Stop FEEDING Your Addiction (ancient secret to quitting for good)

Added: 2026-05-07

[00:00:00]What I'm about to share with you will show you instantly why you feel so stuck when it comes to eliminating your bad habits or overcoming your addictions.

[00:00:09]And if you've ever felt like the harder you try to quit, quit social media, quit your phone, quit porn, quit sugar, whatever it is, the harder you try, the bigger the problem, the bigger the struggle becomes. If you've ever felt like that and you've been wondering why, this story explains exactly what's happening and what to do about it. Fair warning, this is a bit of a strange story. And that's because it comes from an unusual source. This is an ancient story. It was a few years ago and I literally went on a far journey to bring this wisdom back to you. I was in Portugal at the time. I rented a car and I went on a long drive up into the mountainy north of Portugal where someone had given me an address in the middle of nowhere. I ended up driving through these mountains where there's only tiny roads and tiny villages every once in a while and somewhere there was this little farmhouse and there I met with a small group of people and we had an opportunity to spend a day and night with a master from an ancient shamanic lineage. This was a rare and really special experience and at one point I had an opportunity to bring a question, to bring a request. And when that time came, I asked about porn addiction specifically because at the time I was already creating content for Quip by Healing. I was already working with people and my request was how can I help these people who find my content, who find me somewhere on the internet somehow, who have this problem? How can I be of better service to these people?

[00:01:45]How can I help these people free themselves from this addiction? The answer I got was surprising and stuck with me ever since. But I'm giving you all this context because I want to be clear about I'm bringing this question of like a very modern problem to this really, really ancient master and teacher. And I think that's why the answer is so different, but also that's where a lot of the value lies. It's it's a different answer from the usual like habit forming neuroscience framework that we usually approach these things with. So, here is what this ancient master taught me and showed me. And I'm going to do my best to translate this as best I can. So, the first part is really actually a question and response which is what are you feeding? Whenever you feed something, that is what gives it life and energy and what makes it persist. And the thing is that whenever people try to quit porn or quit social media or break a bad habit, there are all kinds of different things that we try to make this happen, but what most of them have in common is that we are still feeding the bad habit. Now, there's this thing that we want less of, but we keep feeding it and then we're wondering, why does it stick around? Why does it keep getting stronger? And obviously the answer is because you're still feeding it. Now, maybe you're wondering in what way am I feeding my bad habits? In what way am I feeding my phone addiction or my porn addiction?

[00:03:08]And the answer is you're feeding it energetically. You're feeding it with your time, with your attention. You're feeding it with your fear, with your worry, with your anxiety. You're feeding it by spending your own time and your own attention, your own life force on worrying about the problem, thinking about the problem, making yourself feel bad about the problem. All of the time and attention and energy you spend focused on the problem is feeding the problem. I want to invite you to take a moment to really feel into this because I think you can actually relate if you think about some time where you're really like spiraling around this problem, spiraling around how do how can I quit? How can I stop? And I feel so bad about it. Can you feel how there is almost something like an energy exchange happening? You can almost feel that the bad habit is like feeding off of your fear and worry.

[00:03:59]And it's it wants more, essentially it wants more of you, right? It wants more of your time, more of your attention, more of your fear, more of your anxiety.

[00:04:08]And this is exactly why we have this feeling of a well, that the more I try to fight this thing, the stronger it gets. So, what do we do with this? The first insight of course is you have to stop feeding the thing that you want less of in your life.

[00:04:21]And how do we do this? Thankfully, this master also had a very clear answer, a very clear instructions.

[00:04:28]The second part of this is that you have to be very clear about what you want more of in your life. This is where you as an individual matter. This is one of the most important things you can do, one of the most important decisions you can make is be clear about what do I want to see more of? What do I want more of in my life and then you start feeding that. So, this is a big part of the solution. You have to take your attention away from this thing that you want less of, away from the thing you're trying to get out of your life. And you have to divert that attention, divert that time and energy towards something else, something you want more of in your life. Meaning, there has to be something that you care about. There has to be something that you want to invest your time and energy and attention in because it matters to you. It's a bit like cultivating a garden where you on the one hand, if there's a plant over here that you want less of, you want this plant not to take over the whole garden, well, you have to stop watering it. You have to stop feeding that plant. But you also have to be clear about well, what do I want here? I don't just want a barren landscape. You have to make the choices about what is it that I want to grow and then you have to put in the work on I'm going to feed and water and tend for the plants that I do want to see more of in this garden. We have to be clever about the choices we make here when it's about redirecting our attention away from what we don't want and towards what we want. I made a video about good versus bad replacement habits that is relevant here because it really depends on what you direct your attention towards and not every choice is equal. So, if you say, well, I want to quit porn and what will I do instead with my time and attention? Well, I'm just going to play video games.

