Defeat Lust & Pornography man with phone
Defeat Lust & Pornography 9 minute read

Why Can’t I Stop Watching Porn? 3 Reasons It’s Hard to Quit

Last Updated: March 1, 2024

I can’t stop watching porn.

No really, I want to.

I have made promises and tried fresh starts in the New Year. I have even gone forward in church, gotten down on my knees, and begged God to help me stop watching it.

But I can’t quit porn! What is the real problem? Will I ever be able to stop watching porn? Because based on my past it seems impossible.

Porn addiction is an extremely complex issue with no simple answers or cookie-cutter solutions. But most people I talk with fall into what I call the “Zap Trap”⁠—praying that God would just heal them or looking for some other instant solution. They want to stop watching porn without having to fight the fight for recovery.

However, in working with hundreds of men over the past ten years, I have learned that instant healing in this area is rare. So, let’s look at three main reasons why it is so hard to quit looking at porn.

How Hard Is It to Quit Porn?

Editor’s note:

As Dr. Alvin Cooper noted many years ago, the anonymity, affordability, and accessibility of digital porn make it much easier for people today to become addicted.

Not everyone experiences the pull of pornography in exactly the same way. However, some former drug addicts and alcoholics attest that pornography is more difficult to overcome. This is not everyone’s experience. Many factors contribute to the severity of an addiction, such as the age of first exposure and how many years they’ve been consuming pornography.

Additionally, pornography addiction often begins when porn is consumed out of a desire for genuine intimacy. As John Doyel notes below, isolation fuels addiction. Part of the challenge, however, is that pornography often feels like a substitute for real relationships.

3 Reasons It’s So Hard to Quit Porn

1. Porn is addictive.

Apart from the spiritual battle you are in by simply being a Christian, you are in a physical battle with a physical addiction that traps you into watching porn. You have literally become a drug addict. The drugs you are addicted to are those released in your brain when you become sexually aroused.

God designed those drugs as a wonderful part of His plan to bond a husband and wife as one during times of sexual intimacy. They all have a distinct purpose and are marvelously effective. However, your brain does not differentiate between having sex with your wife or having sex with porn. The same drugs are released with the same effect. Pleasure, focus, energy, release, and other things happen that make having an orgasm one of the most enjoyable things God has given to us.

We can’t quit porn because we like it. We like it a lot. So, we want it again and again. With that experience accessible in a five-minute trip to the bathroom with your smartphone, we start using it more frequently. When we get stressed. When we get angry. Or when we want to escape from problems, we can easily get a fix that does not fix anything.

Dopamine, testosterone, norepinephrine, oxytocin, and serotonin flood our brains, and we feel good for a while.1 Then shame and fear return, and it is not long before we want another escape. It’s hard to escape porn when porn is your escape. Scientific research shows that porn warps the brain like any other substance.2

Those who can’t stop watching porn do not like it when I tell them they are drug addicts, but that is the truth. The drugs are between their ears. They don’t need a pusher. Their drugs are basically free of charge and are extremely effective. We can now access whatever things we want to view and get a quick fix within a few seconds.

Also, we can walk out of wherever we just acted out and seem fine to everybody. No hangover. No trace of what you have done unless you forget to delete your history. Breaking free from this addiction takes a lot of work, and most men are not ready to fight that battle. Especially due to reason number two.

See Why Is Porn So Addictive?: 4 Reasons It’s Tough to Resist.

2. We remain in isolation.

How many people know about your secret struggle? You can’t quit without telling someone about it, but you feel like you can’t tell anyone. Telling means risking your job, your friendships, your wife, and your family. People will drop dead in shock because everyone thinks you have it all together, and so that pressure keeps the truth buried deep in your darkest places. You feel trapped because you are in a prison of your own making.

I know this from experience. As a pastor for 26 years who struggled with sexual addiction for eight long years, I hated myself. I committed many sexual sins, and there was no way I could just say to my wife and my board, “By the way, I am addicted to sex.”

However, God in His mercy revealed my secret life and my recovery began in September 2005. Talk about a train wreck and painfully injuring my wife and our four adult kids.

