The Library

We are on vacation now for a few days iy"H. We were less than a second away from a major accident just as we were about 2 minutes from the motel, after driving for about 3 hours. It was so close that my wife was shaking for about 15 minutes after, and she's usually qui...

Nothing you describe reminds me of addiction, just natural tayvo that is a bit twisted by shame, a big helping of bad habit, and some pleasure. You do it because it makes you feel good, right? Sounds normal to me. Not 'good', not 'healthy'... but not mentally ill, either....

I have never told anyone that he needs the 12 steps. Instead, I have always gone out of my way to defend recovery methods other than the 12 steps. I need to do that as I'll try to explain later. I guess some folks hear me echoing " use the 12 steps! " because they kno...

Avraham wrote: I t ried to distract myself by learning and going to a shiur... distracted myself for a bit. That lasted till like 5PM. I tried hard. I feel like I'm too focused on the problem and not living in the solution. How AM I supposed to live in the solution? D...

I have a few things to share with you. Be"H they will be of some use:If you are reaching out for help, I guess it means that you have discovered that your best efforts have not worked. So going it alone - merely with new information - is nice, but it never worked for me. ...

If there would have been any other path I could have taken other than the 12 step path, I would have taken it! And I did! It was just that it was clear to me that I had exhausted everything else. I was already a frum guy and that had obviously not worked...what, does it...

I never needed to stop the game until I really needed to stop. Then I stopped, and that is when the proverbial (whatever) hit the fan. I was using it for comfort about so many things, it was ridiculous. I needed a lot of help and support, and still do. But just trying t...

Someone wrote: Recovery is just like the chazal about Torah - it's as difficult to acquire as precious pearls and as easy to shatter as glass.... I must re-inspire myself and retrain myself to let Hashem in all the time. Dov Replies: Here are a few things from a screwball...

Someone wrote to Dov: "I have a hard time considering the addiction in any form, even in terms of recovery. It's triggering. The best thing for me is to think of other things. I'm concerned that if I speak to another addict, I will spend too much time discussing the ...

Nothing is "asked of us" in the 3rd step, at all. It is we who need to do the asking."Hashem, I obviously haven't the ability to run my life without screwing it up. My lust will overtake some areas, just complicate others, and I just don't have the natural ability to rem...

Are you an addict? Well, just because you feel driven to do these things does not mean that you are an addict, as far as I am concerned. Everybody with a normal human yetzer hora can feel driven to act-out. It is part of our nature that something about it gives a pleasure...

I got a good deal of passion to serve Hashem once I was convinced that He isn't disgusted with me at all. Think about it... If a rebbi, teacher, parent, sister, wife, store clerk, whoever... have this look of near-puking whenever you see them looking at you, would you be...

The Crazy Jets Fan A guy who was a crazy Jets fan missed an important game but his friend taped it for him. By the time he got the tape, he had already heard on the news that his Jets won that game. That night he set up beer, chips, salsa, closed door, all for watching th...

I have noticed a funny thing about the people I work with professionally (in health care): As they begin to improve, they start to complain about how bad off they are. It is just so frustrating as a person helping them, to hear them get more negative at the very time that...

The point of writing our 1st step is to finally be able to answer this: "So, do I actually have the ability to remain sober? Have I run out of resources yet, or not?"That's the only question when it boils down. If in my heart of hearts I still believe that I really posse...

I was just in Manhattan, and definitely empathize, but the salvation for me is to come to truly believe and remind myself that no matter how juicy and outrageous the images of those women are, the problem - if I have one, is in me, not ever in them. No matter how lusty...

One of the beauties of the 12-Step program is this: Many people (especially men) tend to think in terms of solving problems. So while we are writing our 1st and 4th steps, or whenever we think or write about our problems or what is messed up in us, we want to see it all i...

"The challenge now is doing something about it," you say. Bear with me please, as I am not arguing with you at all, and some of what I will say seems to be paradoxical. Sorry about that, but here goes...If I really could do something about it, I'd have done it years earli...

Nu. Sometimes we just get the crap beaten out of us with a walk through the streets.... I guess that as long as I make a call to a 'more or less' sane recovery person to admit it so that I can let go of it and get back to real life and whatever it was that I was doing ...

As far as I have experienced, I do not get any better (at all) by staying sober, alone. Rather, I needed to suffer as a result of being sober. Then in coming through that with Hashem's help, I came to see what it really was: I was using the lust to escape from facing mys...