The problem – relying on an inadequate tool
As I’ve worked with people who have become frustrated and felt powerless to overcome their pornography habit, I have noticed one common tool that kept failing and causing continual frustration: willpower. I also noticed that those who learned to continually use a power beyond willpower, had incredible success overcoming their habit.
To help us understand this greater power, let’s look at a passage from the Book of Mormon. Here Abinadi described how Jesus was able to overcome the challenges He faced:
“Having subjected the flesh to the will of the Father… thus the flesh becoming subject to the Spirit… [He] suffereth temptation, and yieldeth not to the temptation, but suffereth himself to be mocked, and scourged, and cast out, and disowned by his people” (Mosiah 15:2,5).
Notice that Abinadi points out that in Jesus, flesh became subject to the spirit, so he was able to overcome his temptations.
Willpower is a finite resource, and here is the kicker, it’s a resource of the brain, which is part of the flesh!
Think of your own experience. How often have you tried to white-knuckle yourself through urges and temptations? How often did you finally run out of willpower and give in to the temptation?
This is because willpower runs out. Even if I have great willpower in one moment, let’s say level 10 on a scale of 1-10, chances are that the next moment, it will be a 9, then an 8, etc. Eventually, I will not have enough. Those who have been trying to overcome habits for an extended time know this very well.
If we are to learn to overcome our habits, we need to draw on the infinite resources of spirit, rather than the resources of the flesh.
It is also vital to understand that you have these different parts to you – spirit and flesh. We might call these our higher self and our lower self. To call the flesh the “lower self” is not to say that there is something wrong with having a body. Our bodies are unspeakable gifts that enable us to experience mortality. The tension comes from the conflicting desires that arise between the spirit and flesh. The desires that arise from the lower self are often referred to in scripture as the natural man. The natural man or woman is often pulling on us to satisfy appetites, passions, cravings, and other desires such as hunger, thirst, and sleep. It is not wrong to have these cravings. It is human.
When experiencing desires from His natural man in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus Christ diverted to a higher power than willpower: “Not my will, but thine be done” (Luke 22:42). We will discuss this more later. This course will help you learn to access will and power far greater than your own willpower.
To learn more, let’s continue to the next lesson.
“I had been trying to overcome this for years just using sheer willpower… but no matter what, I would lose.”
-Anonymous participant