See Understanding the Shame Cycle.

Remaining in isolation makes it seem impossible to stop. Recovery demands confession, disclosure, coming clean, and genuine repentance. If I had been a better and braver man I would have stepped forward and asked for help. But I lived in denial and minimized my actions by telling myself I knew enough to be able to stop watching pornography.

We like to say that a lone sheep is a dead sheep. If you remain in isolation, you are a dead man and won’t be able to break free. Porn has its hooks in deep, and you will need a team of people to help you pull the hooks out and stop watching porn.

To make it through a withdrawal period of about 90 days, you need people available to you on a constant basis. You need to learn how to reach out to them when the whole temptation process to watch porn begins. We like to say reach out before you reach in. Reach out to your team before you reach into your pants.

The opposite of isolation is community. Scripture has a lot to say about community and our ministry was founded on this passage in 1 John 1:

“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.”

Secular research conducted outside the Church likewise underscores the vital importance of accountability:

  • One study found that having an accountability partner can make you 95% more likely to accomplish your goal.
  • Gallup Business found that accountability is a key component in employee engagement. Businesses with highly engaged—and highly accountable—employees reported up to 17% higher productivity, 21% higher profits, 10% higher customer satisfaction, and 59% lower turnover rates for employees.
  • One study suggests that accountability can even help people treat one another more fairly.

Fellowship is community. It is being daily connected to other men to help you fight the battle. How many armies send their troops out alone to fight the enemy alone? None. Stupid question. So why are you trying to fight it alone? Lone sheep are dead sheep.

3. We don’t take it seriously.

It is so easy to say to yourself that everybody is doing it. It is not such a big deal. Are you kidding me? Porn use is destroying families and marriages at an alarming rate.

God says sexual sin is a big deal. He calls us to purity and holiness. He has started a good work in us and plans to finish that work, but if we are walking in sexual sin like porn, we grieve and stifle the Spirit within us and will continue to be pulled into deeper areas of sin.

Every Monday night, about 100 men gather at our church because their sexual sin has been and is ruining their lives. They cannot stop and are heading into very dangerous and dark waters. We lie to ourselves when we think that we can handle it. If you could handle it on your own, why are you reading this article?

Not only should we take it seriously because God does, but we should take it seriously because of the effects porn has on us and society.

Did you see the cover of Time on March 31, 2016? They found that Millennials who have used porn over the years are experiencing erectile dysfunction because they have trained their brains to see sex as something you do online. So, when it comes time to have a real relationship, they fail to answer the call.

Are you aware of the rise and prevalence of sex trafficking around the world?

We Need Daily Encouragement to Stop Watching Porn

I believe with all my heart that God’s Word holds the path to stop watching porn. He calls us to community with no condemnation. He wants all of us to be connected and truthful with one another (and Covenant Eyes can help with this). We need to do as James says. We need to confess our sins to one another and pray for each other, and then healing can begin to come. Lastly, we need encouragement. Look at this passage in Hebrews 3:

“See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.”

We need encouragement every day or we will be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. To start your journey, check out How to Quit Porn: 6 Essential Steps.


1 William Struthers, Wired for Intimacy: How Pornography Hijacks the Male Brain (Downers Grove: IVP Books, 2009).

2 Frederick Toates, “A motivation model of sex addiction – Relevance to the controversy over the concept,” Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 142 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2022.104872.

