#5: Don’t actively count the days -

I’m not really for the 90-Day Challenge for a couple of reasons.

1) It keeps you focused on trying to “make it through” each day when really we should just be living our lives.
2) It could give us the false expectation that as soon as we make it to 90, we are cured. As guys, it is normal to have sexual curiosities and cravings, we will live with that for the rest of our lives. Giving into those cravings in an inappropriate way, at any point in our lives, has the potential to bring us back to square one.

I recommend writing your start date and time somewhere and once in a while, or when someone asks you how far along you are, you can look it up and make the calculations. This could encourage you and the questioner to keep on going and to be thankful to Hashem for giving you the strength to get that far.

#6 : Be aware of positive changes -

After a few days, you are probably noticing some of the positive effects of being clean. Savor the good feelings and remember them. Is your relationship with your wife or other people you deal with on a regular basis improving? With me, my wife began noticing the change in me before I even let her know I was working on myself, and she said so. When the little cravings would try to get at me, I would tell them that I was much happier being clean and promptly dismissed them. On the flip side, I would...

Remember the negative consequences of giving in -

Remember how falling would really make you feel after the short-lived high, the impact it would make on your relationships, the way it made you feel like you were living a double life, etc. It's just not worth it.

#7: If you know Alef, teach Alef -

The Lubavitcher Rebbe would tell people that nobody knows too little to teach others. If you know Alef, he would say, teach Alef. Reach out to others, if something works for you and it could help others, rather than keeping it to yourself, share it with others who it could help. We are often unaware of the wellsprings we have inside of us. Often when someone asks me about something they're having trouble with, I ask them what they would tell an imaginary friend who just logged on with that exact issue. Usually their advice is really good! When we teach others, we are teaching ourselves. When we help others, we are helping ourselves. Each time we share how we should be looking at a situation, we are reinforcing it in our minds.This is one of the first things I started doing and it has helped me tremendously.

skeptical wrote:

Not really, you could give "90,000 Skeptical Reasons To Say NO to acting out...."

#8: Everything is hashgacha pratis -

There are guys I speak to on here who are down because they are single and want so badly to get married.
There are other guys who wish they were still single because they long for the freedom that being single allowed them, or because they wished they could deal with their issues without it affecting their wife.
I've met guys who so badly want kids.
I've met guys who long for the days when they had uninterrupted quiet time with their spouse.

In short, the grass is always greener on the other side.

Things not going the way you had envisioned it?
Smile and relax, it's ok.

Everything that happens in this world is Hashem's doing and everything Hashem does is good. We think we know how things should be. Hashem knows how things should be. We have just one piece of the jigsaw puzzle, Hashem sees the whole picture. Everything is being orchestrated precisely for our own good. If we're in a situation, even if it's a difficult one, we can relax knowing that the sole purpose of the situation we are in is for us to grow.

Be the best you can be in the situation you're in!

skeptical wrote:

I'm not a salesman, but BOY can I relate to this. Great illustration!

#9: The only person I can control is myself -

Sometimes the people around us behave in ways that make us angry or upset. Sometime women on the street aren’t dressed properly. We can’t control how they behave. We can only control how we react to them. When it comes to people we deal with who get us down (a wife, parents, siblings, for instance), sometimes it just takes some understanding and putting ourselves in their shoes. It won’t necessarily change things, but it could help us tolerate the behavior, and respond appropriately. If it’s a woman on the street, we have the choice to drink in the sight or to look away. If the situation is one that we are incapable of changing, we can remember what was written above regarding hashgacha pratis and grow from the situation.

So sweet!

#10: Ivdu es Hashem b’simcha! -

It’s a very big mitzvah to be happy and to serve Hashem with joy. In fact, it’s just impossible to serve Hashem properly when we’re down. The yetzer harah (the selfish part of us) is very much aware of this and therefore, it doesn’t really care so much if we sin, what it wants is for us to get all sad about it. Why? Because sadness breeds more reason to make ourselves feel better and the YH always has good ideas of how to go about doing that... (What he conveniently lets us forget is how miserable we feel after!)

Feel like acting out? Find something to smile, laugh, be happy about, and give the YH the boot!

The post I am about to write is not one I looked forward to writing. I even debated whether or not I would. But I have spoken with several people and have decided that b’ezras Hashem, it will do more good than harm.

I am currently visiting at my parent’s house, a visit that I am only able to make 3 times a year. Before I left on my trip, I was chatting with a GYE friend and he warned me of the dangers that would face me here. I pretty much dismissed the warnings. He warned me about being complacent and I waved those concerns away as well. I really wasn’t being complacent, I told myself, I have plenty of opportunity at home and I make the right choices there, being in a different place shouldn’t make much difference, right? Besides, I visited my parents a few months ago and I was fine then. What I failed to remember was that the last time I made the visit, I placed a big emphasis on mentally preparing myself for a challenge. In the past, coming home to my parents meant falling usually on the same day as my arrival. Just being aware of that before I got there kept me on high alert.

