw in our modern environment. The reward system does a good job of getting us to seek out things that make us feel good, but it did not evolve to do a great job of putting on the brakes when we encounter too much of a good thing. Our reward system didn’t evolve to self-limit, because in the primitive world, it never had to limit itself!” more:
One in five searches from a mobile device are for porn. As a culture, we do not know what we need, we need to develop the instinct of “enough”. We find this in our deepest instinctual self, it is felt on the inside, as we get help and give help to others doing the same emotionally intimate work.
The Zen Koan to use here is: What do I need? Ask your self that question throughout the day or even through the night. What do I need? See what comes up.
“By allowing the porn addicted brain to unplug from pornography, much of the damage inflicted by heavy pornography use may be repaired. This is almost like restoring your brain to “factory settings” – hence, a reboot.” Rhodes
We need the help of others when an addiction has taken over. It may be impossible to cure an addiction alone.
