Hello All

Chag Sameach. I am happy to say that I am around 60 days clean of p*rn. I feel that I can go on forever. I have not used the wall of honour as I think that the more I stay away from the internet, the greater my chances are to stay clean. I think that I will be clean for a lengthy period of time perhaps even some years. However, since I have stopped the p*rn, I have really struggled to cope with other issues. P8rn suppressed may ability to deal with issues becasue it took centre stage and basically suppressed the real problems I am having such as being too self critical and flogging myself emotionally for mistakes that I make. I have started going to therapy and my therapist is helping me to deal with these character and personality based issues. I (perhaps wrongly), do not feel addicted at all to p*rn. I know not to believe in myself until I die (Avot) but it just does not seem like an issue anymore (that is where I am wrong). 90 days will happen, it is just a matter of time and the most perplexing thing is that I just don't feel like porn. It seems ludicrous to take a depressant pill or agent (p8rn). P*rn is a depression button and why would one want to do it?

Just a nice thought. We often are critical about ourselves for having a certain feeling (anxiety, embarrasment etc) and very often we think that emotions should and can be quashed. Because of this opinion, we constantly try to fight our emotions. That just makes the problems worse as it leads to self criticism and perhaps too much of it (as in my case). Once we know that we can't control the emotions we feel we stop fighting against their existence. That lessens the burden of carrying the emotion because the emotion is legitimate. Our issue is not the emotions we feel but rather how we react to them.