I think I meant after, but that is because it is more potent. It certainly is the case beforehand as well (my pants dont NEED to come off, at least not logically). but after there is a different insanity. one that I wish I had had sanity prior to acting out, and an insanity that I fear will return. that may be my biggest enemy: the fear that I will fall again. when I think that, I act out quicker because if I'm going to mess up, might as well enjoy it and get it over with so I can do better quicker. that's stupid, but its what I think, or am told by the YH, or whatever.

No need being scared at all.

The thinking comes before. That is of course how you got here with your pants off to begin with. In fact, most of your very 'best' thinking is exactly what got you (and me) into this very mess to begin with. And by that I mean your Teshuvah and avodas Hashem thinking, as well. The way you percieve women, yourself, sexuality, the past, and future, Hashem, the value of people around you - all are what brings a a chronic luster and masturbater to reach for his or her drug again.

For a normal person it might be a little of that...but mostly it is a desire-driven thing, period.

The chronic users (addicts) tell themselves "it was just a sudden desire that got hold of me!" - in other words they blame it on G-d by saying "my yetzer hora made me do it" (that is blaming G-d). Or they blame it on other people, bikinis or joggers (that Hashem put there too, of course - so they are still blaming it all on Hashem). But they eventually come to see that they can't explain it all away with that. They come to see that it is too consistent, too repetitive, and that the problem is themselves (ourselves).

As Rabbi Elazar ben Durdaya finally admitted before surrendering his life to Hashem - "ein hadovor tolui ella bee".

Dov wrote:


As a wise man once said "To bee or not to bee, that is the question."

MT

Forgive me if the quote is off, but "ein adom oseh aveira eleh im kein nichnas bo ruach shtus". I dont blame Hashem ever. I simply have this misconception that if I dont feel Him there, He must not be. The intense desire becomes a spiritual clog,and the only way to clarity is to knock myself out of the ambiguity into something that is clear. therefore I do what I know brings me a clear feeling, and a good one at that. and then with my newfound clarity, I call myself a sheigetz and proceed to the aforementioned intense Teshuva that may or may not be sincere. vs the alternative, "just because I fel off, doesnt really mean anything; it's ok." that I feel is my surrender. make any sense?

Of course it makes sense - if it works for you over the long term and makes life work for a change. Perfect sense.

I fear I was misunderstood. By 'blaming Hashem' I do not mean that the person holds a grudge to Hashem and says in his heart, "Hashem is no good! For, look what He gave me to deal with!"

Rather, I am referring to those of us who are true addicts. And the way very many of us frum, chronic porners & masturbaters (FCPMs!) sincerely see our situation is: "it is my 'yetzer hora'" - when in all honesty using that model is just a big philosophical or hashkafic issue and not one of actual avodas Hashem or honesty, at all. Saying it is the YH is just blaming it on G-d. The same guys blame struggles squarely on pretty or pritzusdikeh women in the street (who Hashem put there, obviously).

The real truth for a FCPM (that Hashem always loves and hopes for us FCPMs to see, admit and accept) is that sweet porn is precious - oh, so precious - to us. With all the guilt and pain of it, we still love the way that deeply looking at the porn makes us feel and they way our orgasms make us feel - and there is nothing quite like it. And we cannot imagine living without it! Running from that because it sounds 'k'neged haTorah' is just plain idiocy. How could admitting the truth about how we feel be k'neged haTorah?!

Instead, it is part of vidui, and a mitzvah. It also is the doorway into recovery form addicts, AKA: 'the 1st Step'.

That's all I meant. The resistance is really to the truth, for whatever rationalization, and the result is blaming of Hashem for our addiction. From there, there is no way out, only pain.

Ashreinu that we are among those who are not afraid of seeing our life's video played for us, for we face the truth, admit it to others, and take action to live better!

so there is no active replacing that which porn does for us?

tryingtobeme wrote:

If by that you mean, "So do sober addicts gain orgasms for free every now and then?", I have to admit no, we don't. (at least I am not getting them...if others out there are, let me know what you are doing, ok? Pity I should be left put of the fun. )

But I do not think that is what you mean TTBM....so what do you mean then? Why do you mention 'replacing'. I can't figure out where that came from, so please explain, chaver.

so I am not sure what you mean, but that is not at all what I meant . you even told me yourself you can have healthy relations with a spouse, so I'm pretty good and confused.
I mean that the porn is filling a void, serving a role. albeit, it is a incorrect, bad means of accomplishing this goal, but it is nonetheless. from what you describe, the recovery process does not seem to involve addressing said aims, but rather, redirecting life's focus in a way that circumvents their necessity.
was that clearer, or more confusing?

tryingtobeme


You said it right there.

When we turn to porn, it's usually because we're hurting in some way or another, whether it's insecurity, inferiority complex, frustration, anger, depression or any number of things along those lines. We feel the need to escape and make ourselves feel better, so we turn to the only thing we've known for all this time, conveniently forgetting the pain and broken relationships it leaves in its wake.

In recovery (for the record, that term makes my skin crawl, but for lack of a better word I'll use it), we need to work on those issues that bring us down. We need to figure out how to deal with them in a more mature way so that they don't bring us down. We become happier people, our relationships improve and we find that we don't really need the porn after all.

If we don't work on those underlying issues, you're 100% right. It's like mowing down weeds. It may seem like you got rid of the problem, but if you don't take the time and pull them out by the roots, they'll grow back and take over the lawn.