  1. Kenneth

    Been looking at porn since I was 7. Exposed to it by my friend who’s uncle gave him a few copies of a certain magazine. After that I went down to our little hiding spot and looked at it often…I was molested I was pushed to have sex with a little girl when I was 10 she was about 8 and her mother and my uncle had intercourse in front of us as we tried to play and swim in the local river they were only a few feet away from us…when they finished they wanted us to do it to..but WE DID NOT! I never told anyone about that day but it along with grandfather watching porn with me when nobody else was around pushed me out of control. I was molested by a few 2 of whom I don’t think knew better my brother was a year older than me and my cousin got me to come to his house one night I was about 11-12 and he tried to get me to drink beer with him and it wasn’t long before he was in his underwear. I got super bad vibes and decided to not stay the night and it drink beer with him. His dad was a big pervert and would watch porn in from of us now and then. As a small child I was made to masturbate an older man and was also laid on top of a woman in a manner that placed me inside her…there are just a few things I live with I am now 42 and have been married and put my wife through a lot of pain…I have come out and told her I need help but she calls me a sicko and batters me for weeks over it….I have 2 wonderful daughter my oldest which is now 24 has been my help she knows everything about me and my past and is trying to help me since I really have nobody else I still struggle with it I love women in a way that makes me want more of them I cannot simply see and attractive clean woman and not want to have more….IT IS A VERY VERY INTENSE STRUGGLE FOR ME! I have been suicidal I have often thought of hanging myself im ashamed I hate who I am and my secret self…I have stopped going to church, because when I do filth fills my mind and sex with some of those ladies are all that stays on my mind…I have prayed I have begged I have pleaded I have confessed and nothing happens my many darks desire unfold while my wife is fast asleep 😭 I need help I need somebody as I am fast slipping down a dark and scary tunnel at a high rate of speed and keep reaching for somebody’s hand to help me to reach out and pull me up again…I love my wife so much and I go to work and often cry at my disgust over myself and how I’ve treated my wife….My daughters I feel do not need to know about this part of me although I have revealed it to my oldest that is doing her best to help me…I used to go to church and have stopped I use to read my bible but have gotten rebellious against our father and have decided maybe I’m Just a sex slave here for these demons enjoyment and God has seen me mess up so much that maybe just maybe he has decided to leave me in the wilderness cause he is tired of messing with a complete failure and disgrace suck as me….somebody help me please my life literally hangs in the balance as each day goes by I think of quick easy ways to get rid of this poor excuse of a life …I used to care about t it hurting my kids but I don’t care anymore I’d be forgotten in a week…God is letting me go and I’m now passed caring if he loves me or not…It hurt me tremendously to think God may have just pushed me aside and allowed me to be good for those wolves at the gate..please help??anyone?? Save my life please?i hate my existence and have nobody here.

    • Kay Bruner

      Kenneth,

      Your story breaks my heart. You’ve suffered a great deal of abuse as a child, and I’m not hearing you say that you’ve ever had therapy for that.

      Please, please, please, FIND A THERAPIST who is trauma-informed, and experienced in helping clients heal from child sexual abuse. There is help and hope for you.

      The National Suicide Prevention Hotline is available 24 hours a day at 1-800-273-8255. A chat line is also available 24/7.

      You are a valuable person, and there is healing and hope, I promise.

      Kay

  2. Sandra

    i really need help, i’m a nigerian who has struggled with porn for years, sometimes it all stops and when i think im free i feel the urge to watch pornography again, i dont know what else to do, i’ve fasted and prayed severally. sometimes even after my prayers i still find myself watching pornography, i just wished i was never born rather than sinning against God and sometimes i doubt God’s presence in my life, i feel unworthy to go for fellowships because i just feel that i am pretending about my christianity, I dont want God to leave me because i really love Him but i cant just help myself even after the prayers, it’s now as if i can never be delivered. I really don’t have anyone i can talk to because i’m an introvert and this is my first time ever sharing this.
    I just don’t want to lose God.

    • Dan Armstrong

      Thank you so much for your comment. You are valuable behind measure! Please let us know what we can do to help.

  3. Ibrahim(Nigeria)

    I’ve been struggling with this burden for the past 15 odd years and I have noticed how it has rubbed off on my relationship with people especially women.its been so bad I often used to think why God wouldn’t permit us to have just one Vice with no ramifications or judgement(pornography would definitely have been the answer).These days I don’t get the same satisfaction I used to when I watch it ,but I still find myself committing this abomination because it is literally just right there and a click away. I wish I had never experienced it in the first place because this is by far the hardest battle I’ve had to deal with as a Christian. I pray the Grace of God does not depart from me eventually.

