Dr. Alok (Dr. K)

It's not a substitute for comfort, right?

Safety.

Dopamine doesn't give you a feeling of safety and comfort.

All it gives you is pleasure temporarily.

And here's the real problem with that, is that when we induce pleasure,

when we're feeling uncomfortable, alone, isolated, then what happens is that kind of shuts, it doesn't shut it down, it drowns it out.

But the whole reason why the human body and brain and mind make us feel uncomfortable, think about this for a second.

Why do we feel bad?

Why does the body make us feel bad?

It makes us feel bad to induce certain kinds of behavior.

And so what do I see when a human being feels lonely?

And they turn to pornography, seen it hundreds, if not hundreds of times, let's say hundreds.

I don't know about thousands.

I don't know if I've had like a thousand patients with pornography.

I haven't.

So let's say hundreds.

Is now what's happening is those negative feelings which induce action are now being drowned out by something like pornography.

So now, and this is the real problem, is then you kind of get stuck, right?

You get stuck in this cyclic pattern of like, I feel bad, therefore pornography.

That's going to make the bad feeling go away.