Hi Doc

I'm an old timer here but not a regular poster. Just letting you know I found your post yesterday about going in to Yom Kippur on a clean streak so as not to be a total hypocrite to be very inspiring.

Sometimes we go from total clarity and inspiration to a bad fall in the blink of an eye. As you see after writing that beautiful post you find yourself struggling.

I think the reason is that when we feel so inspired we also start feeling that we are in control and that we can beat this sickness. But in truth WE can't. WE are powerless. WE can just be thankful for the easy times but not lose sight that in good times or bad WE need G-d to carry us through.

KOT

skeptical wrote:


without wanted to be too crude, I want to see naked women. That's all it is really, I enjoy seeing beautiful women with their clothes off.

I just came back home and all the way here I've had this beast in me pushing me to just look at some pictures. I got in, opened up 3 tabs on my computer, one for work, one for GYE and one for porn. I haven't looked at the work one yet. I looked quickly at GYE, then went to the other one to type something in. For a full minute I sat there with the thing typed in, all I had to do was press enter and I could look all I wanted. After a minute I called the conference to hear velvel and someone else talk about loshon hora. I listened, with my finger poised over the enter button for 5 minutes, then I hung up to hit enter. But I didn't, I closed it and came here to write this.

OK, b''H another few minutes of sobriety. But tell me, what am I supposed to do? I like seeing naked pictures!

doc: need to talk?

thanks cordnoy, I'll message you

Naked pictures? You mean pictures that are actually naked? No varnish on 'em at all? No 'Matte' and no 'Glossy'? What happens if I spill my Woodford on them?

I have never seen pictures like that.

Lighten up, baby.

Would be a waste of good Woodford...and besides, then, they would be naked and drunk!

I fell yesterday.

Yes it's an opportunity to get back up right away, etc the usual speech.

I've always known that there's a certain point when the fall becomes inevitable, but I think that point is much earlier than I thought. Maybe looking at 7 or 8 half-naked pictures is that point. If I peek at one or two I can stop there although it's difficult. 3 or 4 is even more difficult but it can still be done. But by 8 pictures the urge to look at more is too much and I can't stop, and after a while I will masturbate too.

I really feel that this is about letting go of the lust long before I get to my computer and then stopping myself from looking at that first one. This fall was a classic case. I was clean for just over 2 weeks and the lust was building inside me. Seeing beautiful women in the street didn't help and I felt like I was being pushed to look at pictures. I resisted for a while but eventually I reasoned that 1 was OK. An hour or two after that I needed another picture or two. Still not fallen yet, but the need to find more pictures was becoming stronger until the inevitable happened.

I need to work on letting go of this lust even when it's building up, but it's hard. The only strategy I know of is asking Hashem to take it away but I've never experienced that working for me. I don't know what to do when it gets to that stage.

Dr.Watson wrote:

Sorry to hear you fell and thanks for sharing.

What I quoted from your post is a misconception. A mistake which i also made for a long time (and thanks to Dov i became aware of).

HaShem does not take away the lust or feelings or urges. We take it away. We surrender. We say that I cannot live with it and I cannot live without it. So we say no, because we are powerless because if I even touch this thing the end is inevitable.

But we are convinced to the death that we cannot live without it. that we will DIE if we do not act on it.

And we ask HaShem TO RESTORE OUR SANITY. Yes, we are insane. But that comes with an admission that I am insane (without Him) and that I need Him in order to remain sane without acting out.

May He give us a sober and sane day.

I understand what you're saying but it seems almost impossible to just say no when my body has such a strong compulsion to it. It didn't feel like i would die if i didn't do it, it felt like my body was forcing my hand there and I wasn't strong enough to stop it. It felt like I hadn't eaten in 2 weeks and suddenly there was bread in front of me only I wasn't supposed to eat it. What can I do to make the compulsion a little weaker?

So if it is impossible then maybe you should admit defeat, that you cannot on your own.

And if you are powerless why are you counting how many pictures you can handle?

I think it might help me to know that the difference between staying clean and falling flat is just a few pictures.

Seriously, what do you do when the urge is so strong? In practical terms.

Chesky,

Perhaps you can tell the Doc a play-by-play account, in practical terms, as to what should he do when he sits down in front of his computer. He walked the streets of England, saw beautiful women with all color hair, most of them were dressed provocatively that they caught his attention even though his glasses were off, his brim was down, and he was concentrating on Reb Akiva Eiger's pshat in the machlokes Tosfos and the Rashba regarding bitul b'rov. He is now trying to study, and orange hair woman # 1 enters his mind. He blocks it out, saying, "Get da hell outta my life." back to studying. Green Mohawk woman # 2 dressed in black with spiked boots enters his head. The doc says nicely, "Please move away; you are disturbing my studies." She obliges. He studies so more, and now the entire Leicester square female contingency is prancing around on his computer screen. They invade his study. They close his books. One of them even closes the door.

Doc turns to Chesky, or to God, or to whomever, and says what?

Thank you so much

I am powerless so i stay out of trouble.

I cannot take on something which is way more powerful than myself.

I surrender. I raise the white flag BEFORE the fight.

I cannot touch lust.

I have no idea if i would survive seeing a "few" pictures.

But my track record has pretty much proven to me that playing with a few pictures is a sure fall.

Believe me that my head tells me all what I am hearing from you. That is why I cannot do it on my own.

Chesky,
I think you wrote that as I was writing mine.
Some of what you wrote answers it, but some doesn't.

I am asking for the Doc.
I asked similar questions for myself before.

Today, I personally do not need the answers.

Thank you so much

well. Im wondering how you hope to get to the tall roof and what does it really mean to be on top ?
I just called my friend now and he talked me through why im having these urges. Today its because I have work to do that is not particularly exciting.
But writing here on this forum helps me to share my problems with you guys and is easing the strain on my heart.
Thanks