  4. ゼカヤー

    I was raised in a christian family. I’ve been so active in church since i was a kid. My porn addiction started when I was a high school student. I have experienced sexual behaviors with my cousins, they taught me those lustful behaviors which i find so addictive. And it’s not just my problem, my problem is i am attracted to my same sex. I know all these are a big sin and i can’t help but to always ask for forgiveness to God and then after a week i can’t hold it anymore and i just give up and turn to porn again. It’s a tiring cycle and I think God is angry to me for abusing His grace.

  5. Stanley O.

    Am stanley,i struggled with porn for years but to no avail,i tried everything possible…but finally by the grace of the almighty God am free from porn addict…i got myself involved into bible based society…i read the word of God everyday…that was how porn addict vanished…you too can get rid of it…read your bible everyday,gradually porn addict will vanish….never get tired trying to stop that dirty act….you will make it in Jesus name Amen!

    • kenny

      Hello Stanley. I’m glad to know you have overcome your porn addiction. I’m struggling with it for some years now. I will pray and read my bible seriously now. Please uphold me in your prayers. I will definitely overcome porn in Jesus name. Amen.

  6. Craig M Hatch

    I kind of given up, not mad at God, mad at myself, I cant do this because I am so isolated and I just don’t care anymore! I am going to burn in the lake of fire for it, because I am too weak! I am just tired, tired of trying to change this addiction but cannot seem to stop!

    • Dan Armstrong

      Craig, I’m proud of you for admitting your struggles. It takes tremendous courage to do so. You can overcome this. If you need someone to talk to, please call our customer service at 877.479.1119

  7. John

    I want to ask God to forgive me also. I seem to watch and masturbate to porn when my wife wont have sex with me. We have two kids and things aren’t like they used to be.
    I am asking for prayer because i hate it after, and i want to be right with God. I dont watch porn daily or weekly but still need to be strong.
    God I really need your help.

  8. Roy

    Porn is so dragging me from advancing my spiritual living which i really want enhanced…i got hooked into this sin when i was 7.Now i am 27 and its still digging me up.yes!! 20yrs…i really need help guys

  9. Mehrdad

    Hello there

    I am a 26 years old male, I have been watching porn since I was 12 years old all because I am & I was alone and adventures.

    The best I have done was to hold myself for 14 days and it was awesome. I felt my self in that period.

    When I am doing it, My will power goes to shit & I can’t control my self not doing something stupid or nothing at all and it does prevent me from getting up and doing something great and helpful to myself and mylife.

    It has nothing to do with religious, hell or heaven or something like that.

    Just know that we came to this world with couple of cards in our hands if we play them right we are the winners, if not we definitely are the losers.

    One of those cards specially for men is urge to release the energy they have. If we use it in the right way it is a delight and success.
    I guess the problem is that we use it excessively like any other situations. going extreme in any activity is bad I guess.

    Eating too much food, being too much religious and so on not only it hurts us it will hurt people around us.

    I haven’t played my cards right so far, watching porn and Masturbation has become one part of my life that is too extra like a freaking cancer. If I could cure & fight it I could live again if not it is just going to eat me alive and leave me with nothing just regret.

    Some people say it is natural. if it was natural with no harm believe me nobody would argue or talk about it much.

    The good news is that I never gave up nor I could let it go. but deep down I know I am trying.

    I will keep trying and trying one day I look back at this moments and either I see that I have won or lost which is all up to me.

    From now on I am not looking at watching porn or masterbation like it is natural or part of our lives I am going to know that is should be part of my successful life and when I look back and see that I could do it 30 years from now I feel proud.

    If there is any tips that could help more please share

  10. Fair or not fair.
    God will not remove temptation from any of his children.
    Remember, Jesus was tempted, the apostles were tempted.
    What are we to God if we cave to every temptation.
    There might be some miracle cases of sex addiction being removed but that wouldn’t mean that some other addiction won’t take it’s place. I found that when you resolve one addiction another will kick in.
    If your an addict (including sex addicts) or alcoholic, go to a 12 step program ( I have never been to a sex anonymous meeting, it sounds dangerous, but I don’t know).
    I think the AA meetings would work. They have open meetings and you don’t have to be an alcoholic to attend. You can go there and benefit from that.
    I am an Alcoholic, I know how AA worked with my drinking. I have 37 years of sobriety.
    Meetings help me with keep everything in balance.
    Living the 12 step program is inline with Christianity. Continue going to church but get a 12 step program incorporated into your life.

