I'm starting a new thread under what works for me to describe the tools I use. They are not really new but most people don't know that they exist. There are lots of tools I use at different times but I made up a name for the thread after the main one.

Introduction

Desire is a tremendous force that is responsible for much happiness in the world. But desire can also be a nuisance.

It is a well-known fact that a man needs an outlet for his desire. This fact is only true in a certain sense, but in another sense it is not true. We create our own desire by feeding it on many, tiny opportunities that present themselves daily. If desire is a nuisance for you now, stop creating your desire. This thread will show you a mental procedure to accomplish that. Your desire won’t need an outlet because it won’t be there. The thread will also help you decide whether such a course of action is indeed what you want.

The procedure affects you in a few different ways. One way is that it gives you a plan to use when you have an opportunity to become aroused. Instead of thinking the thoughts that arouse you, you use the procedure. As you use the procedure more and more you become conditioned, the new behavior becomes easy to recall and is somewhat automatic.

Another way the procedure affects you is that it reminds you that you have choices. All day long desire says “look at that lady, you can’t help it” and the procedure reminds you that you are free to engage in something else.

Quite often when you remind yourself that you have a choice you don’t really believe this. The procedure proves it to you through an experiment. Each time you use the procedure you automatically recall the last time you used it and you realize that you did have a choice. At that moment a smile spreads across your face. This aspect of the procedure is responsible for quickly causing desire to drop until you feel that there is barely any of it left.

The experimental aspect of the procedure demonstrates that the power of desire is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You believe you have no choice but to give in, if not now then later. Therefore you give in. Later you give in again because you lent further credence to the mistaken idea that you have no choice. This state of affairs is very difficult to understand because we believe that our intellect is fundamentally sound. How can I believe so intensely something which just isn’t true?

The procedure also helps you accept the desires which are difficult to face. Sometimes you think your desire is normal and understandable, but sometimes you desire something which is somehow forbidden. There are different levels of forbidden behaviors and I am referring to the very worst ones you know of. When you desire such things you are going to have a very hard time accepting that the desire is there and therefore you cannot do anything about it. When you use the procedure by implication you acknowledge that you did look, you did think, you did desire.

You have been reading this thread. The procedure sounds interesting to you, and you think that with some small changes it has potential. You decide that the thinking part doesn’t make sense, and that the part that really matters is the one where you engage in something. You think the author has a good point that not every activity is equally engaging. Or else you think that the important part is where you remind yourself that you have a choice what to think about, and engaging in an activity is nonsense.

What you are doing is learning something new and tampering with it before you have tried it out in practice. I know that you are smarter and wiser than me and that you can improve the procedure. Maybe you are a doctor, or a therapist, or you are an old and wise teacher, maybe you have written books and you are on the best-seller list. Perhaps people come to you from all over the world to ask you questions. Or you are the head of a major corporation. But even you sometimes miss something.

The procedure works if you follow all the steps as indicated. Each step is necessary, and will not work unless it is performed as described. After you have done that and you understand what really makes the procedure tick, then you are in a position to improve on it.

You have been beating yourself up because when you go out on social functions you admire the fancy make-up and shoes. When you are waiting in line at the store you peek at the pretty ladies on the cover of the magazines. When you meet with your child’s teacher in school you notice her make-up. You have been reading this book and eventually you decide to use the procedure to see if you can turn this around.

You use the procedure over and over in different situations with good results, and after a few weeks you feel like a changed man. You know that as long as you keep using the procedure you no longer have to fear your desire when you are at social functions, when you see your child’s teacher, or when you are in line at the store. One night you are browsing around on the Internet and you stumble on a web site which was created specifically to arouse men. In a flash, you click on something and you look at it. You thought you were stronger now. What happened?

When you feel desire you have certain ideas in your head which act on you very quickly and which are mostly baseless. When you use the procedure you see the reality. But the ideas behind each desire are slightly different. Using the procedure against what you know well cannot protect you as well against a desire you have never encountered before. On the other hand it does protect from the desires which you can reasonably expect to encounter. Therefore it makes sense to establish clear boundaries. If you can, get an internet filter administered by someone else. If you have a choice of a route to use to go to work, use one which provides fewer opportunities for desire. Make your life easier by keeping a healthy distance from desire. Once you have considered such options use the procedure.

