stillgoing wrote:


The expression here goes'Whatever works' If he can use this idea to prevent a fall then that's what's meant by dayon shematzilos osanu min hachait. It may be straight out lust but that is something he needs to work on regardless, and he certainly should try to make his experience with his wife as wholesome as possible.

waydown wrote:


Two choices!

There is a third.

cordnoy wrote:


This meant....Stop with the religion stuff!

I thought maybe you were trying to scare away a vampire.

Cordnoy,

your 3rd choice which I'll take to mean surrender is not a magic bullet. Its a process. Perhaps it works for you intsantanicly. But for me it doesn't. My wife does. Perhaps I'll follow your plan in the long term. But right now I am trying to avoid a fall. I pull all the tools out of my tool box. Channeling whatever the heck you guys want to call it lust, love,sexual desire etc.. helps me not fall.
Still going, the scenrio is very simple. When I itch I tend to think alot more about women. When I think about women my mind wonders in all territories including porn or flirting with women. When I tell myself hold off on feeding that itch because tonight I will feed it with love, I won't feed it during the day. Its that simple and it works for me.
As as a side note, None of you guys have addressed my question. Why care care about looks if its all love? Why can't one marry unless he sees his wife. And I think most normal rabbonim would tell someone if you dislike a girl's looks don't marry her. (Unless the guy turns down every girl who is not a size 0 and blonde. But a normal guy..) I think its clear that lust plays a role. Just it should be channeled towards love.
And whatever you want to call it. My wife likes when I "itch" over her good looks. Perhaps its not the case by others. Or perhaps for some addicts its too hard to channel lust so just chuck it. I am not knocking that approach. But for me it seems to work and it makes my marraige healthier.
One more poniter, guess what my kid woke up sick so my night activity did not work out. But i won't get upset about that. It helped me thru the day.
Again sorry cordnoy I am way over my 140 twitter feed characters.

Re stop with the religon stuff,

Wrong I won't stop. I believe very strongly that it is what makes my life unbearable. Its important to realize that we are who we are because of our religon. Its impossible to just use the addiction stuff without realizng that its religon that helps you make it unbearable. And thats a good thing.

While some point out goyim join too. But far less in terms of percentages than jews. Thats because religon plays an integral role.

And religon will get me out of this mess. I just don't believe in some abra cadabra higher power phycology lingo. It has to make sense. I don't follow magicains. It makes sense because of my religious stuff

Your equation of looks = lust is false. Looks is one of the factors that contributes to love.

waydown wrote:


I had a short spell where I felt the same, but I assume many guys on this website feel exactly the opposite - that their life IS managable not only because of religion, and their Lust is unmanagable.
In other words, they want to stop it so they can live their life. You don't sound like you actually want to stop since to you Lust = Life, only there's this religious thing in the way that is making your life unmanageable.

AA wrote:


When an alcoholic is sober, he will search for solutions because when he's not drugged he knows what's right.
If when one is sober he still says that Alcohol / Lust is a way of life (if not for religion), then perhaps this needs to be addressed.

All the best my friend

Cordnoy,

Come on lets not take it away from the pashat pshat. One must appreciate his wife's external looks at least when he marries them because hashem knows humans are subject to lust.

And that fact that most of our wives invest lots of time and money into looking good (even putting on make up which is totally external) is not just so they should have a bachianta inner look. Its because the norm is a man has a physcail desire for his wife's external looks too.

Markz,

Wrong I want to stop lust because the truth is deep inside that lust ruins ones life and is wrong. What makes me see that truth even though at the current moment my lust addiction is craving is religon. Without religon I wouldn't see or take notice of that truth necessarly. If I weren't religous then perhaps I would look at the trees not the forest and say lust= life= instant gratification.

Also would lust = life in a physical sense if I lived in an enviornment where chasing after lust is more incorpoarted and understood. What I am getting at is, the reason lust is so unmanagable for the masses is because you are jewish too. Now that mode is part of ones life. And it makes ones whole life not managable.

I want to stop it so I can live my life. Part of living my life is being a jew since I believe in hashem.

ok i am opening my beak: it seems that people are saying their lives are unmanageable BECAUSE of lust or wtvr. the SA tradition is that our LIVES were unmanageable and then we need to medicate with lust. just throwing this out there.

Sholomo,

Thats an interesting approach. It sounds like you are suggesting lust is an outlet for somethingelse. We don't get addicted to lust just because lust has its own instant gratification of it own. I wonder if thats true across the board. And if yes do that mean you need a social worker to help you with that root problem in additon to SA?

waydown wrote:


According to SA or any anonymous program, the drug is the SOLUTION not the PROBLEM. our lives were the problem. and that is why therapy complements program work because we can deal with our "stuff". i would safely say that every addict has emotional issues that can be worked on with therapy. HOWEVER, going to therapy will NOT keep an addict sober as history has proved time and again. SA is effective for addicts (amongst other things), and there are other tools effective for non-addicts.

I just want to be clear about my religous debate. its clear to me that many areas in my physical life are unmanagable with lust. For starters I am not being as succesful as I can in work because my mind wanders. And I am a danger to my wife & kids who need me. But would that alone without my conciouness without the fact that I am not living up to halalcha, the torah and even more my jewish moral values be enough? I don't know. Because part of me is being frum so my unmanagable is all mixed together. But I would venture to say its the mesh of things.

waydown wrote:


I don't agree but it will need to wait.

B'hatzlachah to you