Bruce asked London: "What can you see in my posts that I should be grateful for?"

If I may weigh in: for starters, if pornography is difficult for you to avoid, you are, obviously, able to see; those who are blind don't face this particular test.

I have tried to remind myself that the Talmudic principle of Meegoo should apply here (albeit, not an exact application):
G-d doesn't owe us anything, and could have made us blind.  G-d, therefore, has a Meegoo: since he could have made us blind, the least we can do is to avoid abusing the gift of sight.

Not to be too silly, but to remind ourselves of this Meegoo, why not post a picture of "Mr. Magoo" near our computers?  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Magoo.  No one will have a clue why it's there, but it can remind us that eyesight is a gift, and that none of us want to be like Mr. Magoo, who won't ever be faced with the test of pornography.

Not Bad!
I normally hate puns even though I have a bit of a knack for them, but this one is the best I've ever seen.
I like it.

Thanks - I never did share that with anyone.  Remember, though, that it's a pun with a purpose (maybe that's why you liked it!).

Dear Bruce

Your challange to me reminds me of when I first got into reocvery my therapist asked me to give her a list of 10 things that I am grateful for, and I was stumped I could not think of one, that how closed off my mind was, but as for you here goes:
1. Your'e alive
2. You write you have friends / room mates.
3. You are extremly articulate
4. You are very intellingent - (stright A's)
5. You have found the recovery path at a very young age
6. You are studying
7. You have your entire life ahead of you
8. You spent 2 years in Israel

That's just from reading your posts, I am sure that if I were to get to know you better I could write a lot more.  I have found that for me developing an "atittude of gratidue" is one of the cornerstones of my recovery, I have so much in my life that Hashem has bestowed on me, but when I am acting out I cannot see His blessings in my life all I can see is what I don't have.  There are so many people out there who are sick with this illness and are suffering a living hell, I am so grateful to Hashem that just for today I do not need to live a life like that, that Hashem allowed His Grace to come into me to get recovery.  I hear at meetings that recovery is a gift from Hashem, that I can do teshuva / make a living ammends for my past what a blessing.  The worst days in recovery are 10 x better now then the best days when I was acting out.

Keep coming back
London

there is a beautiful VORT from the REBBE REB ZISHA zT"l

it says in TEHILLIM .KI HILLEL  RASHA AL TAAVAS NAFSHO
(meaning a raasha will praise himself with his taavos explanation not necessary)

Says the heilige REBBE REB ZISHA a person will have FALSE humility in order to feed his Lust.He will keep himself as humble as Hillel to fulfill taavos nafsho.

This is a classic chsidishe vort, enjoy it.

It has a very practical lesson when a person feels insignificant he has no guard to prevent him from doing an aveira because he is insignificant.

I know this is not a forum on religion or a forum on chassidus.If I may say one small statement the BAAL SHEM TOV taught us that EVERYONE IS PRECIOUS.
He is special his avodah is precious his tafkid in life can only be fulfilled by himself.

BRUCE HEILIGE TZADDIK ,TOOT YOUR HORN GIVE YOURSELF A PAT On THE BACK!!!

H&H
bardichev

I'm not so sure I understand that. Maybe an example would clear it up.

I must now admit that I fell today. I will eventually start a daily log on this site, when I feel ready to take on the 90 challenge, but this is my little corner of the site for now so I have to admit it here, and I have to admit it to stay accountable. It hasn't even been three whole days since last time.

Bruce, three days of saying "no" weighed against one fall - that's not too bad. You have the upper hand, slowly but surely you'll break free. Read the handbooks and stick with us, you can do this. and keeping honest about your falls is the first step.

yes Bl"N tomorrow

sheva yipol tzaddik vikom

h&h
b

I just printed out the 90 day chart last night. It was midnight and it takes me a while to get to the printers on campus from where I live, so I thought "no, I'll just do it tomorrow when I'll be over there anyway". But the problem is I've been in the same building every day since even before I joined this site and I had told myself the same thing more than once. So I knew that HAD TO GO DO IT RIGHT THEN AND THERE because otherwise, who knows how long I would have pushed it off for?
So now that I have the chart physically sitting there on my desk, I have no excuse not to start filling it in with big checks. I haven't officially started yet, but you will know when I do. I'll start a new thread in the Wall of Honor section.