We should not wish for desire to disappear from the face of the Earth because without desire the human race would come to an end. A good approach is to use the procedure at such times when there is no need to be aroused, for example when you are working, when you are shopping, when you are getting dressed in the morning, when you are taking a shower, when you are walking down the street or when you are driving.

The Procedure

One morning you are going to the office and you drive by a billboard advertising a new movie and showing an attractive woman. Without even realizing it you notice her hairstyle. Through the pleasurable feeling you think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it. It does not grow by itself. If I engage in something, before I know it I will turn around and the desire will be gone.” Then you reflect on the meaning of each sentence. Then you turn the radio on and try to focus on that.

You walk into your office building and take the elevator with an attractively dressed lady colleague. With the corner of your eye you notice her shoes. You think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it. It does not grow by itself. If I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” You quickly reflect on what this means. Then you say good morning and engage in a conversation about the new memo that went around the office.

You sit down at your computer and check the financial news. You view a video where an attractive lady journalist interviews the chief executive officer of a major company. You notice her dress. You think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it doesn’t grow by itself. If I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” Then you focus on the content of the interview.

You are using a procedure made up of three parts. The first part is to think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it. It does not grow by itself. If I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone,” like playing a tape. The second part is to reflect on the meaning of these sentences. What do they mean? Are these ideas accurate? Do I agree with them? The third part is to devote your full attention to some activity.

Each time you use the procedure your desire becomes weaker. In the rest of this thread I talk more about the procedure and try to convince you to use it.

Strong Emotions

You are a young man in school. You go home on winter break and sit down to dinner with your family. You notice your sister-in-law’s elaborate make-up. Can you use the procedure now? You are supposed to think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it ...” but you feel desire washing over you.

The procedure sounds simple, but it is not that easy to use the procedure when you are getting worked up with desire. There are many opportunities for desire, for example billboards on the street, magazine covers at the gas station, and photos and videos on web sites. The desire feels overwhelming. It is hard to concentrate when you are having a strong feeling, but if you prepare ahead of time you will be able to do it.

You looked across the table. It feels good, but now you remember the procedure. You ignore the feeling, look down at your plate, and you think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” You think about what this means. You did look, but you should not be able to get more aroused unless you look again or think about it more. You don’t really believe this, but you know it should be true. You then start a conversation with another guest.

Surprise!

As you use the procedure you will be surprised at the effects. You will watch your desire drop very quickly over a period of days. You will feel as if desire is not a force inside of you but outside, someone you cannot send away but who cannot bother you.

You are on a bus. Out on the sidewalk you see a woman walking who is dressed in a way which you think should be against the law. You manage to give the procedure a chance. You think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” You think about these statements. You don’t believe it, it seems as if there is nothing that could make the desire go away. Before you looked up you were reading a book, you are on page fifty-seven. You look back down and try to really engage in it.

Fifteen minutes later you are on page sixty. You remember the woman on the sidewalk. In that instant, your desire and fear melt, and a smile spreads across your face. How can this be? The procedure surprises people. Even after you have been using it for years, each time you are surprised by its effectiveness.

Pros and Cons of Desire

You have read about the procedure. You may have tried it and verified that it works as advertised, but you are not sure whether you would be better off using it regularly. Or perhaps you used the procedure for a while and then stopped. You are asking yourself whether you should use the procedure regularly. What are the advantages and disadvantages of regularly becoming aroused?

Arousal feels good. As you get more aroused the pleasure builds up more and more, up to a climax. At this point there is a powerful, pleasurable feeling and a sense of relief.

After the climax you feel content and relaxed, and this may make it easier to go to sleep.

If you give in to arousal you don’t have to work against your desire but just go with the flow, so to speak.

And you don’t have to deal with the terror that in the next ten minutes, ten hours, ten days, or ten years you will eventually give in, because you already did.