[00:06:11]Then of course, the video games can distract you, but the problem is that the video games keep you in the same context as before. If before you were at home alone in front of a screen, you know, doing stuff by yourself, that's all still true and that creates several problems. One of them being that you're still in the same environment.

[00:06:30]It's very easy to switch from the new habit of gaming back to the bad habit of porn because you're right there already.

[00:06:37]You haven't really made a big enough change in your environment or your life and that makes it harder to quit. But there's also something deeper going on because you are simply like distracting and entertaining yourself and that's not what we're talking about here. Right? If you take of what do I want to feed with my energy, with my love, with my attention, with my life force, probably video games is not what comes to mind.

[00:07:00]So, there's a difference between a distraction which can be a convenient and fun and entertaining distraction and that's fine. There's a difference between that and something that feels like it gives your life purpose and meaning, something you really deeply care about. And that's what we're looking for here. And in case you're not sure about what this might be in your life, I have resources for you as well.

[00:07:18]I have a video about how to follow your curiosity to find these kinds of things and also a video about what to do if you try to follow your curiosity, but you come up with a blank. I linked to those in the description along with other useful resources. Make sure to check that out. There's a lot of really good resources for you in the description of this episode. So, this is the basic idea. The teaching I was given was about this thinking of yourself as feeding things with your time and energy and attention, which includes your fear and anxiety and worries. You always can ask yourself, what am I feeding? And what you'll find is whatever you're feeding in your life is what sticks around, it's what stays alive, it's what you get more of. Now, this is something I've experimented with a lot in my own life and from my own experience, I can say first of all, this is true. And secondly, there's one more thing that I want to share with you that has really made a difference for me to implement this more powerfully. So, with my own struggles with bad habits and addictions, mainly porn addiction, that was like my worst habit for many, many years.

[00:08:21]My own struggles with this, I can clearly see that it was especially during times where I was kind of alone and lonely and directionless, not sure about what to do with my life, that is when the addictions become worse. That's when all of my bad habits flare up and I can get caught in this cycle of trying to fight my bad habits. And I can see very clearly from my own experience that in times where the opposite is true, where I have some project that really lights me up, that makes such a big difference because it just rather than me being in a mode where I'm trying to fight my bad habits or fight my addiction, it's almost like my whole attention and energy just flows away from that into something else. It's like I forget about all this stuff and it makes it so much easier. For me, that has often been creative work. So, whenever I've been building a business, whenever I've been working on some project that I'm really passionate about. Another one for me is I love teaching. So, whenever I've been occupied with for example, planning and putting together a retreat and then holding that retreat, and that's a project that takes a lot of time and attention and energy and it it totally lights me up. It's the kind of thing that makes me jump out of bed in the morning eager to get back to work, eager to create something.

[00:09:30]And in those times, it's like I don't even think about my addictions and bad habits. So, this is my personal experience that shows how this teaching is definitely true. And also, there's so many positive effects that come from that because obviously when I'm feeding a business or a project with my energy and attention, then what I get is a growing project, a growing business, which usually also comes with growing income and also growing my own skills, growing my experience and expertise, it enriches my life.

[00:09:57]So, you can see that there's the positive cycle on this side, just like ruminating and worrying about your bad habits put you in this negative cycle and everything gets worse, feeding something that you really care about with your time and attention and care puts you in this virtuous cycle where things keep getting better. An additional factor that has made a big difference for me is community. It's bringing other people into it. I've always found it much more nourishing and also easier to stick with projects where I'm not alone, where I have a business partner that I'm working with or a team I'm working with. Or I've often done stuff which is basically group activities or bring groups together to practice communication and relational skills, for example. That becomes, on the one hand, a project. It's a project that takes my time and attention that I care about, but also being in community, being in touch with other people, not being alone. That is another factor that just it amplifies this positive cycle. So, based on this, my recommendation is that you get clear about one, what is it that you want to see more of in your life? And two, how can you do this with other people?

[00:11:05]How can you get other people on board so that you have a project that excites you and you're not in it alone. That seems to be the superpower. For an example of how I experienced this, you can also check out my Spartan mode video where I went through a really extreme brain reset and dopamine detox for 30 days.

