TheSicarioWarrior wrote on 29 Mar 2020 07:13:
Please somebody help. I am helpless against what is going on right now. With being stuck at home, I now have access (unknown to my parents) to unfiltered internet literally at my fingertips (I know the codes to my parents’ iPad/iPhone). I have no trouble during the day, but come nighttime, I fall. I stay up late watching the filth night after night. I previously was doing much better overall, but this is absolutely killing me. Please help.
This struggle is very normal, and everybody deals with it on some level or another. Having a desire for this doesn’t mean that there is anything negative about a person. We say twice daily in Shema, "do not explore inappropriate sights, after which you stray". The passuk is addressing every person in every generation. Even chashuve people and those who lived centuries ago had to deal with this issue. Likewise, when talking about this desire, Chazal tell us that a person’s nefesh craves it. Chazal aren’t referring specifically to bad people; they are addressing every single person. Do not condemn himself as being no good when you encounters a nisayon.
A good area that can positively impact this struggle is developing one’s overall self-control, without specifically targeting this issue. The reason for this is because when a person acts out, his fundamental problem is that he is lacking in his ability to withstand an urge; therefore, when he is faced with a difficult nisayon, he falls apart. By giving in to every ta’avah he has, a person allows the the yetzer hora to gain a hold over him. The person must therefore back-track and work on becoming a more disciplined person in general, someone who doesn’t always have to give in to every ta’avah that he has. Even if the nisayon of kedushah is too hard for him to withstand at this point, nonetheless, by working on his general self-control, he will be developing his ability to say “No”, and eventually, kedushah-related nisyonos will also become easier to resist.