When you stare at women you can vividly imagine that they belong to you, and by implication that you are a powerful person who can have whatever he wants. This is especially true of women found in pictures and videos on the internet since they don’t behave naturally.

Lewd thoughts allow you to imagine yourself behaving in ways that you avoid when you visit your wife because you believe nice people don’t do those things.

When you are feeling sad or tired, by having lewd thoughts you may feel that you are pampering yourself.

You can resort to arousal as a sort of consolation prize when the world doesn’t go your way, for example if your neighbor has a better-looking wife, if you don’t get your promotion at work, or if you don’t get into the school of your choice. For a while arousal allows you to focus your attention on a different world, as if the real world did not exist.

There are disadvantages too. While there are times when arousal feels very good, these times are few and far between. If you give in to arousal most of the time it feels more like a chore than a treat.

If your pursuit of arousal drives you to spend time on the internet or reading books or magazines, this takes precious hours out of your day.

You may have to hide your pursuit of arousal from your family, so usually this time is spent in uncomfortable places.

You have to live with the fear that your wife and children will find out about it. If they do you may end up getting divorced.

When you are sad or tired and you arouse yourself in order to reward yourself the feeling does not last long because afterwards you beat yourself up about it.

If you believe that there is something morally wrong about lewd thoughts you may not be able to resist the temptation to feel ashamed, because of the implication that if you are ashamed deep down you must be a good person. As a result you feel better and you do not face the problem and address it effectively so the cycle repeats. Therefore you may have to feel shame over and over again.

If you use arousal as a consolation prize when the world doesn’t go your way this feels good briefly because in the world of your imagination you are a man who can have whatever he wants. The problem with that other world is that it’s not really here.

Usually in the real world you can get part of what you want if you insist or negotiate. If when you are disappointed you always run off to the other world you learn from this that in the real world you don’t stand a chance, and you never develop the skills to find alternative solutions, to manage problems, or to negotiate.

Since in the imaginary world you always get what you want, over time you convince yourself that it would be unbearable if you don’t get what you want in every circumstance, like a newborn baby. Since in the real world people are often disappointed you are not content and relationships with others are difficult and painful.

You will believe very firmly that a man needs an outlet for his desire. Your implied demand for attention from your wife may turn her off, and you may respond by resenting her because you mistakenly assume that she understands how much you need it.

The anxiety that eventually you are bound to become aroused is removed by using the procedure over a period of a few weeks. If you give in to arousal you will feel silly knowing that desire can be removed.

If you believe that the Lord enjoys your ideas and opinions, in the same way as a parent enjoys watching a child have new experiences, it’s awkward to think that the same mind can have interesting thoughts one moment and arousal the next, because it’s not true that a man needs an outlet for his desire. It feels odd to flip-flop between truth and falsehood.

Many times in the past you verified that the Lord’s views were wiser in the end. If you believe that the Lord does not endorse your behavior when you pursue arousal while in line at the store or when you are at work, for example, you have to wonder why not. What does the Lord know about arousal that you don’t? When you think that you feel uneasy.

If you believe that you have to teach your sons not to arouse themselves, you are going to feel like a hypocrite if you cannot follow this advice yourself.

If you believe that you set the tone in your household, so to speak, pursuing arousal could create a negative influence for your sons whether they know about it or not.

You have to wonder how it will affect you after death. There has to be some sort of spiritual life then. How will this choice affect you then?

When you go to services you may feel uncomfortable, afraid that your spiritual guide and your friends will know that you are doing something which is not consistent with your religion.

You want to be able to be there for your sons if they encounter difficulties in their marriage because they believe that a man needs an outlet for his desire. If you are not able to help them you are going to feel bad.

Many years from now you are going to look back on your life and recall how you spent a large chunk of it pursuing arousal, and it may feel like a wasted life.

If you are young man you will learn a view of women from your own behavior towards them, whether they are real, in print, or on a computer screen. Once that view is in place it will be difficult to change. When you get married your wife will deduce how you view her from the way you act towards her. If you view her chiefly as someone for you to desire she will know this and this will cause endless problems which will be difficult to troubleshoot, and your marriage may fail entirely. If you get married again you are likely to repeat the whole process again.

