Welcome to the husband material podcast, where we help Christian men quit pornography. So you can change your brain, heal your heart and save your relationship. My name is drew boa, and I'm here to show you how let's go. Here we go. Husband material is live. This is the first live video podcast. Recording today's episode is titled the exact path to freedom from porn. Ultimately, it's not a magic pill. There is no quick and easy solution. Two years ago, a prominent Christian leader came to me and he said, drew, what's the magic pill for freedom from porn. I thought really? I thought you were supposed to be an expert and he's acting like there's some kind of magic pill formula you can take. That'll just take away your problems. I mean, ultimately, if you really wanted to take away your problem with porn, you would just remove your brain. Cause ultimately the issue is, is in our brains, there are no pills, but there are patterns. And over the last 10 years I've noticed some very specific patterns and who gets free, who's going to succeed and who is constantly going to struggle. I see this with every new client who comes to work with me, the direction that they have at the beginning often determines their destination at the end. And this is true of any journey. If you set out on a long journey and your compass is just two degrees off in two weeks, that will put you 50 miles out of the way of where you want to go. So that's why today I'm giving you the exact direction you need. Cause without direction, ultimately in the end you'll be working so hard and feeling like you're getting nowhere. And some of you have been trying to quit porn for years. You've been fighting this battle against your sexual urges and feeling like in the end with each relapse that you always go back to the beginning. So today you will get some direction. What does it take to travel the exact path to freedom from porn? The first part of this path is to get really, really clear on your passion to be motivated by passion, not pressure. Sometimes guys think I need to be free from porn because God says this is the right thing to do, or because I don't want to hurt my wife or because she's putting pressure on me to change. And ultimately that kind of stress is the exact problem that we are using porn to cope with. So if your motivation for finding freedom is adding stress to you, then you're set up for being doomed right at the outset. And I hear this when guys come in and they say, well, I'm not really sure if I want to be free, then you're not ready. It doesn't matter how much help you get in your heart. You don't have the passion yet. And the passion needs to be personal. And sometimes people think, well, if I just want porn for myself, isn't that selfish. If it's for any other reason, ultimately than something that you actually want, then you're not going to take ownership. It will be something you feel like you have to do. It'll be a chore rather than a, I get to go on this journey. I get to do this and you won't be willing to continue when it's hard. Um, so here's how you get that passion. Here's how you get really, really clear on why you want to be free from porn. You need to visualize it. You need to have a precise vision for what you want your life to look like. And so when I have a new individual client or when I'm starting a new group, I will ask people to literally get out your art supplies and draw me a picture of what your porn-free life will look like one year from now, five years from now, visualize it. Imagine it, it needs to be as specific as possible and as ambitious as possible, the guys who really want it have the first part of what it takes to be free. Passion alone is not going to do it. And some of you you've been passionate. You have been adamant about freedom from porn and yet something has been missing. So there's actually a second part of the path to freedom. You not only need passion, you gotta have the right people. You can't do this alone. Some have said that sexual addiction is an intimacy disorder and we were wounded in relationships. So we need to be healed in relationship. You can't do this on your own because healing requires a restoration of the relationships that have been broken with God, with other people, with yourself, with your calling. And so it takes specific people. What kind of people do you need? There are three types. Number one is you got to have an ally. Somebody who is right there with you, somebody who you are not paying to like you and to accept you. I love doing coaching. Ultimately though, people are paying me to be there to support them. And so it's not the same. It's also not the same, cause I'm not in the thick of the battle. It's not a battle for me anymore. So for me to be their ally, doesn't quite work. I can't be the person you call at 2:00 AM. When you're triggered, you do need to have that person can help you and who you can help. Part of the beauty of having an ally is that you have somebody who God can use you to help. And this is so beautiful. When you reach out for help to your allies, they will also begin reaching out to you. And then you get the pleasure of having God use you to minister to them. And that is an unbelievable experience. You can only have that. If you have an ally, I love it. When your allies are not only people who you talk about sexual stuff with, but you can talk about anything with, and let's be real. If you can talk about sexual fantasies and urges and sin with people, you can talk about anything. And certainly I hope that in this husband material, private Facebook group, you can find some allies, some other Christian men with the same passion as you, once you find that passion, you need to find people who share that passion. And once you find an ally, they're actually two more types of people you need. The second type of person you need is a guide. Somebody who's in relationship with you. Who's further ahead on the journey. And this is why a lot of groups fail because it's a bunch of allies who don't have direction. They don't have a guide. They don't have anybody who's saying, come on, guys, we're going to go this way. You gotta have somebody who is a mentor for