Hi, I have been struggling with this for more than 17 years.
Few days back Read the TFM abridged and it blew my mind. But had a relapse (although I shouldn’t use that term and that idea).

Now I am thinking of reading the full book, but I am going through tight schedules and I am worried I would finish the book.
Has anyone read both the abridged and the full book?
Does the full book has more contents that we can use to shatter this addiction myth from our mind?
Is it really worth it?

You may have heard about AVRT (Addictive Voice Recognition Technique) from reading EasyPeasy, the book that's popular over in the r/pmohackbook subreddit. It's an approach to overcoming addiction based on recognizing the addictive voice, the thoughts in your mind that tell you to use what you tended to use heavily, and then dissociating yourself from it. Jack Trimpey, the founder of Rational Recovery, personifies the AV frequently as the Beast, because it is the voice of our animalistic midbrain, and it is ruthless in trying to get what it wants. However, this Beast is dumb, and paralyzed. It cannot control us, so it talks to use with words and in images to request the object of its desire. We are in complete control of ourselves, so we get to decide whether or not to give the Beast what it wants. Both approaches recognize addiction is not a disease, but a choice, and both reject 12-step ideology.

At first glance, AVRT and TFM seem to say completely contradictory things about how to quit an addiction. In TFM, addiction is just a preference for heavily using something. In AVRT, it's just handing over control to your midbrain, which generates the "addictive voice" that tells you to use. In TFM, you just deconstruct your preference for what you feel addicted to and then think for yourself to discover if you can be happier adjusting your use of that substance or activity, or abstaining, while with AVRT you dissociate yourself from the addictive voice.

So, if we're a TFM subreddit, is AVRT a useless waste of time? Is it a "false doctrine" to be rejected? Well, TFM is not a religion, just a collection of up-to-date information on addiction to help you make a better decision for yourself about a substance or habit you may wish to change. Rational Recovery's AVRT is an older model, but I think there's still some truth in it that may not be acknowledged in TFM. I think it fills in some of the TFM's gaps. I noticed this when after weeks of not using porn, I still have dreams about PMO, and these dreams are not under my control. Yet in my day-to-day waking life, I still prefer not to PMO and choose to abstain. How can these two parts of myself be squared?

What I think is going on is that there is indeed what you could call an addictive voice, and it is a part of ourselves that is separate from our rational part that controls our body and makes the decisions. So, the Beast does not control us. It can only speak to us and request us to use. It seems to me that this AV is the voice of our habitual, unconscious preferences. It's indeed like a dumb, yet ruthless animal, so the Beast is a good name for it. Yet within the TFM model, I see it it as something that merely prompts us to consider old habits so we have to consciously consider them before rejecting them or deciding to pick them back up again. We do indeed have brain changes that have been conditioned by past heavy PMO use, and they don't just go away after we decide we won't use heavily anymore and that we prefer to abstain or moderate. The Beast — this unconscious preference — cannot make us use, but we often have to do a sort of conscious appraisal of what it says before we decide to use again or not.

Since I argue that there really is an addictive voice, what does that mean for those of us adjusting or quitting PMO while reading TFM? It means we shouldn't be discouraged when we have thoughts or even dreams about picking up the heavy PMO habit again. This is just unconscious learning we have conditioned into our midbrain, but we aren't the midbrain. That part of us doesn't control our limbs; our conscious mind does! We get to decide whether or not we actually agree with our habitual, unconscious preferences, or if there really is a better option. We can listen for addictive voice to come up, and use that as an opportunity to check how confident we really are in our new preference, and if our confidence is resolute, we can just acknowledge what the AV is saying and disregard what it says. If we aren't yet completely confident, we can do some more critical thinking about our options to abstain, moderate, or use heavily. Like Jack Trimpey says, the Beast will make up any bullshit excuse or lie to try to convince us to give it what it wants. But this Beast is a quadriplegic who cannot make the choices that we make. Let it whine all it wants! It will get weak and die, while we get strong and move towards a better life.

To summarize, you control your conscious preference, and are in complete control of your body. You might have a lingering conditioned preference that might comes up now and again, but it's not in control, it's not you, and it's a dying.

If you wish to learn more about AVRT, check out the book Rational Recovery by Jack Trimpey, and the AVRT Live video series.

Edit: This post was 100% human-written. No AI was used. Yes, I write with em dashes.

Edit: I made some points that might have been missed by readers bold, and added a short summary.

Hello, I am currently reading tfm right now but I have been told by some that its potentially a waste of time and I should be reading Unlocking the emotional brain. I have some questions.