If you are a religious person then success in all forms is contingent on your compliance with you religion. If because of excessive desire you fall out of compliance this will have a negative effect, so that you don’t get some of what you need or want. You may not understand the impact of your non-compliance, but one day you may understand it, like someone who never got an education one day turns around and understands what could have been. From that day on that knowledge may cause you bad feelings.

It is important to understand that not all pros and cons are worth the same to you. You may find one major consideration that outweighs many others. You may find it easier to weigh the pros and cons by placing them side by side.

Over time your pros and cons of desire may change. It is important to recognize when these changes occur. If your pros and cons change the procedure may stop working because you do not really want to use it. A good way to understand when your pros and cons change is to try to write them all down again. Are there new ones? Are there some that you did not recognize in the past but are now missing? Have some considerations become more or less important?

I have tried to list relevant pros and cons, but there are no pros and cons as important as they ones you write down yourself. You learn from watching our own actions. You will learn something useful from watching yourself writing down the pros and cons that matter to you.

Full Engagement

You are at a social function and you see an elegantly dressed lady talking to your wife. You think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it. It does not grow by itself. If I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” You think about what this means, then you focus on your three-year-old child next to you who needs her food cut up. Later you see the same lady again and you feel that your desire has dropped.

The procedure requires you to engage in an activity. This means to do anything with your full attention. This is not so simple since most people can perform two or more tasks at once. For example most people can think or listen to the radio while they drive a car. Driving the car does require work, but it does not always receive your full attention.

On the other hand we all, on occasion, devote our full attention to an activity. You are sitting at your desk typing an e-mail and drinking hot coffee. You fumble and almost spill the coffee all over your desk and yourself. You move quickly to avoid spilling the cup. During the few seconds when this is unfolding you forget all about work, the absolute priority in your mind is to make sure you don’t spill your coffee. You devoted your full attention to that activity.

You are driving down the street and having an animated discussion with your wife, who is sitting in the passenger seat. All of a sudden you hear a siren. You look in the rearview mirror and you see a police car driving behind you. Everything in your mind gets put on hold while you quickly pull over to the side of the street. You are devoting your full attention to that activity.

You have a great day at work. You come home and your wife tells you that your son did something terrible in school. He is in trouble with his teacher and he needs to write an apology. You thought you were going to have a nice evening at home with your family but instead end up spending time trying to help your child change his behavior. You are devoting your full attention to that task.

Sometimes engaging in an activity may require some imagination. If you study alone you may find that studying with a partner is a lot more engaging. Playing a board game can be very engaging. Sometimes a videogame fits the bill, because gameplay usually requires your full concentration and quick reflexes. Or you might go out and do some gardening. The choice of engaging activity is limited by the situation.

Sometimes an activity is available but you are just not getting into it. You are reading a book but you are thinking about some topic at the same time, the book is not that interesting so you are not really engaged. It may be possible to engage in the book fully by paying more attention to the details, even though the value of the book itself may be little or nothing.

Maybe you are washing dishes and in the meantime your mind is elsewhere. It may be possible to fully engage in the washing by trying to do it more vigorously or more quickly.

A False Confidence

Your wife made friends with another married lady and you have been having meals together regularly. Each time you get together you wonder whether this lady is trying to impress you because she seems to dress up for the occasion. Many times you have noticed her fancy dresses and this has bothered you a great deal. The next time you get together you look at her but you think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” Then you start a conversation with her husband about an engaging topic. A few minutes later the conversation changes, you realize that you forgot all about his wife, and you feel the desire leaving you.

You decide to do this over and over again. Over time as you use the procedure the desire drops to a point where you can easily ignore it. You never take a second look at the lady and you think you can stop using the procedure now. This may be unwise. If you have used the procedure well for a few weeks you feel like a changed person, and you think about stopping. For some people this is not a good choice because desire may not have left permanently. When you don’t use the procedure desire creeps up, unnoticed, until one day you turn around and you can see that desire has become very strong.