you. Somebody who is discipling you, somebody who's supporting you and guiding you in a relational capacity. This could be somebody from your church. This could be somebody from your school. This could be even a family member. Usually guides are hard to find. It's a lot easier to find an ally than to find a guide. I'm a guide. That's what I do for my job. That's what husband material ministries is about is giving you support guidance. And in our husband material community in this Facebook group, we're helping you find allies. When you have an ally and you have a guide, the last piece of the puzzle, the last type of person you need is an expert. And there are so many experts. I don't know if you can see my books over there, the amount of expertise that has become available to us in the last 10 years is truly stunning to me. Um, when I first got into a group and got my first allies and got my first guides, uh, we didn't really have very much expert material to work with. We had this curriculum called lust free living, where you would share your less Demoni. It was really lame. Uh, there was also a book called every man's battle or every young man's battle, very shallow, very surface level. And since then, when I really started to go deep into understanding the research, the, uh, the sexual addiction treatment, that's out there. I found so many experts. Patrick Carnes, Mark lacer, Marnie Fri more recently guys like Jay stringer guys, uh, some of the experts are in this group. We got guys like Scott Cohn, Sean Bandito, Cynthia Sam, Trevor Windsor, Nick stumble from pure desire. You know, dr. Ted Roberts is an expert. A lot of people are turning to guys. You gotta find your experts for me. One of them was dr. William Struthers, uh, for the ladies out there, you might be listening to dr. Julie Slattery. There is a whole world of amazing world-class Christ centered therapists who have made their breakthroughs and insights available for free. So why are you not tapping into them? I mean, start reading, read, uh, surfing for God by Michael John Cusak, read breaking free by Russell Willingham. Read my book, redeem sexuality, personally. My favorite expert, who is a guide for me, he's a mentor for me is Jay stringer. His book unwanted is incredible. If you have not been through, uh, that book, read it, please read it in the last 10 years. So many amazing advancements have been made so that you can get awesome expertise in sexual freedom and healing for a low price. By getting some of these books. I also recommend the unwanted workbook. Um, the book unwanted is great. You can read the book. What you really need to do is read your life through the lens of that book. So unwanted is great. The unwanted workbook is a resource I've contributed to with Jay stringer. In summary people, you got to have allies, you got to have a guide and you gotta have an expert and maybe your guides and your experts can be the same people. Um, I'm certainly becoming an expert. And in putting out these videos and podcasts, um, I'm growing in my expertise and doing more research, you know, right now I'm, I'm learning from the expert, Dan Allander from the Islander center in the Seattle school, learning about sexual abuse, learning about betrayal, powerlessness, and the ways that Satan has come against so many of us in our sexuality. So I'm always learning. You need to be reading something. My friend, you need to be meeting with an ally and you need to have a guide. Who's leading you. Let me summarize what I've said so far. So you got to have a passion, not just pressure to heal. A lot of people are feeling pressure to heal because I'm a pastor and I have to be free. Cause I'm a husband and I have to be free because I'm a Christian and I have to be free. No, no, no, no. Figure out like what it is. You're really dreaming about. That's that's your passion. Then you gotta have people. And the alternative to having true people who are supporting and guiding you is having the police. I like to call it the porn police. And when you say, Oh, I have an accountability partner and we check up on each other and we tell each other about our sins. That is not the kind of people I'm talking about. That is the police force. When you have accountability software, which is essentially a tattletale on you, when you have a screen filter, which is essentially a offense that anybody can get around, you're just imprisoning your desires and hiring some police. No, get the police out of your life and get the people who are going to support guide, educate you, lead you to freedom. And then the last thing is it's part three of the path to freedom from porn. What I call the porn free path. And that is a program, a program, not a playground. What do I mean by that? Most people who want freedom from porn, they'll buy the book, they'll buy the workbook. And then they'll tinker with the tools, tinker with the toys and maybe do a chapter here, do an exercise there. They're not training. They're just tinkering. You got to get into a training program. If you want to achieve any kind of dream in your life, whether it's related to sexuality, whether it's related to your career, whether it's related to your physical health or something, you got to have a step by step program that will lead you to freedom. And unfortunately, a lot of us have been burned by programs that didn't work that we thought would help us, but they didn't. And some of the programs I hear about like that are the conquer series. A lot of guys go through the conquer series and it's not enough for them. The ones who are really serious will enter a program like the seven pillars of freedom, an 11 month rigorous process. And then that's where you hear more of the freedom stories of people who go through the program. You know, a lot of people have read the book unwanted, but they haven't been through the unwanted workbook. I mean, certainly the conquer series can change your life. And there are other people who sit through the five videos, they passively participate and they're treating it like a playground, not like a program. And the other thing is that the conquer series is not the kind of program that I believe leads to deep