Honestly, I don't care who pushes me in recovery whether it's a neurologist, Christian, a Muslim, an agnostic, or whoever else under the sun as long as I recover. That's the important thing: Recovery!

So if this neurologist helped you daven, Baruch Hashem!!!! YOU DAVENED WELL!!!! That's what counts! Maybe a dentist will help you praise Hashem for your teeth or a therapist to love yourself.

As long as it helps us recover, we should welcome any help we can get, even if it comes from a goy

Thanks Doc and Daniel!!

Whatever works!!

BTW, we have to realize and accept the fact that I've been saying the words of shemonah esrei three times a day for like 5 years before I really cared about what I was saying, and by then it was much of a habit. Changing that really isn't easy and there shouldn't be unrealistic expectations.

One thing that is helping me and was suggested by my rebbe is to talk to Hashem in our own words and my rebbe suggested doing so in every brachah of shemoneh esrei!! To say in my own words something relevant to that brachah!!

I'll tell you the truth, I haven't done it much, it feels very real takes a lot of effort and I'm not always in the mood of facing reality that much and the same with just talking during the day. But the more that I do it, the more I see that my "normal" davening has more meaning and I can focus more on what I'm saying.

(just btw, I have a hunch that the reason we have such a hard time with davening is because if we were to say the same things that we are saying, in our own words, it wouldn't look anything like what it says in the siddur. That automatically makes it a bit less peronal for us, hence the lack of interest...just my opinion there is a practical idea for that, if anyone is interested)

Yankel, why don't you (and all of us) start with one bracha and put it to our own words. I feel that saying 18 brachos in English and Hebrew is unrealistic for is right now. Let's start with one. I actually do it in Modim every morning (except I missed it this morning oddly enough) I thank Hashem for 3 things: it could be helping me get a good grade on a paper, the beautiful mountains, blue sky, my parents etc

But Thata just me. Maybe the bracha for refuah really reasonates with someone or the shma koleynu.

Anyway, I think it's a brilliant idea. You have a smart rebbe!

This is a great quote. "There’s absolutely no such thing in the world as giving up." This makes me feel hopeful. Unfortunately, buddies of mine that like metal music don't feel the same. It's funny but if they really believed this quote, I guess they could get out of their deep depression. (One cause of their depression could chronic masturbation because they don't see any meaning in the world anyway.) It just bothers me that some people are so low and they hate the world so much. I feel very offended by metal listeners because they don't respect anyone at all. Anyway, I just felt like hating on them, but I still think I'm right. "The Zohar says that there can be no light if it doesn't come first through the darkest darkness" This quote is all cute, but why do I feel like sometimes the world just doesn't have any hope. I don't mean to be pessimistic though, I'm sorry.

I have some thoughts about powerlessness and simcha but they're not forming coherently in my head so I'll just leave this instead (as always you might want to lower the volume):

I think my attitude now is something like this:

Yes I'm powerless over lust, but that doesn't mean I can't party like it's 2004

I like the second better.......first has too much going on.

Keep those tracks coming!!!

and KOMT!!!

I've had a shift in my mentality regarding surrender.

I used to think that I need to surrender lust because it's stronger than me and beats me all the time, making me miserable. I need to get rid of it. I don't want it in my life any more!

For me it feels a bit fake. I do want it in my life. If I could I would surround myself with pretty girls like a Roman emperor. That's not why I want to surrender it.

When I think about all the amazing things Hashem has given me my mind boggles. Bli ayin hora He's given me health and happiness and a home and food and clothes and opportunities. He's even given me a wife. But she has just one type of look and figure, and I'm just so self-obsessed that I want to be able to experience many different types of looks and figures. I'm like a stroppy teenager who's not grateful at all. Hashem has given me so much and rather than being grateful I want even more. Like when you refuse to give something to a child and suddenly everything you've given them in the past is forgotten, you're just mean and horrible cos you won't give something he wants.

Imagine my parents gave me £10,000 just like that. I would be so grateful that I would want to give them something back. I could't give them £10,000 but at the very least I would buy a bottle of wine, some chocolates and a card. Just to say thanks.