Stop and Focus

You have been using the procedure for a few weeks. You marvel at the beneficial effects of the procedure on desire. But you know that it will come back if you quit, so you make a point of using the procedure even though you feel strong against desire. You are on a plane and the stewardess is serving snacks. As she walks up and down you notice her in her uniform. You think to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it” but then you get sidetracked thinking about your travel plans. Ten minutes later you realize that you never used the procedure properly.

When you first use the procedure it takes real work. You are keenly aware of the urgency of the situation, so you have no difficulty concentrating on the procedure. However after a few weeks the desire feels manageable and there is little sense of urgency, so you have to make a conscious effort to think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” It takes concentration to finish that thought and to reflect on what it means, and finally you may need to remind yourself to really engage in an activity, even though you feel the desire is manageable.

A good way to make sure that you use the procedure well is to stop what you are doing and take a moment to concentrate and get it done.

The Search

When you use the procedure you think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it. It does not grow by itself. If I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” Then you think about these ideas. Do they seem right or wrong? Then you engage in something and give it your full attention. In each case, when you think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it” you have to understand what “it” refers to. Often “it” is a woman’s hairstyle, her shoes, the pattern on her dress, or the color of her make-up. But sometimes “it” is something else and it is difficult to pinpoint.

Sometimes the source of desire is hard to see because you view the desire as an indication that you are a second-rate person. In other words, although tradition speaks at length of terrible things that people do and commands you not to do them, over time you decided that there are good and bad people in the world, and the good ones not only don’t act on certain desires but don’t even have them. This attitude seems harmless until you discover that you do desire some of those terrible things, because the prospect of being in the “bad” group will make it impossible to see the desire. You cannot use the procedure if you don’t realize that you desire something.

Other times it may be difficult to identify the source of the desire because you attached arbitrary meaning to a neutral event. The association doesn’t come to mind because it doesn’t seem to make sense. In this case you might review experiences from the last few days or weeks and try to figure out what they mean to you personally.

In such cases it’s worthwhile to stubbornly search for the source of the desire until you identify it. It might be easier to do this if you go for a walk and talk to yourself, or perhaps write to yourself. If you do this with a sense of urgency you will likely succeed.

Going to the Next Level

You have been using the procedure and you are happy with it. But you notice that every few weeks or months you have to deal with especially difficult desires, maybe because they are usually out of reach, or because they are right in your back yard, so to speak, and you can’t keep away from them.

One way to view this situation is to think that you are human and not an angel, and if you spend your days using the procedure and have established fences to keep away from the desires that you can reasonably avoid, then you are doing what you can reasonably expect of yourself. But this situation also raises the question: are those infrequent desires really more powerful, or do I just think they are? Is it possible that I could successfully use the procedure against those as well?

For example you may end up in a situation where you are forced to be in the same room with a woman who dresses immodestly. When you look at her clothes you think that she purposely dressed this way in order to cause men to desire her. Although you cannot know for sure what her real intentions are, there are such women. If she is deliberately trying to cause men to desire her, does it follow that you have no choice to but to look at her or think about her? You would think that it would, because if you asked a group of men they might all agree that she is desirable. In other words this is what people generally think. If you observed the reaction of a hundred men you would find that most look at her or think about her. But does it follow logically that if she is deliberately trying to make you think about her this behavior is your inevitable future?

Imagine if this woman went to see a doctor for a check-up. When he begins examining her he might notice how she looks and that she is deliberately trying to arouse him, but if the examination reveals something which is cause for concern at that moment he will focus all his attention on that because she could have a life-threatening condition. This is evidence that the doctor has a choice of what to think about. Although the desire might be the greatest he has ever experienced he still desires her because he wants to, not because he has no choice.

Another way to think about this question is that if you really have no choice but to desire then there should be a direct connection between the cause and the effect. In this case the cause is that the woman has arranged her hair, clothes, shoes, or make-up to cause you to desire her. You see this and you deduce from her actions that this is what she wants. Where is it written that these events must cause you to take any action at all? It would seem that there is no connection.

