Root 4: Negative Emotions

A pornography addiction isn’t mostly about sex as much as it’s about how a person has learned to medicate the pains and discomforts of life. Like a drug, porn floods the brain with dopamine, temporarily numbing discomfort and masking negative emotions.

If you use porn to cope with stress repeatedly, your brain starts to adapt. Whenever stress arises, your brain releases dopamine, triggering a craving for porn. This puts your brain in "relief mode," seeking comfort in the familiar source it knows: porn. Over time, emotions like loneliness, stress, or anger become automatic triggers, prompting your brain to crave porn as a way to find relief.

This cycle of using porn to numb pain doesn’t solve the problem—it only makes it worse.

Addiction experts explain that when someone starts using an addictive substance—like drugs, alcohol, or porn—to cope with negative emotions, the addiction significantly deepens.

Lies I Believe as a Result:

• I just need to stuff my feelings and move on.
• I can handle my emotions on my own.
• God’s not interested in the little things in my life that cause negative emotions.

The Truth from Scripture:

• Inviting God into my anxiety is an important spiritual discipline (Psalm 139:23-24).
• When I identify and share my emotions with others, I am much less triggered by those emotions.
• I can cast all my anxieties on God because He cares for me (1 Peter 5:7).

Questions to Help Process Negative Emotions:

Take a few minutes to think about each question below and write down your answers.

1. Can I name the specific emotions I’m experiencing right now, such as stress, anxiety, or boredom?
2. Are there particular situations, people, or habits that lead to these feelings?
3. Do I process my negative emotions in a healthy way, or do I try to numb them with porn, media, food, or other distractions?

Application Steps:

To break free, it’s essential to grow in emotional awareness and intelligence.

By identifying your emotional triggers, you can learn to process your feelings with God and trusted people, rather than medicating them.

1. Ask for God’s Help

• Like David in Psalm 139:23-24, invite God into your emotions. Ask Him to reveal deeper issues and to help you process your feelings in a healthy way.

2. Practice Identifying your Emotions

• How do you feel and why do you feel that way? Said another way… What’s your emotion and the source of that emotion?

3. Create a Healthy Plan

• Recognize your emotional triggers and prepare healthy responses in advance. If boredom is a trigger, plan activities like exercising, reading, or meeting with friends to stay proactive.