freedom from the battle. A lot of people, a lot of purity programs out there are all about being a warrior, you know, conquer, overcome. And it puts you in this mindset of being in a war against your sexuality. So I'm going to talk a little bit about what kind of programs work for anyone, no matter whether you've been fighting the battle or not. Here's another type of program. When you get into a residential treatment facility, they don't mess around. You will not be in a playground. You know, if you go a hope quest residential treatment in Georgia, if you go to a restoring the soul in Colorado, if you go to one of these, uh, places like capstone in Arkansas, and you pay thousands of dollars to enter a residential treatment program, they will give you an entirely new lifestyle and entirely new environment. They will set you up with those people. Allies, guides, experts, and you will have a transformational opportunity because in this treatment program, it's a program. It's not a playground. You're going through these steps and you have people that you're going through them with, and you are not going to enter that kind of program unless you have a passion to pay thousands of dollars. Problem is most of us can't get residential treatment. We can't afford that kind of thing. We can afford to disrupt our lives. And so what I actually offer in my coaching program is essentially residential treatment from home. We transform your environment, your lifestyle and your relationships, right, where you are, because that's possible. Now through digital discipleship, we can create a customized program for you to not just learn some information, but to go through transformation. What does it take to have a program that really works a program? That's going to give you freedom from the struggle of your sexuality, not just freedom from sexual behavior for awhile takes three things. Number one, it has to help you face your sexual fantasies. So something I talk about a lot, a great program is going to deal with your fantasies. The specific types of porn that you're looking at, nobody is attracted to porn. In general, we are all turned on by very specific images, videos, types of people, types of power dynamics. And there's always a reason why this is why the conquer series doesn't quite cut it for me. Cause it doesn't go into your specific sexual fantasies. Now what a great program will also do is also talk about your family, your fantasies, and your family. The thing is you don't realize this, but your fantasies are actually connected to early childhood experiences that prominently took place within your family. Um, that might sound weird to you that what you're telling me, my sexual attractions were shaped by my mom and dad. Yes. As weird as that sounds, your problem with porn is not just a result of growing up in the age of the internet. It is the result of your very specific childhood experiences. With some of my clients, I have a list of the different experiences they've had that have shaped their sexual fantasies. Some of them are my dad left. My dad died. My stepdad cheated on my mom. My mom dominated me. My mom used me. My mom needed me. My dad was passive racism. All of these different experiences are part of the soil where our sexuality developed. So you got to look into your fantasies. You got to let that lead you back into those early experiences in your family. And a great program is also going to help you undergo formation, fantasies, family, and formation. Formation means that in light of all of this deep digging that I'm doing through my story, I am going to make new choices. I'm going to create a new habitat. I'm going to create new habits. I'm going to get help in a way that's actually going to form me, rewire my brain into the kind of person who just doesn't get turned on by those same things anymore. Um, so that you can look at porn and not just say, Oh, that that's not something I do anymore. You can say, that's not who I am anymore, because I've been formed into a new person, a program that helps you do that is ideal. And those programs do exist. Some of those residential treatment programs are awesome. The problem is they're super expensive. And once you go home, a lot of times people lose what they learned because they're going back to that same old habitat and those same old habits. And so I think the ideal is to be able to go through this deep work of going through your fantasies, your family, and formation, where you are. That's what I do in my coaching program. And I'm creating a brand new class specifically on how to outgrow porn. Like not just quit for a little while, but outgrow it all together. And I will be sharing a little bit more about that. At the end of the episode, you can go to outgrow porn.com to sign up for this free class. And it is going to be incredible. This is going to be a place where I walk you through the exact process that I use with my clients. I'm going to give you as much as I can in one sitting of the work that we do over weeks, months, sometimes years, depending on what kind of passion he has, what kind of people he has. Um, I give you the program. I can't provide you with the passion. Um, I can connect you with some people. The point is, um, I'm creating a program based on the coaching process I've been using with guys. And if you want to get in on that and be notified when it's available, go to outgrow porn.com. Let's open up some time for Q and a. I've given you the porn free path here with the passion you need, the people you need and the program you need. It looks like we already got one question. So let's dive in. Kent is saying, how do I motivate my friends who are struggling with porn, both in marriage and out and finding myself, trying to convince them. They know it's wrong. They're all Christians, but they're not willing to take the next step. Maybe they just aren't ready. I think you're onto something. My friend, if they don't have the passion, they're not ready. This is something I learned in my very first group that I led in 2011. And I continue to tell myself and remind myself of this truth. Today, you cannot teach someone what they don't want to learn. You cannot teach