If that’s the case then you should be able to use the procedure against all desires, even the ones that you have not encountered before and that are new and sophisticated. For example, at social functions women wear shoes that are shiny and with fancy shapes and colors. Wearing such shoes makes women walk more gracefully, and there is an idea that these shoes are more attractive. This is what most people think. Is there a rule that when you see this you have no choice but to think about it? If you use the procedure will you find out that there is no link?

Some women have especially attractive hair. For example, the hair might be deep black and shiny. Or the style might be bold. Is there a direct cause and effect, so that if you see such hair you have no choice but to think about it? If you use the procedure will you find out that there is no link?

Sometimes your wife will want some closeness but without physical intimacy. Is there a direct cause and effect so that whenever you hold her you have no choice but to think about visiting her? If you use the procedure will you find out that there is no link?

You are planning to visit your wife and at the last minute your wife is not available. Is there a direct cause and effect, so that at this time you have no choice but to think about her? If you use the procedure will you find out that there is no link?

Disaster Recovery Plan

Even though you use the procedure for many years there may be times when you paint yourself into a corner, so to speak. Because you are heavily conditioned to use the procedure and desire is weak, this will only happen when you have a misunderstanding and you imagine that you should get aroused when in fact you should not. By the time you figure this out you may have a burning, pleasurable sensation.

Although this sensation seems like pain it is really anguish caused by a tremendous pleasure to which you are very close. The sensation is there because you are thinking about and looking forward to the pleasure in the back of your mind. Without your active role the physical component is still there but it does not affect you, and over a couple of days it goes away all by itself.

If you are not married there should never be a situation where you misunderstand and where you believe that you are supposed to become aroused. Therefore if you run into this problem the issue is likely that you are not convinced that you are better off using the procedure.

How this situation unfolds from this point on depends on your circumstances. If you are married this may just be a time to buy your wife a present, so to speak. For many however this will not be possible. Perhaps your wife is not available, or you have a difficult marriage. In this case you can use the procedure but the main emphasis should be on finding a truly engaging activity. The activity must take place over a long period of time, to give the body time to resolve the issue.

Consider if at such a time you got lost on a mountain trip and you had to find your way back. You would be completely preoccupied with saving your own life, keenly aware of the need to find food and water, frantically trying to figure out the way home and walking around at an exhausting pace. During this time you would be aware of your burning sensation but you would not be preoccupied with it, and eventually the sensation would go away by itself.

You can see from this example that it is possible to find a long, engaging activity that would enable you to get through such a difficult time. You can probably find many more if you use your imagination and apply it to your own life. You can make a list of such activities now and file away this plan for use in such an eventuality.

Such a drastic plan may have a large impact on your routine. You may decide to take a couple of days off from work or from your family. Such a decision would be difficult to make on the spur of the moment but it is easy to make if you prepare for this eventuality well ahead of time. An analogy is a company that plans for a disaster, such as a fire or an earthquake. The plan may have a large impact on the company but the impact is acceptable because the plan is thought through ahead of time and everyone involved is aware of it.

This problem will happen specifically when you misunderstand the reality and you believe that you are required to get aroused, and then later realize that this was not the case. If this problem occurs at other times, it is indication that you are not using the procedure properly or that you don’t want to.

False Hopes

You know a lady who has been very diligent about her appearance. In the past you felt desire because of her clothes, and many times you used the procedure. You thought to yourself “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” Then you devoted all your attention to some activity and were surprised to feel the desire drop. Earlier you were nervous about this, but now you feel that the desire is somewhat under control. Then one day she approaches and greets you and seems to display some interest in you. Over the next few days you keep thinking about her, so you use the procedure. You think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it ...” but you think the thoughts are too regular. You are not getting more aroused, but the desire is not dropping.

