After hearing all the rants about John Mayer’s interview with Playboy I wanted to read it for myself. I was not at all shocked at John’s answers. Todays culture is filled with sexuality. We have porn but we also have all the shows and music that reference sex. We have the internet and our phones were we “sext” each other. I will have to give John an “A+” for honesty. Most of us would have just stumbled around the questions. I want to take some time and discuss some of John’s answers.

One of the first things John said about porn is “I am a self-soother…BTW pornography? It’s the new synaptic pathway. You wake up in the morning,open a thumbnail page, and it leads to a Pandora’s box of visuals. There have probably been days when I saw 300 vaginas before I got out of bed.” John said he is a self-soother. I would call that selfish. I am not trying to be hard on the guy but that is one of the ways porn affects us. It forces you to be selfish. When you are watching porn or looking at 300 vaginas you have started a process that will not be over until you “release the tension.” It would be safe to say that this release is a solo effort 99.9% of the time.

John went on to talk about how porn effects relationships. He said “You’re looking for the one photo out of 100 you swear is going to be the one you finish to, and you still don’t finish. Twenty seconds ago you thought that photo was the hottest thing you ever saw, but you throw it back and continue your shot hunt and continue to make yourself late for work. How does that not affect the psychology of having a relationship with somebody? It’s got to”. John is telling the truth. We can’t stop with one photo. I know before in the past when I have looked a porn I would see something I liked and thought to myself you know I bet if I keep looking I can find something that I like better. Could your relationships end up the same way? I have someone I love now but  wait a minute I think I like what I see over there better. Should I gamble and see what happens? This sounds too much like an unhealthy lifestyle. Never satisfied with anyone or anything. John even said that at times when the porn is not enough and he will make up back stories in his mind. He also said about relationships that “When I meet somebody, I’m in a situation in which I can’t run it because another person is involved. That means letting someone else talk, not waiting for them to remind you of something interesting you had in mind”. This comment came after he was talking about having unbelievable orgasms on his own. He said “they always end the way you want them to end”, yet another selfish comment. Mayer also admitted to running a filmstrip in his head during sex. In his own words he is more comfortable in his imagination than with actually human discovery.  Sexual relationships are more than just the motions. Healthy relationships are tough and take time and effort on both parts. No matter how busy you two are, there is always an excitement when you do something together, when you share your precious time. Play a sport, eat at a restaurant, watch your favorite movies together. You will feel the magic of love and connection that you have with each other.

What can we learn from Mr.Mayer other than some killer guitar skills? Class we see that pornography is misleading and can be dangerous to current and future relationships. We have learned that porn is self serving.Experts say men who frequently view porn may develop unrealistic expectations of women’s appearance and behavior, have difficulty forming and sustaining relationships and feeling sexually satisfied. A recent study also shows that 30% of porn viewers (magazines,movies,internet) admit to sexual behavior that disrupts their lives. Men become like computers, unable to be stimulated by the human beings beside them just like John said “when I meet somebody, I’m in a situation I cannot run..”. In a 2003 study (I know it is 7 years old) two-thirds of 350 divorce lawyers said that the internet played a role in divorces in the past year (2003) with excessive interest in online porn contributing to to more than half of such cases. One lawyer said in the study that “pornography had an almost nonexistent role in divorce seven or eight years ago.” I guarantee the stats from this survey have drastically changed in the last 7 years. How is porn affecting your life? How is it affecting your relationships? How is it affecting your daily life?

I want to leave you with one of the saddest things I read in this interview. Here is part of the actual interview. They were asking him about his album and the changing moods he has on the worst night of his life.

MAYER: Yeah, Battle Studies is that feeling between 10 p.m. and two a.m. when you have this wild level of arousal and optimism. It’s about the things people do to each other during those hours. I have wasted four hours of my life refusing to masturbate and believing that somehow the phone would ring and I’d get a call from somebody I hadn’t talked to in years.

PLAYBOY: The phone will ring and your life will change?

MAYER: Yeah. It’s like looking for a fix. I’ll spend four hours not even putting anything into motion, just believing somehow it’s going to come my way.

John your fix is Jesus. To the men and women reading this your fix is Jesus. Jesus will see you through all your struggles. Not just porn and marital problems he will see you through all of them. He never said that he would make it easy. Life is not easy. Jesus is our advocate John 2:1 says ” My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous.” One of my favorite songs is “Thought The Fire” (not by Chaka Khan) this song reminds me that I am not alone in my struggles and you aren’t either.

So many times I’ve questioned certain circumstances
things I could not understand.
Many times in trials, weakness blurs my vision
then my frustration gets so out of hand
its then I am reminded I’ve never been forsaken.
I’ve never had to stand the test alone
as I look at all the victories the spirit rises up in me
and its through the fire my weakness is made strong.

chorus:
He never promised that the cross would not get heavy
and the hill would not be hard to climb.
He never offered our victories without fighting
but he said help would always come in time.
Just remember when your standing in the valley of decision
and the adversary says give in
just hold on, our Lord will show up
and he will take you through the fire again.

Steve Oh
LoveJesus.LovePeople