someone what they don't want to learn. I see this in the ministry of Jesus too. In John chapter five, Jesus comes to a man who was paralyzed and broken for 38 years, 38 years of paralysis. And he asks him the most offensive question. He says, do you want to be healed? It's that same question that he asks to us. If you've been struggling with porn for eight years or 38 years, he asks the same question to us. Do you want to be healed? And until they can answer, yes, I want to be healed. I'm willing to do whatever it takes to receive your presence and power Jesus in my sexuality, no matter how uncomfortable it is, no matter how expensive it is, yes, I'm ready. Then there's nothing you can do. My friend, um, they oftentimes need to experience the misery of sexual brokenness at a greater level before they can be open to the ministry that will bring healing. Sila says, how does one find an ally? My friends are great. You find an ally by getting vulnerable, sharing your story and inviting somebody to be your ally setting. Very clear expectations about what that relationship involves. I have a worksheet for this on my book, redeemed sexuality. You want to establish things like how often will we communicate? When will we communicate? When are we unavailable? You wanna, you want to find somebody who is at a similar stage on the journey to you. So if you are struggling with pornography every two days, and they're struggling like every two months, maybe that's not the best companion for you. You want somebody who's in a similar place. Maybe you've already done some deep digging into your sexual fantasies. Find somebody who's a little bit more self aware. Maybe you are completely new to this. Find somebody who's completely new to this. And then you really treat it just like you would treat, getting to know another person Luke says, should an ally be of the same sex? Yes, you can have people who are supporting you and guiding you who are a different sex. You don't want to call somebody of the opposite sex when you're sexually triggered at two in the morning. Not a good idea that you need to have somebody who you can call at two in the morning. That's what allies are for. Noah says, what resources would you recommend for middle school and high school age students. I'm a youth pastor and I'm struggling to minister to our youth whose addiction has been made worse by quarantine conditions, man, that is so real. The quarantine and the pandemic has been a recipe for relapse. For many of us, it's making the struggle more intense in terms of resources for young guys and young girls, I would recommend my workbook, redeemed sexuality, it's designed for youth, and it doesn't go fully into some of the territory of your family and your fantasies as deep as something like the seven pillars or unwanted. So that's a great bridge. There are also some awesome resources available at educate, empower kids. That's my favorite organization doing some of the prevention work of educating on sexual formation and sexual development and trying to parent kids through the porn crisis. One of the challenges with middle school and high school students is that they're still under the care of their parents and their parents may or may not be comfortable with a youth pastor or a youth leader addressing these topics. So usually the youngest that I will ever work with somebody or help somebody is once they're out of their parents' house. And remember so much of this comes from your family experiences. So if you are still living with your parents, whether you're a kid or an adult that is going to make it so, so hard to separate from the sexual patterns that developed when you were a little kid. So when I work with a guy who is still living with his parents, usually he has to move out before he sees significant success. Sila says, guys, don't generally talk about their issues. It's hard to find a man to be vulnerable with a men. That's why the husband material community exists go to husband, material.com, go to husband, material, men.com, invite your friends to join this group, because this is a place where men are getting vulnerable. This is a place where we are choosing to open up, not just about our sexual behavior, actually about our very stories, the specific sexual struggles that we have. And that's where it gets interesting. That's where the healing comes. When you go into the specifics of your sexual fantasies, some of you know that I have had a sexual fetish since I was 13 orthodontics that I hated about myself. Some of you know that my sexual preferences have tended towards power and domination. Something that I really hated about myself and didn't understand for many years, and being able to open up about that to somebody unlocked a whole new level of freedom, and then being able to understand it in light of my family and go through a process of formation. That's what got me here today, guys. That's why I'm free because I found the passion for me. My passion first was I was writing a book about this even before I was completely free. Uh, I was already passionate about creating a resource that was better than all the lame curriculum out there. You know, the less Demoni is less reliving. And I had a lot of great people at Wheaton college. Some of you are tuning in live who were with me at Wheaton college and you know, what a fantastic Christian community that is. And I found the programs and they're out there first Corinthians 10 13 says that in every temptation, God provides a way out today. I've provided you with that way out. It's the path you need the right passion. And you have the right people and you need the right program. When you have all three of those things in place, you set yourself up for unimaginable success, or you can get free, not just from your sexual sin and your sexual behavior. You can get free from the stress and the struggle and move on and become the man you were created to be. So thank you so much for tuning into this live episode. If you want to be in attendance on future live episodes, go to husband, material, men.com and join our private group. Thank you so much. And always remember you are God's beloved son in you. He is well-pleased.