I'm gonna make it. You'll see.

as they say in am-reyka

YES WE CAN!!!!!!!
h&H
b

Bruce, you will prove to us that you are made of the "right" stuff. I know you will.

Hi Bruce new guy

I posted this in your thread a few days back you asked me for explanation

Here it is

All people have middos (attributes) some positive some negative. Again all people no matter what faith have middos
Only people have middos animals have behavior patterns which we see from chazal that we can liar certain middos from them. Tznius from cats Boldness from a leopard etc.. But only humans have intellect to actually judge cause and affect to see the next move on the chess game so we use our Middos either good or bad to do everything we do.

ALL people have middos YET we as Jews are the only nation as a whole that have GOOD MIDDOS as part of our DNA.
So let me am very clear non-Jews have good middos too. We have recently seen one of the righteous gentiles of the world save a baby in Mumbai. My Grandmother was saved in the Holocaust by righteous gentile.

We as Jews inherited from our forefathers GOOD MIDDOS DNA.There is no reason to feel guilty about the fact that we got something extra from HASHEM .For we also got a tremendous responsibility from Hashem which is to live a life that one can try t perfect himself and live in a way that he portrays to himself and the world that he embodies good MIDDOS character traits that are similar to the way HASHEM acts towards all the people of the world.

Having said all this Let us take the most important MIDAAH.Humility .I know it is the most important Middah for The Ramba"n says in his timeless letter that Humility is the key middah that leads to all other good middos and to Fear of G-d
And to Olam HaBAAh. (Read the Iggeres Haramban it is a MUST!!)

Humility is so key that Hashem says that one who is not humble is as if he is kicking away my feet. Another Gemara tells us and we all know this from our own interpersonal experiences "one who is haughty is not accepted even by his own family".So in order to serve Hashem one needs to go in the way of G-d with humility.

Now there are times that one has to put a portion of his humility aside and build up a BOLDNESS of KEDUSHA.
That is called Raising ones heart in the way of Hashem.One must be proud to serve Hashem Proud to be part of the chosen people. Proud to be able to take even itsty bitsy baby steps to get closer to HASHEM.

One of the classic modus operandi of the evil inclination, is to use humility as a negative attribute. He can convince a person that they are meaningless their lives are empty no one really cares about them they are down .So if you are so not important what big ripple affects will your aveira have. What big satisfaction can Hashem have from little me any how. Self esteem is not SEFISHNESS.

I know I went a bit long .I’m sorry. I tried to fuse some classic ideas from mussar AND Chassidus .

Humble and happy
bardichev

OK thanks for the clarification. I thought you meant something like that.

OK folks, I have to shamefully announce yet again that I had a fall this weekend. Except this was the biggest ever. I will not go into details. Perhaps it is the final push of the Y'H before I start the 90 day challenge. He knows I'll make it, so he's trying to delay it. Did a good job, too. But when I get hellbent on something I ALWAYS see it through to the end. I don't quit, I don't give up or let up until it's through.

I think another, major part of the problem is that I am confounding this particular issue (addiction) in my mind with my personal religious issues (and there are many as some of you know) when this really has very little if not absolutely nothing to do with religion whatsoever. It's an issue of addiction, not religion or issur/heter. But when the two get confused, then it's easy to set off a vicious cycle where I fall in one which leads to a fall in the other, and so on.

I can't live like this anymore.

Dear Bruce, you hit the nail on the head. Nothing to do with religion. You can see this in Dov's amazing posts throughout this forum (and in the daily chizuk e-mail lists - see yesterday's #497). Since you have fallen lower than before, let's call this "rock bottom" - from where you can only go UP.

Is there anyway you could join an SA group in your area? That would be your best bet.

We are waiting to see you succeed. I CHALLENGE YOU TO TAKE THE 90-DAY LEAP OF FAITH.

Jump on the train and don't look back!