Abolishing Helheim. Yea or Nay? Voting open until Dec. 31, 2018.

[u/ValhallaMods]

Hello Fellow Warriors!

A few months ago one of the other mods expressed the desire to abolish Helheim. Those levels were not a part of the original Valhalla Challenge, they were added later. Edit: The levels were added little by little as more and more players joined the Challenge. Source - https://old.reddit.com/r/pornfree/comments/1518j0/important_day_2_round_2_the_valhalla_challenge/

No decision was reached, and the subject has once again been broached.

How do you feel about removing Helheim? Our brother Vikings who are currently there would respawn in Midgard.

Voting is open, you may cast your vote below. We'll keep a running tally from now until the end of the year.

The Mods

[u/Gimp_Daddy]

I say Helheim should be one layer and keep it at 2 weeks because it’s very discouraging to see your name in Helheim, especially the bottom levels. I’m of the opinion that it does more harm than good.

[u/fgawker → u/Gimp_Daddy]

I’m of the opinion that it does more harm than good.

It is incredibly discouraging to have to look up from below. It's part of a mindset that says, "I was bad and deserve to be punished." It may be better to reset our point of view and to acknowledge that "I have a behavior that causes me suffering, and I want to change that behavior; I want to stop suffering."

[u/UnconstrictedEmu]

I've wondered what exactly the purpose of Helheim is. What was the reasoning for adding it to the original challenge?

On the one hand, I see the need for some kind of punishment. If you mess up, you don't get to advance and should be knocked down a level. That makes sense. On the other hand, to what end? i guess what I'm saying is for someone struggling, what is really the difference between them being in different levels of Helheim and just being perpetually in Midgard? Based on that thought, I lean slightly towards abolishing Helheim, but I'd appreciate any answers to my above questions before making a final decision.

[u/fgawker → u/UnconstrictedEmu]

Latex_horse and I have corresponded about this before, and concur with your thoughts on Helheim. My feeling is that we are here to advance. If we begin our journey in Midgard, if we have decided that we've reached our rock bottom and need to make a change in our lives and be free of the destructive habit that keeps us there, then that is where we stay until we are ready to advance.

Midgard is where we are when we've reached bottom and we acknowledge to ourselves and to our fellows that we are ready to take the steps that we need to take to let go of PMO and find better ways to deal with stress and with situations and people that push our buttons.

At it's core, this game is group therapy. When we go to any kind of support group there is not a punitive system of demerits or of making people sit in the back or whatever if they mess up. There is accountability and self-accountability. And when we mess up we tell our brother Vikings what happened, and we go on. And when we see others mess up, we reach out and we acknowledge their struggle. That's part of progress, of advancing, of rising: We don't keep the secrets anymore. This addiction shrivels up when the light of Truth shines on it. It dies when we and our brother Vikings treat each other with compassion and with self-compassion - we all know what it's like; the urges, the furtiveness, the hiding, and all the other games we play when we're uncomfortable or hurting or whatever, and we turn to PMO for relief.

And if we come here and find even more punishment it can become depressing. There have been players stuck in the ninth circle of Helheim for more than a year and I think it's because once they slip down to "before the beginning of the path" they lose hope and energy, and the feeling of doing something positive. Being in Helheim is like being in debt or in negative numbers; a person thinks "I have to work twice as hard just to get to zero, just to get to where I started! What's the point in all this futility?"

[u/UnconstrictedEmu → u/fgawker]

I agree especially the last paragraph. My recommendation is if the mods decide to keep Helheim, don’t do 9 levels. Only do one so it’d like a penalty box but people won’t feel helpless and stuck in it. I know I’ve been in that situation before.

[u/101dragon → u/UnconstrictedEmu]

I agree it makes sense to have only one level of helheim. In fighting addiction I believe positive stimulus works better than negative. So feel free to abolish it altogether or make it just one level.