Rabbi Dr. Avraham Twerski

In the field of alcoholism treatment, there is a concept of a "dry drunk." This term describes those who have stopped drinking alcohol, but whose behavior remains essentially unchanged from their drinking days.  

We’re Missing the Boat In my lectures about drug addiction, I often cite the comment of a 14 year old girl who was interviewed about Nancy Reagan’s campaign to “Just Say ‘No!’ to Drugs.” The young woman said, “Why? What else is there?” I have watched our government spend ...

A lobster is a soft mushy animal that lives inside of a rigid shell. That rigid shell does not expand. Well, how can the lobster grow? As the lobster grows, that shell becomes very confining and the lobster feels itself under pressure and uncomfortable. It goes under a ro...

One of the greatest successes of the 12-Step program is in teaching addicts how to surrender instead of fighting against desires that they feel ‘powerless’ over. But the question often comes up, what does surrender really mean and how is it really different than ‘fighting...

Rabbi Twerski's Talk - "Teshuvah Through Recovery" Those who couldn't make it to Rabbi Twerski's talk last week in Jerusalem can view a video of the event at this link. To watch Rabbi Twerski speaking about GYE click here (or jump to 50.40 in the video above). MP3 a...

A Woman asked: After being married for 2 years, I found gay hookup apps on my husband's phone. This was tremendously shocking and heartbreaking. We are dealing with it well but I feel totally tricked (into marriage) and betrayed. Also, my brother had known this whole time...

Dear Friend, I believe that in our generation, the single greatest danger to Klal Yisrael is that of immorality. The plague of illicit material on the internet has affected the type of people we would never have suspected vulnerable: yeshiva bachurim, kollel yungeleit a...

The yetzer hara deludes people to thinking that life is for pleasure. Looking back upon one’s life and realizing that it was all in futility, is the despair expressed by King Solomon in Ecclesiastes, “Nothingness of nothingness—all is nothingness.” A man came across a p...

In our tefillah, we say, “Remove Satan (the yetzer hara) from before us and after us.” The Talmud says that “A person’s yetzer hara (evil inclination) renews itself each day and seeks to destroy one” (Kedushin 30a). The yetzer hara has only one goal: to crush and destroy ...

I referred a woman to the website. Here's her response:"Thank you for being available and helping me out when I thought I’d never smile again. The website is huge. My husband and I are totally using it. Thanks for your swift replies and for devoting your life to helpin...