It can be done - with Him by your side.
 
 
  Breaking Free Chizuk #1392  
 
 
In Today's Issue
   
Image of the Day
Announcements: Recorded: Should I tell my spouse?
Torah: Only With Him
Chizuk: Fallen generation
Practical Tips: The Science of Habit Change
Daily Dose of Dov: Everyone Else Knows That He'll Be Okay
 
 
90 Day Journey
 
Click below to update your 90 day chart
Still Clean Had a fall
Haven't begun the 90 day journey yet? Click here to join.
 
Image of the Day
 
Announcements
 
Recorded: Should I tell my spouse?
 

MIRIAM,
The Guard Your Eyes' leader of the conference calls for the wives of the addicts, had joined us on

Duvid Chaim's 12-Step phone conference

on Wednesday DECEMBER 23rd.

The call had over 100 attendies and was a great success.

Miriam is Duvid Chaim’s wife and has more than 10 years experience in the S-Anon and CODA Programs, plus advanced training and education through the International Coach Academy with a focus on helping couples and individuals getting back to basics in their relationships and living life rather than just surviving life.

To listen to the recording of this amazing call on your computer, click here.

To download the MP3 file, right click the link above and press "Save Link As" - and save it to your desktop.

To listen to the recording by phone:

From U.S. (641) 715-3813

From Israel: 076-599-0069

From UK: 0330 606 0519

PIN: 637207#

Reference #123

LISTEN TO RECORDINGS OF OUR OTHER AMAZING GUEST SPEAKERS.

Torah
 
Only With Him
 
By Yosef Hatzadik

Taanis Tzibbor - Krias HaTorah:

"Im na matzasi chein be'einecha - yeileich na Hashem bekirbeinu"

If I am to give you pleasure with the eyes (ten lo mishelo, she'ata v'shelach shelo), it can only be if you are with me. I cannot do it by myself. Ilimalei Hakodosh Boruch Hu ozer lo lo yachol lo! We have to give it over to Hashem!

Chizuk
 
Fallen generation
 
By GYE

I recently read an amazing story of an older couple from Russia. The wife called the Chevrah Kadisha and told them that her husband had died. They came and took the body and prepared him for burial. The next day, the Chevrah Kadisha came to the Beis Hakvaros and no one was there besides for the old lady. They quickly arranged for a Minyan and said Kaddish. Afterwards, the wife began speaking to her departed husband and she said: "My dear husband, when you get up to Shamayim and they ask you why we didn't have children, tell them it is because when we lived in Russia we couldn't keep the Halachos of Taharas Hamishpacha, and by the time we arrived in Eretz Yisrael we were too old to have children".

Read more
Practical Tips
 
The Science of Habit Change
 
Part 6/14
 
By the.guard

Click here to listen and/or download this article as a professionally recorded AUDIO BOOK (45 minutes).

The vital element of belief

At first researchers thought that AA succeeds solely by reprogramming participants’ habits. However, the first cracks in this theory started appearing a little over a decade ago. Researches began finding that habit replacement worked pretty well for many people until the stresses of life – such as finding out your mom has cancer, or your marriage is coming apart – got too high, at which point alcoholics often fell off the wagon. Academics asked why, if habit replacement is so effective, it seemed to fail at such critical moments. And as they dug into alcoholics’ stories to answer that question, they learned that replacement habits only become durable new behaviors when they are accompanied by something else: the element of BELIEF. Those alcoholics who believed that G-d or some higher power had entered their lives were more likely to make it through the stressful periods with their sobriety intact.

Even if you give people better habits, it doesn’t repair why they started drinking in the first place. Eventually they’ll have a bad day, and no new routine is going to make everything seem okay. What can make a difference is believing that they can cope with that stress without alcohol.

By putting alcoholics in meetings where belief is a given – where, in fact, belief is an integral part of the twelve steps – AA trains people in how to believe in something until they believe in the program and themselves. It lets people practice believing that things will eventually get better, until things actually do. At some point, people in AA look around the room and think, if it worked for that guy, I guess it can work for me. There’s something really powerful about groups and shared experiences. It seems so much more real when we can see it in other people’s eyes.

