very strong cravings for compelling images of moving exciting images

Question

The problem I find is that modern technology enables easy yielding to exciting moving images in a compulsive way via television, DVDs, cinema and the internet. How can I find free online Buddhist guidance to prevent and avoid online yielding to such powerful cravings which I find are so obsessive and compulsive in me.

Answer 1

Unwholesome cravings are extinguished by using wisdom rather than by using willpower.

This requires seeing clearly & reflecting upon the danger & harm of unwholesome phenomena.

The mind must examine & investigate cause & effect very deeply.

Examples of this method are found in the Dvedhavitakka Sutta & the Potaliya Sutta.

If pornography is a problem, this requires changing wrong views in order to understand what brings women real happiness.

And what Master Gotama, is a woman’s aim?

A man, O brahmin, is a woman’s aim, her quest is for adornments, her mainstay is sons, her desire is to be without a co-wife and her ideal is domination.

AN 6.52

The psychological problem with pornography is related to wrong view or delusion (rather than lust).

Readings: Five Mindfulness Trainings & Sexual Responsibility by Thich Nhat Hanh

Answer 2

Meditate on your urge to watch movies. Ex: wanting...wanting.... wanting... or bored... bored... bored... until it goes away. Here's a good guide for you: http://www.sirimangalo.org/text/how-to-meditate/

Answer 3

Just unplug. A period of abstinence is the best way to moderate any compulsive behavior. It's the basis for most addiction and 12 step programs. You're over stimulating yourself. Rather than bang around on the internet looking for a solution to your problem, go take a walk instead.

If you want a Buddhist answer - every time you cave in to one of those compulsive pressures, you are strengthening your karmic attachment to them. Cut them off at the root. If you don't allow for these behaviors to be born, the rest of the 12 links comprising the chain of dependent origination can't be established.

Answer 4

Just keep watching

Don't try to stop it . The more you try to stop it , the more the cravings be. So if you want to watch something watch it. Make your life goal just to watch it ,

example :

if you love "Titanic movie" watch it 100 times , 1000 times till you start thinking there is no point watching these stuff , I was wrong this whole time , I suffered a lot because of this cravings , Every time I watched , I needed more , there is no end to this. You have to understand that from within. Trying to stop it will just make it worse ,

At one point your mind will say , this is enough, there may be some other way to end my never ending needs and desires , then you can follow the path to nirvana. And you will reach it faster than others , because you have understood that there is no point doing those things practically ,

Answer 5

I try to portray a "non-dharmatic" solution which is effective. Expose yourself to as many as "exciting moving images" as you wish, continuously, until you can take no more; 24 hours 3 days or whole week consecutively. If you wish to cure yourself, opt a period out to do this non-stop exposure, the time required depends on the person. Then you will feel disgusted with all these stimulations.

Or, if it's related to sexual desire and images, try the White Skeleton Visualization; or see images of the Tibetan Sky Burial - which you can google, then you will feel disgusted with this perishable body that rotten and decayed like the meat on the butcher's chop board, putrefying and ugly.

Answer 6

Craving arises in conjunction with sensation. To let go of craving you have to be unanimous to what is pleasant and unpleasant sensation. In addition you have to remove ignorance by seeing the impermanence nature of neutral sensations. [Pahana Sutta]

I see that you have used "I" couple of times. I conceiving lead to craving. [Tanha Jalini Sutta, Cula Vedalla Sutta] Also thoughts of past and future has "I" and the subject. For this see perception of self arising, the evaluation being favorable (watching a good movie), unfavorable (I do not have this latest movie) and neutral (I do not care about this movie) and how this proliferates to sensations and finally craving. Through Vipassana you should see this sensations arising and passing while being equanimous. This will help you realise there is no controlling, everlasting self. Whatever which is not entirely pleasant cannot be taken as self.

When something pleasant changes it is unpleasant, the unpleasant is unpleasant on its own, the conditioned is unpleasant when unknown. [Cula Vedalla Sutta] Understanding sensation lead to understanding the 4 Noble Truths and Dependent Arising and eradicating the unwholesome roots.