    Greg

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related in Defeat Lust & Pornography

Editor's Picks

Pensive man lost in thought.

Defeat Lust & Pornography

What are you willing to do to overcome porn?

I’ve been working at Covenant Eyes for almost 20 years, and during…

5 minute read

Read Post

Editor's Picks

A young woman outdoors.

Defeat Lust & Pornography

From Pain to Freedom: Breaking the Cycle of Trauma and Addiction

“Cry, you baby!” she shouted, towering over me and slapping my tiny…

7 minute read

Read Post

Editor's Picks

praying hands

Defeat Lust & Pornography

How Gratitude Helps Overcome Porn

“Let’s go around the table and say something we’re thankful for” is…

9 minute read

Read Post

Editor's Picks

circle of people holding hands around Bibles and praying

Defeat Lust & Pornography

Heath Lambert on the Power of Thanksgiving Over Porn

“Porn is only consumed by thankless people.” Dr. Heath Lambert isn’t coddling…

4 minute read

Read Post

Editor's Picks

Female student writing in a notebook, making a plan on stairs in city.

Defeat Lust & Pornography

The Anti-Resolution Approach To Change

The idea of waiting until the calendar flips to begin a transformation…

3 minute read

Read Post

Editor's Picks

Close-up of a young man writing his journal outdoors

Defeat Lust & Pornography

7 Keys to Integrity: A Student’s Perspective

Every year Covenant Eyes provides scholarship opportunities for students who use Covenant…

4 minute read

Read Post

Related in Defeat Lust & Pornography

Pensive man lost in thought.

Defeat Lust & Pornography

What are you willing to do to overcome porn?

I’ve been working at Covenant Eyes for almost 20 years, and during…

I’ve been working at Covenant Eyes for almost 20 years, and during that time I’ve talked with thousands of people on their journey away from porn. There have been teens striving to use technology with…

5 minute read

0 comments

A young woman outdoors.

Defeat Lust & Pornography

From Pain to Freedom: Breaking the Cycle of Trauma and Addiction

“Cry, you baby!” she shouted, towering over me and slapping my tiny…

“Cry, you baby!” she shouted, towering over me and slapping my tiny ten-year-old face. Two neighbor girls had locked me in a room and violently sexually assaulted me on a cold autumn afternoon. The memories…

7 minute read

0 comments

praying hands

Defeat Lust & Pornography

How Gratitude Helps Overcome Porn

“Let’s go around the table and say something we’re thankful for” is…

“Let’s go around the table and say something we’re thankful for” is a clichéd Thanksgiving tradition. But this simple exercise may be more important than you realize—especially if you’re fighting the temptation to look at…

9 minute read

2 Comments

circle of people holding hands around Bibles and praying

Defeat Lust & Pornography

Heath Lambert on the Power of Thanksgiving Over Porn

“Porn is only consumed by thankless people.” Dr. Heath Lambert isn’t coddling…

“Porn is only consumed by thankless people.” Dr. Heath Lambert isn’t coddling readers in his book Finally Free: Fighting for Purity with the Power of Grace. While the quote from his book might sound like…

4 minute read

17 Comments

Female student writing in a notebook, making a plan on stairs in city.

Defeat Lust & Pornography

The Anti-Resolution Approach To Change

The idea of waiting until the calendar flips to begin a transformation…

The idea of waiting until the calendar flips to begin a transformation can feel overwhelming, especially when winter days are short, dark, and filled with post-holiday exhaustion. Instead of setting yourself up for failure by…

3 minute read

0 comments

Close-up of a young man writing his journal outdoors

Defeat Lust & Pornography

7 Keys to Integrity: A Student’s Perspective

Every year Covenant Eyes provides scholarship opportunities for students who use Covenant…

Every year Covenant Eyes provides scholarship opportunities for students who use Covenant Eyes. The applicants write essays in which they share their experiences, struggles, and victories—and their perspectives on what it means to use today’s…

4 minute read

0 comments