To be continued...
Daily Dose of Dov
 
Everyone Else Knows That He'll Be Okay
 
By Dov

Someone wrote on the forum:

I've failed the 12 steps because I got stuck on step 3 ("We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God"). I don't have much faith in myself succeeding at this point.

Uri Responds:


A kid is always unsure that he will ever be able to bike, swim, or anything. But everyone else knows that he'll be okay.

Dov (sober in SA for over 18 years) responds:


Absolutely beautiful! (and true). Never thought of it quite that way Uri, thanks!

Who does the third step perfectly? Who even does it well? I never did, for sure!

That it why it reads: "Made a decision to turn... over to G-d" and not "turned our will... over to G-d". Practically no one turns their will over. It takes a lifetime for most folks I know, and so far, for me.

The fourth step ("We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves"), and basically all the rest of the 12 Steps, are needed precisely because none of us succeed at "turning over our will..." - because we are messed up a bit, emotionally and mentally. We are addicts, after all. We really need some work and a lot of help.

So "swim, bike, or jog" right into the 4th step, fresh and new as if you never saw it before, with a fearless gusto! And please don't fall prey to the silly idea that you can do any of the steps (including the 3rd step!) without another person. For me, that game would be just trying the same crapola I had always tried, just trying it harder. Oy vei....

Someone else posted on the forum:

The 12 steps sound like they are the "end all" and "be all" for us to recover from our void left by this disgusting addiction. I, however, have yet to find a good way to go through the 12-Steps. For me, reading them through, even thoroughly, just doesn't work. I really don't internalize it that way. I have suggested in the past, and will make another bid now, to have someone give a shiur on it.

Dov Replies:

Please don't strangle me, but: The 12 steps are not read about, learned about, or darshened. They are done, literally and simply. We don't need shiurim, we need to watch others do them more often. You witness a lot of that in healthy 12 step meetings.

Now, if you'd be a ger and just read the Torah, even the Shulchan Aruch, you'd still have a hard time getting yiddishkeit "right". Sort of like driving - from a manual. You'd need to meet practicing Jews and see how it's really done. (Hopefully they'd be ehrlich and have a mesora and sechel too!)

Le'havdil, it's like that with the 12 Steps. The minhag of AAs was generally to do the steps in order and with a sponsor, or at least with another recovering AA who is ahead of you in the steps (and sober). It was generally to do it on paper and to share it with others.

The best "shiur" I know on how to do the 12 steps is reading the Big Book and the 12&12 of AA for more detail, but when all is said and done, the only thing that will get us better seems to be actually just doing the steps with others - awkwardly and geekily, but simply.

Do you think you may have a porn addiction?
 

Do you have a problem with obsessive and compulsive porn use? Have you seriously tried the tools on GYE and feel that you are not getting better? Maybe it’s time to consider joining a 12-Step program.

Porn Anonymous (PA)
If you’re compulsively acting-out with pornography and masturbation we suggest you explore joining Porn Anonymous (PA). If you need help deciding whether to join PA, call Michael at 347-699-2368, or email help@pornanonymous.org to schedule a time to talk. For more information visit pornanonymous.org (Hebrew: p-a.org.il / Yiddish: pa-yid.org).

Sexaholics Anonymous (SA)
If your compulsive acting-out has progressed beyond the screen (with other people, paid sexual services, etc.) we suggest you explore joining Sexaholics Anonymous (SA). To figure out if SA is for you, call Dov at 917-414-8205, or email Dov at dov@guardyoureyes.org to schedule a time to talk. For more information visit www.sa.org.

Contribute
 
Please help us continue helping others!
 
Contribute Securely Online
(Anonymous recurring credit card donations possible)
To donate by phone, call (24 hours): 718-878-3075
 
Checks can be made out to: "GYE Corp." and mailed to: GYE CORP, 4403 15TH AVE #305, BROOKLYN, NY 11219-1604, USA
Quick Links