[00:11:25]And it was actually a surprising side effect of that is it made my social life so much better. And there you can see an example of how the focus on positive habits, the focus on positive growth, plus socializing, having an active social life, also creates like this amplification. It just makes everything so much better. So, I'll also link to that below if you haven't seen that yet.

[00:11:45]It's definitely worth watching. Now, one more thing that we need to cover is how do you make it as easy as possible for yourself to win at this? The reason I bring this up is because a mistake that we love to make in a situation like this, and it's not just you, this is everyone, is we love to set a goal that is too big and then get frustrated when we fail at it. So, if I go, "Okay, I'm going to transform my life and I'm going to build a billion-dollar business and I'm going to have all my friends around me and stuff like that." And then I have like this glorious image of what I want to create, but because it's so ambitious, first of all, it can feel overwhelming. Oh my god, how am I going to start? And secondly, it's easy to say, "Well, I'm falling short." I want to do this amazing thing, but look at me, I'm failing. I can't do it." And then I start falling back. Now, I'm starting to worry again and so on.

[00:12:33]And then I start feeding my bad habits again. So, how do we avoid that? It's great to have a big, ambitious goal.

[00:12:40]Absolutely nothing wrong with that. But the important thing is that if you have a clear idea of what do I want more in my life, break it down into the smallest possible, most immediate actions you can take right away. For example, if I have this vision of a big business I want to build, how do I make it immediate and actionable right now? What I can look at is, well, how do I start? And how do I spend time on this every single day? And maybe I block out 2 hours a day in my calendar. I go, "Okay, every day, this during these 2 hours, this is where I'm going to work on this vision."

[00:13:11]And the win I'm tracking is, am I putting in the work? It's not, have I made a billion dollars yet? That might take a while, but am I doing the work?

[00:13:18]Am I putting in the hours? Am I giving my time and attention to this thing?

[00:13:23]During this time is when I work on my product, work on my business, work on my business plan, have phone calls or conversations with people to see who can I get on board, who can invest, whatever it is, right? There's a million things that go into building a business.

[00:13:36]And if you can have the end goal in mind, plus focus on what is the immediate next step every single day, that's how you get there. Another thing I need to say here is I'm often talking about business and stuff because I'm an entrepreneur, that's what I do. But with this idea of feeding something with your time and energy and attention, it doesn't have to be a big, grand, ambitious thing. It can be a really simple thing. What matters is that you care about it. What matters is that it resonates with you. And you can do something like cultivate friendship and connection in your life where you're just spending time reaching out to people. Maybe you're organizing dinners to get people together. Maybe you're joining some meetups or classes to make new friends.

[00:14:20]Anything goes, but it's the same idea.

[00:14:22]Instead of thinking, "Oh, it would be nice to have all these friends and all this connection in my life, but unfortunately I don't." The useful question to ask is, what can I do right now? And what can I do day by day to work towards the thing that I want? So, that is the ancient teaching that helped me a lot and that I wanted to bring to you. And I'd love to hear from you how this resonated with you. I'd also love to hear from you, what is something in your life that you would like to start feeding that you want to see more of. Go ahead and leave a comment with your answer. I'm really fascinated to see what people are focused on. And also, like I mentioned, there's lots and lots of useful resources for you in the description. For many of the steps in this process, I've already made videos and free resources for you. There's also the Quit by Healing program if you want a really systematic approach for overcoming porn addiction specifically in 21 days or less, that is going to be the first link in the description. Then I'm going to link to my videos about how to find the right replacement habits, how to navigate towards something that really lights you up, how to follow your curiosity, basically, to find the thing that you want to feed in your life. I'll also link to my videos on how to develop healthy masculinity and how to start building brotherhood. So, very clear guidance on like how you can start assembling people in your life to, for example, pursue a project together with.

[00:15:43]So, I have a video on that. I'll link to that below. And also, in general, the best way I found to gain clarity about stuff like that is through writing. And I will link to the free introspective writing crash course that you can access in my members area. So, that is also linked below. That is all for this episode. Thank you so much for watching.

[00:16:04]If you appreciate the kind of content I make, please leave a comment, leave a like. These things make a huge difference. As you can imagine, the kind of content I create is quite anti-viral.

[00:16:14]People don't like to brag about the fact that they're trying to overcome porn addiction or other bad habits. So, people don't tend to share this a lot. So, giving it a boost in the algorithm by engaging really makes a difference. Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you in the next one.