Whoa, I am still unclear exactly what you meant above, tryingtobeme, but do hear this post loud and clear. My remarks above were confusing because they implied that...well, let me just recap:

1- You asked if recovery offers us what we were really looking for and fills that void.

2- I wrote that if your void is the ability to have free orgasms, then no, it does not offer that.

3- Then you wrote that this was confusing, for I have said that there is such a thing as sober sex.

Do you see what's going on here?

The void that recovery [and Skeptical can just substitute [i]'a sex-drunk's sane relationship with Hashem'[/i]- or just say 'Hashem' - instead of saying 'recovery' if he finds the word disagreeable, cuz for they are identical for the addict] fills is not 'sex'. For the problem the addict really has is not sexual. It is just that lust happens to be this man or woman's drug of choice. It could have been anything else and the basic void of pain and suction-force of ego and things to fill it up would remain the same. There is a big hole run through us, isn't there?

I suppose that sex just happens to be 'convenient' as a drug of choice for frum men becuse of a number of reasons, including:
1) the difficulty, social unacceptability, and impracticality of a ben-Torah frequently getting drunk (except sadly in some frum circles where it is tacitly encouraged) or high on coke or heroin;
2) the fact that as the gemorah puts it, "leis apotropus l'arayos", meaning it can be (and is) gotten away with disreetly by even the most frum-seeming person so the precious image is preserved;
3) we tell ourselves that we are victims because our penis is always there - we wake up with it on us and there is no escape from the body part;
4) the sforim and holy-rollers that deal with lust desire have gotten way too much center-stage for our dorr, so it easily becomes an obsessive romantic precoccupation for many a poor struggling ben Torah, which is like pouring on gasoline to put out a fire; and
5) the secret, assur search for the sweet porn the addict really wants is just so stimulating, there is nothing like it - and so is the orgasm payoff. (Many have discovered the search to be the main obsession, though.) And all this can be done discreetly...so we can retain a feeling of respectability and dignity...till the excrement hits the fan, of course. Then we usually can string things along a while longer, anyhow, and usually do. Nu. We say we 'are working on it'...still in complete secrecy, as though keeping 'dignity' as our overriding goal is still kosher! But it can't be. As Chaza"l say, "ein kateigor na'asoh saneigor". Continued hiding and faking ruins recovery. Cuz the priority is not sobriety yet, but still comfort.

So if the void-filler chosen is kosher sex (that really is mutar by Torah standards), then I and many others have discovered recovery still eludes us. For it is based on pretending that we were really just looking for sex all along! And that is a lie. We know in our hearts that no amount of sexual escapades or numbers of sexual encounters will ever, ever satisfy us. No way. Do you see that yet? So the void-filler cannot be sexual in nature.

Aside from this, in the end, compulsion is just that: compulsion. It's completely irrelevant if it is mutar compulsion - it brings an addict back into his drug sooner or later. In other words, just because a thing is mutar - or even just because something can be considered a mitzvah - does not mean that it is right. This is poshut and no chiddush. If masturbation or porn were somehow a mitzva, sexaholics would be 100% patur from it just as alcoholics are patur from wine on Purim and Pesach. It is not Hashem's Will for me to it, period.

So no, there sre indeed no 'free orgasms'. By which I mean that in recovery there are no orgasms that aren't part of a relationship. In SA recovery there is no sex with self. It's not because it is a 'sin' - that is another issue entirely. Sex with self is a violation of the sobriety definition in SA because it just does not work for us.

So what does recovery - or sanity with G-d, if you will - offer? It dos not substitute for simple desire for sex, food, honor, or whatever - rather, it offers the Big Deal. The thing that made our need for erotic stimulation essential to us. If you are still acting out, then it is obviously still essential to you, right? Recovery is to give us the very thing that made us feel we absolutely cannot go without it - whatever 'it' was - that we always ended up 'falling' to. It gives us davka the thing we were dying for whenever we were driven and could not stop no matter how hard we tried to: some true Security with Hashem, ourselves, and others. Serenity of a realness of the relationship. It is a thing we cannot seem to gain alone and need to open up with others to get it. {I posted a while back about how the fact that Hashem designed us and life that way demonstrates that relationships (kabeid es avicho in the first 5 dibros, marriage, children) all are natural laboratories to develop relationship with Him.]

And BTW, that is truly the middah of Yesod - a relstionship with G-d. Yesod is not 'kosher sex', for crying out loud.

In recovery we are at home with our G-d and everything is going to be alright.

Sure there is work to do...and if the addict is a Jew, there is plenty work to do! But it's all OK. We have a G-d or our very own, and cannot lose. Everything has to be OK, somehow.

For an addict, recovery is where life begins.

Hatzlocha! If you could read all that, you are a saint.

Dov wrote:


Thanks, Dov. Last night I was at a meeting with a particular high dosage of laughter and good jokes, some pertaining to our dear friend Mr. Sex, but also to life in general. These meetings really show me how recovery, or Hashem, or whatever, is really a good-feeling thing, which makes me free, and isn't just some mean guy trying to steal my only pleasure in life and give me some goyishe hashkofos on the side.

Dov wrote:

Now I chap. And BTW, I was able to read it all; I am still not a saint. I understand and agree. I think I was having trouble because the void I look to fill is one of sincerity and intamcy, which can be imitated by sex, or expressed by it naturally. I was confused and not following. now I think I am.
for a quick update-I have been working on being open, honest and really tyring to give up to Hashem. I gave a friend the open access device and put webchaver on my computer. so on that front I am more safe. Now I have to do the inner work...