Thanks to Kiddushhashem for that post! The material there was fantastic and clear - nice to read again. Wow!
Daniel wrote on 10 May 2012 03:59:
Thanks for the compliment, Daniel (that is your real name, is it not?). But why do you write "your brain...our society" - what about your own brain? If you mean "my brain...my training", then how about saying that?

I am definitely a powerless and hopeless sex and lust addict, still. I know it, and even my wife knows that - and I mean really sees it and knows it for a fact. And I am sober this one day so far...for fifteen years and a few months by Hashem's Grace , one day at a time. (Our word for Grace is "Chessed", cuz it is for the resho'im just as much as it is for the tzaddikim - and certainly for middle-of-the-ground people like you and me. Chessed cannot be "deserved", of course.) I believe that one big reason I am sober is because I let Hashem help me, by staying out of His way enough. That is what working the steps does. That explains why he did not keep me sober before, even though it is Chessed. I never had to deserve it - but I had to let Him give it to me! That's apparently the way it works. Like the Kotzker said: "Hashem is only where people let Him in."

OK. So, my point?

So please don't ignore what i posted above about how masturbation and porn use does not prove at all that you are an addict, and why.

But here is the other side of that:

I was clean for 10 months at age 18, then for another 10 months at age 19 - while I was enveloped in a Torah atmosphere in yeshivah in EY. I was living and breathing and sleeping Torah, of course. Like a sha'olin temple in "Kung Fu" with David carradine (another pathetic porn and sex addict like me, but he had to die of it). It was nice.

What does that prove to me?

Nothing, really. :-

I see now that it was all a mater of time, that's all. While I had nothing else in my life but Torah-learning, I could accept life....of course, it was not real life. Ben Azzai is not our model Jew, is he? No. I was hiding from human relationships in yeshivah, hiding from women in yeshivah, hiding from responsibilities in yeshivah, and actually was even hiding from most of myself.

But I would never trade those two years in for anything else in the world! I learned how to learn in those years, learned a lot of Torah, some about myself, how to daven, met a few tzaddikim, and gained a lot of common sense, too. And fell in love with EY and had a nice time, too. OK...

But when real life and me collided, it was a mess. It had to be. I am an addict.

Addicts cannot accept life on life's terms. We just detest it. People are just too stupid to warrant our real respect and love, and G-d just isn't nice enough to us. We are certain He is unfair to us, really. That's what we honestly believe, at least. And that's all that matters, really. We end up needing to escape into our bottles, I believe.

So I did.

That's why there is no talk in any of the 12 steps about how not to drink/lust/masturbate again. None. It's all about sanity; accepting real life, G-d, and His (all) people; being useful to G-d and His people; meeting and connecting with G-d and His people; and keeping our sides of the street clean so we can stay in the game. Living real life...on Life's (G-d's) terms.

So. Consider looking at what KH posted above and trying the "20 questions". Then live with your consequences by taking action - or not. It's a free country! Hey, I suffered terribly from my acting out for fifteen years (11 of them married, when it got much worse, of course) until I was ready. If you are not an addict, you don't need all this. If you are, then you need something. Maybe this is the way for you? Who knows?

By your brain i did mean my own brain.

And where is this 20 question SA test?

It is in the SA White Book. (also attached to this post.)



If you answer YES to a considerable portion of these questions, you are quite likely an addict....

Six out of twenty.
So maybe a little?
But then again, who in the world isnt?!?
If you'd like i can give you the ones i answered yes too.

Daniel wrote on 11 May 2012 20:44:


I know that, Daniel, I know. But I have accustomed myself (at the suggestion of recovering addicts) to say "me" when i really am referring to myself. Saying the colloquial "you", as in expressions like, "you know you really have a problem when..." is OK for normals. But it is using a straw man. It makes it more comfortable to say things, than really saying me and i when referring to myself. It softens it.

My sponsor suggested that I save time and just get to the point. I admit I look at porn and masturbate, period. I admit I want to do this and do that, and when I see this and that it does this or that to me.

It just saves 'emotional' time and gets to the point. It also trains others to do the same themselves, which is a tremendous help to the tzibbur.

So Dov, what would you advise to 'rewire' my thinking of women?
It's extremely prevalent unfortunately in our culture, and it's just the society we live in that brought me and others to think like this.
Your words of advice would truly be appreciated here.

You are certainly not a creep for loving to look at porn or masturbate so much. But it makes you miserable, so whay not quit and find something else to do with yourself? Get busy, man. No sefer ever said we are 'creeps' for doing aveiros. You may be screwed up, but that gets me to the next question...

Your request for advice and help is like saying "my car won't run." Well....is the battery dead? Is the universal belt broken? Is the starter broken...or is it 'just' out of gas? It depends on what noises it makes, does it start at all...what's the actual presentation of the problem?

So. Your earlier posts described a porn and masturbation problem. I ask you what is the problem you are having with your habit? Yes, yes, it is wrong. Yes, its assur (that is, "it is wrong"). Yes, it is kind of strange for me to be having sex with myself. Yes, it makes the imagination take the place of real life....it requires hiding, of course...it is regular, part of a cycle, I guess you see that already. It's funny, how it sounds so much like avodas Hashem, no?

- kviyus (like korban Tomid)...the cycle, predictable, gotta have it every few days and feel wacky if missing it after x # of days 'clean'.

- tzniyus (like lifnai velifnim)...don't you get that feeling when you are hiding in your little corner and masturbate to your little porn shrine? I know the feeling well...

- mesiras nefesh...we take risks for our fix, don't we? Bigger and bigger risks.

Rewire yourself? Who are you kidding, Daniel. Start thinking of women differently? All you can do is the opposite of what is your pattern for all these things, be"H:

1- Instead of using them like your private imaginary toys like you (and I) always have:

Pray for Hashem's kindness and assistance to any woman you have a lust problem with, right then and there. Or for any person of any gender or type that you have any kind of problem with that simply will not go away, like hatred, resentment, intimidation, etc. It's all the same problem, really: our own self-centeredness and childishness. We all have it. You just see it...at least for now.

2- Frequently, guys like us get 'hyper-religious' in response to our acting out and porn use....often it makes us even more self-centered and loony. Then it does not work.

So...

Instead of reacting to your habit with plans to be even more sincere and good, and assuming you ought to be a tzaddik - and failing - and feeling like subhuman garbage as a natural result...try something else. It is our own gayvoh-thinking that assumes Hashem is a fool and expects us to be tzaddikim today. We need another approach:

Take a step in the right direction, now. Admit to G-d that you are in trouble - not an addict, for you do not know if you are - and that you are not doing well with this issue. Talk with Him explicitly about exactky what you do and what you want from Him, right in Shemoneh esrei. If you cannot say the words "I masturbate myself" to your own G-d, then I ask you: what kind of irrelevant and stuck-up god do you have? Gevalt. He knows exactly what you do and how you do it, and how you feel while you are doing it. He is inside you and inside your experience. No fool, here, and no fooling. So speak it out clearly and honestly. He is with you. If you cannot speak your real mind to him cuz you think it is "improper" - but you can to sex-workers on the phone - then I feel very sorry for that...

Find a safe, understanding person or two to speak openly with about your habit and your plan for growth, or what you want to accomplish.

Is this a start for you?

OK, enough out of me.

Dov...i gota tell you...ur gadlus!

Gadlus? Whatever...as long as I am not G-dless ...a drop more gayvoh and I am toast. Thanks for the chizzuk. The ikkar is what are we making of it all and what are we doing today?

Love you (really),

ciao