So this time I didn’t really prepare myself. And this time I did fall, not within the first day or two but not too far after that. I was left alone, I let my guard down with regards to shmiras einayim and then I wanted more. I had the right tools to stop myself had I wanted to, but my want for more was stronger and I’m embarrassed to admit that I decided to ignore them all.

So now I was in a quandary. Do I tell my wife and do I post on here that I fell? I had reasons not to.

My wife:
I didn’t want her to dread visiting my parents in the future with worries that I would fall again once getting there.
I didn’t want her to get suspicious any time I was alone.

Posting on the forum:
Would people think I’m a hypocrite for sharing what works for me if it obviously didn’t work for me?

The truth is that though I was embarrassed to post the last time I fell, it was easier to do so than this time. For one, I had made up beforehand that I would be open and honest if it would come to that. For another, I had been clean for 6 months before that fall. Last time, while I was also playing a coaching(?) role, I was mostly known to a select few, so while I was dreading admitting to them that I messed up after encouraging them all that time, I was still unknown to the vast majority of the site. Since then I’ve opened up on this thread way more than I had intended to.

But now I had a situation that needed a decision.

The act, by nature, is one that is done in hiding. I knew that if I were to continue to hide it I would continue doing it in hiding. I had to blow it right out into the open or I would never be able to pull myself out. So I decided that I had no choice but to tell my wife.

I was driving in the car and I told her that I needed to tell her something at risk of losing her trust. I then told her that I fell. She told me that telling her is what shows her she could trust me. She’s not interested in being a policeman anymore. She has come to realize that it’s not good for either of us.

Telling my wife helped me put it all behind me, but I still felt really uneasy. Do I tell the guys on GYE? What about the guys who are writing to me with their issues? Can I really help them if I’m going through my own stuff? My YH was working me over really well with the messages of self-doubt.

One thing I was able to do on a 1-to-1 chat was to tell the person on the other end that I was really able to relate to their feelings. I had just gone through a down day. It was easier to tell one person at a time that I had fallen the day before than to post it for everyone to see. I even told them about the debate in my mind of whether or not to post. They acknowledged the dilemma, but said that they appreciate posts like this as it shows that I’m human and am going through the same types of things as they are.

So here I am, being open and honest. I have made some mistakes and I fell.

Do I have all the answers? I don’t think anyone has all the answers. We are going through life learning from our successes and from our failures. I stand by my previous posts. Making them apart of our lives does help us live life. The problem is that I failed to follow them properly.

I let my guard down and that led to giving up my commitment, or vice versa. As mentioned, each moment is independent of the one before it and the ones following it. That commitment needs to be continuously be refreshed. I can’t rely on a commitment that was made before. We could put our YH to sleep, but if it’s woken up, it comes back full force. I allowed myself to get into that situation.

I’m human like everyone else here. I need to learn from my mistakes and move on. Actually, I need to move on and learn from my mistakes. I can’t stay where I am while I dwell on what went wrong. I need to keep moving forward and figure out what went wrong as I continue on with my life.

B’ezras Hashem, I will post my insights as they come.

I know how hard it was to post that, keep it up buddy and we're going to win for good

skeptical heres one person who doesnt think any less of you. the honesty in your post is intense and inspiring. youre not sitting up on a pedestal, youre admitting to your humanity. ive been going through a rough patch myself and youre post really touched me.
thank you for sharing and KOMT

To say that it touched me would be an understatement, I was really crying.

Just to verify what was said, nothing was deminished of you stature, and if anything; it just strengthened everything that you have been preaching until now, for most of it was about being honest with one's own situation and not kid oneself, you have just practiced that in it's full definition!!

The good news is that that was already in the past, TODAY is here, so KOT KOMT we're all with you (as you know), Right now we are clean!!

Kol Hakavod! honesty is the touchstone of getting better
keep on rocking and rolling
i admire you (and i'm not skeptical about it har har)

#11: Did you slip or fall? -

Just breathe, it’s ok. We’re working on a middah that in most cases has become an ingrained habit over many years. Though we’re trying, it’s a bit unrealistic to expect to change things completely overnight, or even in a few weeks or months. The minutes, days, or months are not lost. They are a huge accomplishment that we need to continue to build upon.

Take a moment to reflect. What worked, what didn’t work? What can you tweak to do better?

The important thing is to be thankful to Hashem for giving us the strength to achieve what we were able to achieve and ask for more strength to continue. Pick yourself up, wipe off the dust and keep on moving forward. B’ezras Hashem you will grow in ways you never imagined and your life will be the happiest it can be!