You see that the procedure is not working and you ask yourself why. Then you realize that when the lady greeted you, you took it to mean that she wants to be intimate with you. When you think about that idea, is that likely to be true, or is it possible that she is just being friendly? You think about this lady’s situation. Maybe she is married with children, or maybe you know her through work and her actions could affect her career. When you start thinking about it you decide that you cannot really know for sure that she wants to be intimate with you. It could turn out that she’s just trying to impress you or being friendly. After you realize that you cannot be sure you stop thinking about her.

The problem is misunderstanding. You thought that you knew exactly what the lady’s intentions were, but nobody really knows other people’s thoughts. The problem is not guessing what another person might be thinking, but being sure about it. In order to remove this problem you need to tune in to what you are thinking, identify your misunderstanding, and think to yourself that you cannot really know with complete certainty what someone else is thinking.

You have been visiting your wife regularly once a week. You are at work. It’s been about a week since the last time and you start thinking about her. You go home at night and you find out that she is in a bad mood. The next day you think about her more. You have been using the procedure so you think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” But as the hours go by you find that the desire does not drop.

You see that the procedure is not working and you ask yourself why. And you realize that you have been expecting to visit your wife because it’s that time of the week. Then you recall that there were weeks when you did not visit her because it was not possible. Maybe she was sick or she was too tired. And you realize that just because there is a pattern you cannot really know for sure that the pattern will repeat itself this week. It’s just hard to know for sure. When you realize that you cannot know for sure you feel the desire drop.

The problem is misunderstanding. You thought that because something happened regularly it will keep on happening. The problem is not spotting a pattern but being sure that it will repeat itself in the future. In order to remove this problem you need to tune in to what you are thinking, identify your misunderstanding, and think to yourself that you cannot know for sure that the pattern will repeat itself.

You are home for supper and getting ready to go to a meeting, and your wife gives you a pretty explicit indication that she wants you to visit her. You go out and you think about her. You have had some bad experiences with her so you decide to use the procedure. You think “I cannot get more aroused if I don’t think about it, it does not grow by itself, if I engage in something before I know it I will turn around and the arousal will be gone.” You keep this up but you don’t feel the desire drop. You are still thinking about her. When you get home she’s fast asleep.

You see that the procedure is not working and you ask yourself why. Then you realize that your wife pretty much told you her intentions at supper time and you took this to mean that these intentions would be realized a few hours later. Then you recall that many times in the past your wife indicated that she wanted you to visit her early in the day but then at night she was in a bad mood, or she was sleeping, or she had to go to the emergency room. And you realize that if your wife wants something now you cannot really know for sure that the same will be true hours later. When you realize this the desire drops.

The problem is misunderstanding. You thought you could predict the future with certainty. The problem is not grasping causes and effects but being sure that you have taken everything into account. In order to remove this problem you need to tune in to what you are thinking, identify your misunderstanding, and think to yourself that you cannot really know for sure what will happen in the future.

You come home for supper and your wife is very happy and looking forward to having a nice conversation with you. She’s having a baby and she hasn’t wanted you to visit her for a while now, but she likes to talk and spend time together. You notice that she is wearing a new and colorful head wrap. You feel a little bit of desire because she looks very pretty. If it were a different woman you would use the procedure now, but you choose not to. Another night she goes to a wedding and she gets dressed up. You notice her make-up. If it were a different woman you would use the procedure now, but you choose not to. This repeats itself over time. After a few weeks you notice that you are quite irritable and instead of having nice conversations with your wife you have bitter arguments. You are upset about this situation. You are still doing okay when it comes to desire, but you easily get angry or annoyed with her.

The procedure will not work if you don’t want to use it. At first you wanted to use it because it freed you from the desires which you consider to be interferences in your life. However you still noticed your wife and visited her regularly. Now the situation has changed because she is not available but she still looks pretty. Instead of using the procedure you tell yourself that she should be available, or else she should not be buying new and pretty clothes. In other words you don’t agree with what is happening. You think that reality went wrong somehow. The world should be different than what it is.

Then you realize that if this is the situation perhaps there is a good reason why it came about, and you start thinking about the reasons. Maybe your wife does not appreciate how much you desire her. And maybe when she buys pretty clothes she does that partly because she needs to look pretty in order to feel good about herself. After all, she has paid close attention to her appearance every day for her whole life, and she just doesn’t feel right unless she looks attractive. You also start thinking about why she is not available, from her standpoint, and you think the reasons are surprisingly good. And as you reflect on the causes of the situation you feel a lot of the resentment melt away. As a result you resolve to stop telling yourself that your wife should be behaving differently and use the procedure. The choice of an activity which causes you to be fully engaged will be critical because your desire for your wife is strong and varied. Over a few days you cause your desire to drop and you start enjoying each other’s company again.

The problem is misunderstanding. You did not understand the reasons for the behavior you saw. Over time you developed ideas about a person’s motives and you thought you understood cause and effect. When you saw something that did not fit this model you did not think to go back and question these ideas because it would have been a lot of work and because it feels good to think that your understanding is sound. In order to remove this problem you need to tune in to what you are thinking, identify your misunderstanding, and try to invent plausible explanations for what you are seeing.

You have been using the procedure regularly and you are happy with it. Every now and then you encounter an especially strong desire and decide to take a break from the procedure for a few days, even though you know that you will likely start using it again later, because this has happened before. You go ahead with this plan and at first you feel tremendous relief, but in the days that follow you feel that the desire becomes like a chore. You start the procedure again, and a few weeks later you get into the same situation again.

After a while you realize that because of the procedure the desire is under control, and you could use the procedure to overcome even a strong desire, but you are choosing not to do it because it seems so good that you don’t want to pass it up. It seems to you as if you are better off pursuing the desire. The problem is that it only seems that way before you take a break from the procedure. After the initial relief the desire becomes like a chore and you find yourself regretting your choice.

The problem is misunderstanding. When you take a break from the procedure you allow yourself to see only the initial pleasure, to the exclusion of the other feelings that will follow. It’s not that the upside outweighs the downside; you never recall the existence of the downside at all. You can remove this problem by recording the negative feelings that resulted from taking a break from the procedure and reading about it regularly, to remember that they exist.

Depression

You have listed the advantages and disadvantages of pursuing desire, you are convinced that the downside far outweighs the upside, and you feel committed to using the procedure. In so doing you made a critical consideration that you are happy with your role in life, you feel okay now and you have hope for the future. This is usually true but inevitably people run into difficult times. You may have had a long, successful career and now it’s time to retire. Or you lost your job and are having difficulty supporting your family. You are a scholar who is not able to study, or a teacher who is not able to teach. Perhaps you pride yourself in your religious observance and now your observance is hampered by external factors. In this new situation your feelings may grow to be so negative that you quit using the procedure and desire feels like a welcome break: your pros and cons of desire have changed from the sadness and the tears of your new situation.

The problem is that you have a personal philosophy that says that people of a certain kind are special and the others are second rate. The philosophy that made you special in your previous situation now makes you second rate in your new situation. For example if you used to pride yourself in your work and now you retired you may feel second rate because you no longer work. Or you invested a lifetime in teaching and now you have no students. Or you have a history of perfection and now you are required to engage in tasks that you can only perform imperfectly.

Everyone is going to have a personal philosophy whether they want one or not. If you don’t consciously choose a personal philosophy you will choose one unconsciously through your behaviors. When you act a certain way you find powerful justifications for your own behavior. You may believe that your personal philosophy can never change. In reality you keep choosing your philosophy every day because you think it’s helping you in some way, and you may be right. However as your situation changes, the philosophy that has served you well in the past now hurts more than it helps.

Before you decide that your personal philosophy has overstayed its welcome you may try to use your powerful intellect to feel better by making the following consideration: although I am now a second-rate person at least I have high standards. In order to generate this comforting thought you find ways to criticize yourself. The problem is that you are directing your criticism to yourself, so while you comfort yourself with your high standards you also feel blue most of the time.

It is important to recognize that under these conditions the procedure cannot work because you don’t feel better off using it. You feel blue all the time because of your efforts to paint life as hopeless and yourself as a loser. For the procedure to work this problem needs to be addressed first.