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A Year on GYE

GYE Corp. Thursday, 22 December 2011

It's been about a year on GYE, and I thought this would be a good time to update what went on the past year.

My road to recovery was not as great as expected, with several ups and downs during the year. One particular area which captured me this past year, was using my blackberry for bad things. Even though I had it for 2 years without being tested, after filtering my computers, it finally got to me.

Nevertheless, since this past summer I made some serious attempts to change for the good.

Some new innovations I have been doing include:

  • Joining a 12 step phone conference
  • Reaching out to other people in a similar matzav
  • Reading Garden of Emuna by Rav Arush
  • Reading Garden of Peace
  • Cancelling internet service on my cell phone
  • Getting google.com off my home page
  • Filtering out youtube on my work computer
  • Making a kebala not to look at youtube videos on my home computer if there's no one else around, without contacting someone first.
  • Not watching movies and TV shows.

Even if I have the opportunity to watch a clean show (say an action or violent flick), I will try very hard not to. My past experience is that in order to qualify to be in front of a camera, you must be good looking and/or wear tight fitting clothes. It may not feel like a trigger at the time, but I think that seeing something definitely has an impact later on, at a weak moment.


All of the above sounds nice and is essential for me, but I am coming to realize that seriously working the 12 steps is most crucial. This helps me to have better emunah and to get closer to Hashem on a daily basis. I am starting to recognize and be aware of my character flaws and learn to respond differently. Most importantly, I constantly need to remind myself to humbly ask Hashem to remove my shortcomings and make me better.

The last few months have seen much improvement for me, B'H. I still have my occasional battles, but not as severe as before, bli a"h. I'm also trying not to get so hung over the quantity of days sober, but more on their quality.