1. What exactly does it do
2. How is it any different from tfm cuz it looks like tfm but for other mental health issues and it also walks u through the devalue process
3. Do I need to read this to moderate or abstain from porn and masturbation as a heavy porn user
4. If I do need to read this should I quit tfm and read this, read tfm first and then uteb, or vise versa

Thank you for reading this. Cuz my lord if u gotta read TWO 400 page books to quit thats just messed up lol.

Among the many different books on addiction that I have read when trying to find a solution to my heavy PMO habit, nothing comes as close to the truth and has been as helpful as The Freedom Model. However, in my process of quitting I needed some supplementary material that I found from a book by addiction expert, Stanton Peele, in his book 7 Tools to Beat Addiction, particulary his chapter on anti-addictive values. If you read the Freedom Model, you will come to understand that there is no brain disease called addiction that can make you engage in any behaviors against your will. So when I talk about anti-addictive values here, what I really mean are personal values that contradict heavy PMO use.

In the book, Peele mentions a personal story about his uncle Ozzy who used to be a heavy cigarette smoker, until one day he went over to the cigarette machine at work and noticed that the price of the cigarettes rose from $0.30 to $0.35. Despite the increase, he still bought the cigarttes. One of his coworkers then said "Look at Ozzie—if they raised the price of smokes to a dollar, he'd pay them. He's a sucker for the tobacco companies!" Recognizing a contradiction between his choices and personal values, Ozzy then immediately quit, despite being a chain smoker for many years. At his job he was known as a union activist. He was the kind of guy who would stand up for any of his coworkers against his company, so he didn't have too positive a view of large corporations, which made him the kind of person who would not want to be a sucker for one of them. Yet, he smoked cigarettes and would pay whatver price they had. He was a sucker for the tobacco companies, so he had to quit.

As someone considering quitting PMO, you may not be Ozzy. People's personal beliefs and values vary widely here, and the specifics of those don't really matter except for whether or not they support or contradict heavy PMO use. Here are some values that Peele lists in his book as anti-addictive:

1. Achievement—accomlishing constructive and socially valued goals, such as participating in athletics, running for office, getting an education, succeeding at work, or providing for your family
2. Consciousness—being alert, awake, and aware of your surroundings; using your mind to make sense out of your life experience
3. Activity—being energetic in daily life and engaged in the world around you
4. Health—eating well, exercising, getting health care, and chooosing an overall healthy lifestyle
5. Responsbility—fulfilling your committments as well as doing what the law obliges you to do
6. Self-respect—caring for and about yourself and, by extension, all people
7. Community—being involved in the communities of which you are part (your town, school, work organization, religious group, neighborhood, political party) and contributing to the welfare of these groups—and the larger world"

Some people may be wondering: doesn't this contradict the idea that the pursuit of happiness is the reason why people start or quit heavy involvement in PMO and other behaviors, like the Freedom Model says? Why would values help someone quit? Well, if you accept the positive drive prinicple, consider how much of your happiness in your life is interwoven with your personal values. These two things are actually heavily interconnected. Pursuing your values is pursuing happiness.

Now, here are some ways using PMO and quitting it may interact with one's values. There are lots of different potential specific values people may hold, Many of these may help people quit, even if the specifics of those values people may hold appear contradictory. Different people change for different reason. This table is not meant to be exhaustive, so you may need to think carefully about how to apply this to your own values.

I hope this gives you some good ideas. I wish you a happy life unburdened by PMO! Take care everyone.

(Note: I am still 100% a heavy porn and masturbation user and this list is a work in progress and not at all 100% accurate, This is just a theory do what u like with it)

1. Read tfm 470 Page book again read it so well u feel like u understand everything and u dont ever have to read it again
2. Reaf Tfm pmo 87 pages read it so well u feel like u understand everything and u dont ever have to read it again
3. Watch TFM Workshop Video 2 hours
4. Then when all done if u followed everything the book said u should know how to make the preference change and be free
5. Call mark sheeran on his website to ask questions (only get one free consultation tho)
6. If none of this works find $400 and pay mark sheeran for sessions
7. Make sure to follow theough on ur happier vision u built up

Tips

1. CONSIDER MODERATION
2. take notes while reading theses if needed
3. feel free to use audible or u listen to the freedom model books.
4. Also use chatgpts read aloud frature to listen to pmo book
5. Reading and listening simulatnouesly speeds up time of reading theses books
6. Dont try any other ideas like ezpz or the unlocking the emotional brain stuff until u have finished everything with the freedom model
7. Take care of all life obligations and create as much free time as possible
8. take breaks to watch porn or social media if needed but still try to abstain
9. U want to get out as fast as possible so u can start chasing goals as soon as possible by

Finally make getting out of ur scenario a no1 priority and then when ur done make sure you have a plan for what u wanna do after