They could easily have given £9,980 and bought themselves some wine and chocolates but that's not the point. The point is that they wanted to give a present and I would want to reciprocate by giving them a token of my gratitude.

Surrender is a gift to Hashem. I do want lust in my life, I would love to be able to sit and watch porn all day and night. But I want to give this to Hashem as a token of my appreciation for everything He's given me. So I'm giving Him all the girls with small x and big y as a present, as a thank you for everything you do.

I wish I could say this just once and that would be that, but I know that this has to be an ongoing thing. That's where the rest of the program comes in.

Dr. thats a gevalldige post!!!

i too feel that way all the time, i really do want to lust all day and night, but as you wrote in the post we owe it to hashem and we need to give it up,

kol tuv and KOMT!!!

Your post was so honest and beautiful and inspiring.
It is wonderful that you can be so beautifully honest with yourself.
I want to refer you to a post I wrote, but please don't take it as a disagreement to what you are saying but as an eye opening addition which I think will be encouraging to you.

See post HERE:
guardyoureyes.com/forum/4-On-the-Way-to-90-Days/72604-Tatti-Tatti-please-just-for-today?limit=15&start=390#233542
Scroll down to my first post on that page.

It's a bit long but very fundamental and ends on an encouraging note.

I heard something gevaldig from Captain Steve today about being don lecaf zechus (regarding others favorably).

He said that it's easy for Hashem to be don lecaf zechus because He can see the future and He knows that this person will get better, he will have his tikkun. So a person who does something wrong is not a bad person, it's just that he's still on his path towards perfection, he hasn't reached it yet. It's not that he's a rosho, it's just that he hasn't become a tzaddik yet.

Once again patience is a virtue.

This is for Yankel (the song not the comment )

Just did my first step with my sponsor. Took about 2 hours. I'm really tired but relieved.

Woohoo!!!!

WOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

(for the song, thank you!!!!!!!!!)

and for the last post

GEVALDIGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!

One step at a time!!!

KUTGW!!!

Every day is a day to work the program, but I think maybe some days are for progressing in it and some are just for laying low and maintaining what you've got. Some days negative sobriety is all you can do. First do no harm.

A few days ago I felt I was growing. I did my first step and had a few conversations about G-d.

But shabbos was hard. It was hot, there were girls everywhere and I felt very strong urges. For about 6 hours straight. I felt this big empty hole in me and I felt the need to fill it. The words of the White Book very rarely seem so true when I'm actually in it, but this time I could feel what was happening. Looking out the window hoping an attractive woman would walk past "please connect with me and make me whole! Oh, you don't want to give it to me? Then I'll take it from you in the most undetectable way possible, in my mind. We will share a moment that you will never even know about. But I'd know what we shared and that connection will fill the whole in the pit of my stomach."

But of course it doesn't. I need something more substantial to fill it. I've volunteered to do some service in the community, but they're still looking for something for me. I hope they get back to me soon. I need to feel useful. I need to feel like a real person.

In the meantime negative sobriety will have to do. Boruch Hashem for my filter. without it I'm sure I would not have fallen yet, but I would have fed the obsession so much that it would be a huge fight with the y"h for hours, maybe days, before his inevitable victory.

I wouldn't be here talking about a whole to fill, I'd be talking about my valiant heroic battle and how proud Hashem must be of me for fighting it, as if fighting it makes me a tzaddik.

I did that for a long time. Peeking just a bit here and there, waiting for the self-induced urges to come on so strong that I would have to fight like crazy, so I could feel like a big tzaddik and a martyr, and not even have to feel so bad when I lost and acted out. After all, who could manage such urges? No-one. That's exactly the point, so don't give them to yourself!

Someone was once in court for drink driving. He claimed he should not be culpable for it because he was not in control of himself, I mean, he was drunk when he did it!! That's no excuse. If you think you might get in a car after you've gotten yourself good and drunk then you can't drink. By the time you're drunk and wondering if you can drive home it's too late.

Anyway, I think today might be a similar sort of day. I've just got to get on with my work and not fight. Recovery begins with one sober hour.

Just saw this: