I find the biggest problem i have is that my mind (especially after i have stopped for a few days) goes into automatic, and even if I do manage to think about what I am doing i cant seem to overcome it. If it occurs to me i will be alone in the house with a computer or alone in a room with newspaper...its as if a switch is turned on in my mind that i will mast-- and nothing I read or reasons not to do it that I have thought of before or even holy books that are in my hand (I.E. visual reminders which includes pictures of gedolim) or even the knowledge that my computer is loading this site on another page seems to help.even if i have decided not to touch the computer when I get home or to not open a newspaper again helps, all i need to do is see any of those things to be triggered. Now you might say well put a filter on youre computer and don't bring a newspaper into youre house. In my mind all of a sudden putting a filter on the home computer is the equivalent of admitting to the family i have a problem , and if I had the ometz to do that ( or the ability to withhold my imagination from exploring the possibilities of the akwardness that would create...) then I would have done that ages ago. and as far as newspapers /magazines go I am a soldier in the israeli army and cannot controll what others bring into the room ( just to make it clear i am not refering to dirty magazines, only to secular newspapers , B/H I am in a religious unit and stuff like that is not a problem) I find myself the onlyone awake at 3 in the morning and see a newspaper on the floor, and the rest is history.

Aside from that another major problem i face is yeush in the sense that I know there will be situations where I am pitted up unfairly against this Yetzer Hara, I will be tired alone... we all have to admit there are times of weakness  and in those times you will find yourself alone, and even strong ideas you may or may not be able to bring forth in youre mind dont seem to help. So i find that even when reading wonderfully inspiring ideas, somewhere in the back of my mind they seem irrelevant being as they may not or possibly cannot come to my aid when i need them most.

Those are my 2 biggest problems, those and the fact i only have access to a computer once every 10-14 days. so if anyone has any suggestions for things to read or shiurim to download while i do have access to a computer or can bring this post to the attention of someone they think can help I would be most gratefull.


Thanks for reading  please help

hi yehuda -

sounds like rather than being the master of your own house, you have become a slave to your desires...beeen there, done it, workign through it.

its very hard to break free alone.

the forum is a great place to start.

duvid chaims 12-step (on the telephone 12 o clock eastern time - see announcements for phone numbers) is another starting point.

as far as sites with shirium or help you when feeling at a low - there are many.
the ones I like are:

www.iawaken.org

www.lessonsintanya.com

both have short shiurim which my lustfilled brain can handle.

one day at a time brother.

keep on climbing...


the darkness will give way to the LIGHT!

you can do it!

dov in israel

First of all - welcome!

The fact that you joined this site says a lot about how much you want to grow, and that's fantastic!

My personal opinion, though - shiurim and good, and important. However, you already know what's right, you just have trouble doing it (like the rest of us!).

Have you read the handbooks? They supply a lot of practical tips for ending this unwanted behavior.

The key is to realize that you're not alone in this fight, and it's a battle you CAN win!

scroll down on the "Torah" link on this page: www.guardureyes.com/GUE/Time/time.asp for plenty of shiurim to download...

and read through the thousands of articles on our websites when you have access to the computer. For example, here is just one page with 50 chizuk e-mails on it.

Yehuda,

No simple answers, but it seems that for many there are two steps: Sur Mera (leaving behind the bad) and Aseh Tov (doing good). Every step you can take to leave behind the bad is getting you closer to the finish line. But that is not enough. You've also got do focus on the good. Doing good things will 1) bring you closer to Hashem, 2) pull you away from wasting time on stuff you should not, and 3) to the extent you give yourself credit for what good you do (and this may just mean spending time recognizing good things you already do like defend E"Y) build your self esteem which will limit the amount you need this stuff.

Best

You are in a tough spot. I don't know how much this has affected your view of women over time, but if it has not already, you should know that it does affect it, and that women can sense that "using" attitude even in minute amounts. So if you are married it may take a toll later, even leading to divorce, and if you are not married it's even harder because your future wife will have this as her first impression of you.

I am saying this to bring up the issue of motivation. Depending on your situation, it may seem to you that you don't have much reason to fight this. That is not true. So know that every time you do this you make it less likely that your present or future marriage will work out. Women know.

Assuming that you can internalize this deterrent and you become convinced that you must change, you can then get on with the business of how to change it. Since you use the newspapers and you can't get rid of them you are going to have to get creative about how to keep away from them. If it's not possible you may need to make the neder that I made: regret and confess (i.e. do teshuva, as per hilchos teshuva of the Rambam) after a lude thought or after looking at an erva, "as soon as possible". This means that if you had a chance to do it and did not you must say "I am sorry I did not teshuva asap" because you are in violation of the neder. You should put a time limit on it. Maybe you could do it until you get out of the army, and then re-evaluate. Be careful to say that you are not making a neder to speak (to confess) at such a time when the halacha (or the army!) requires you to be quiet, e.g. during Pesukei d'Zimra or other parts of davening. At the expiration of the neder Hashem will probably exact a Korban, as in the case of a nazir.

Note that your yetzer ha-ra will increase with the neder (I am sorry) but doing teshuva will also be possible thanks to the neder (just really tedious.)

Note that regret has to be there - not just the words.

If you missed teshuva and have had 100 lude thoughts since, you may experience a stinging, scary wake-up call, since Hashem will have to bring you back in line. When you are aroused the rasha personality is in charge, so that is needed to make the arousal subside.

If you have been doing this for many years, you may need to keep it up for a long time to replace the sinful behavior with acceptable ones.

Hopefully you haven't been doing this for long and just saying "I am sorry I had a lude thought" will suffice, without the need for a neder.

firstly i would like to thank those who took the time to read and reply to my post, it really leaves one with the feeling that someone cares. And that i have begun recovery.

The most important thing that happened to me  is the realization of what I/We are up against. It is not the need to masterbate that entices us to look, it is the looking itself that is addictive, and masturbation is merely a peak of those desires. We desire to let our eyes feed on an image. The best example is how we derive actual pleasure just by looking at a woman passing by on the street and continuing to stare as she passes by. Those few seconds are literally no different than the first few bites into a steaming slice of pizza which are eaten while still inhaling. During those first bites the mind is focused on and is thinking about nothing else other than that pleasure. masturbation is an extreme example of that because it requires your mind to focus so intensely on an image in order to imagine you are actually doing something to that image and that that image is responding to what you are doing, a tremendous amount of imaginative energy is put in to fooling your mind you are actually there and actually doing something which then brings about the result of masturbation. It is the ultimate actualization of that feeding, to reach that point of ecstasy you have to completely wrap your mind around an image and let it totally consume your conscience. It is that that we are addicted to. and only with that realization does it truly dawn on us that allowing ourselves to look at an image,or more correctly to feed on an image is just as bad as masturbating, because it is a less extreme version of the same thing. We can no longer convince ourselves that as long as we are not masturbating its not bad, that the fall is only when we have given in and masturbated. No you have given in to your addiction just as seriously if you have allowed your mind to feed on an image as when you have masturbated to an image. Just like a drug addict cannot ( or must not) fool himself into thinking, its not so bad its not a fall, its only a joint its not like I did heroine or anything, I think we would agree that both light and hard drugs are a fall for someone trying to free himself from a drug addiction, and if their mindset is not so then they dont really have a chance of recovery.

I wish I had written that, because it reflects my own conclusions exactly.

yehudaslegacy wrote on 14 Apr 2010 04:52:


perfect summary of my 'adult' life!!

You know that horrible feeling you get if your plans to masturbate don't happen .... (example: your laptop catches on fire...etc)?

OK that happened to me the other day.  So I'm wandered about the house, really annoyed, and after a few minutes it occured to me.  Hmmm, what would I be doing RIGHT NOW if a few moments ago I'd have mast----ted?

I'd be cleaning up.  oooh....Yikes.  Disgusting.    And it occured to me, that for the first time I actually found something better to do than mastur--!!  I realize I hate that disgusting side effect of it.  Yet I never EVER think about it.  Thank you yetzer!

So the next time (and it willbe soon!) I'm going to try and say.... "in a few minutes do I want to be mopping myself up...and concealing disgusting evidence ... or... would I just like to be walking around the house, in zero discomfort or unpleasentness?" 

And why am I writing this obvious stupid nonsense?  Sorry - don;t know!

You're righting it so you'll remember it more clearly next time, and also so you can share the idea with everyone else, so we can gain from it!

You should always write this stuff out it really helps seeing it on paper and out in the open! and what you say is completely true! keep posting don't ever say oh people already know this so i won't say it! like right now i had an epiphany, i would also get in to an uncomfortable mess if i one time i did not clean up properly another reason not to mas***ate. 

Chazak Amenu wrote on 14 Apr 2010 21:42:


Another reason not to do that is that it's going to come out when you get married and could cause your wife to hold a grudge towards you. So if you want a good marriage you don't want to train yourself to objectify your source of pleasure. It took me a long time to finally understand this point. I thought it was just feminist propaganda ..

I should mention that while there is certainly truth in what you're saying, yehudaslegacy, I do feel that I would adjust one point. I agree that looking is the beginning of the fantasy. However, on many, many levels, it's not the same as a thought fantasy.

For one thing, thoughts are much harder to control than actions. For another, when we actually Ma*****, we're getting physically addicted because of the physical pleasure, and the physiological response of our bodies and brains.

I do agree, though, that we can't let our thoughts run wild, for a whole bunch of reasons, not least because it'll eventually lead us back to the more extreme versions of the fantasy.