Dear "o",
I, for one, actually have no
significant arguments with you. As I tried to explain earlier, I am simply in the business of emphasizing certain
protim because my painful experience shows me that the main issue for many of these otherwise ehrlicher people is
not the "banner of Torah" - but rather the weakest link in that particular person's chain. As the wise saying goes, the strength of any chain is
only and exactly equal to it's weakest link, period. Strengthening the
other links does not make the chain any stronger. It will fail.
I have met hundreds of sweet and ehrlicher yiddin including wonderful mechanchim, talmidei chachomim and others in and
out of SA, who desperately described themselves as
living a double life because of their cyclical and predictable behaviors using lust. It seems to me that the fact that what they are doing
happens to be an aveiro only serves to get their attention - and soon they discover that the
issur is no longer their bigggest fish to fry. It may have
started off as the main issue, but they - and often their wives, children, and other people as well - eventually discover that they are living a double life and that it is ripping them all apart slowly. There is no difference whether they are masturbating to porn, injecting heroin in their arms, or drinking. Their friend eventually becomes their enemy. The
issur is not their enemy - the enemy is their idiotic, immature, and humiliating
dependence on it.
The issue no longer revolves around Torah, at all. It's Derech Eretz now.
Many of these yiddin see themselves (for decades) simply as ba'alei tayvoh (which they may very well
also be) and avaryonim. Many of them have been well-primed by the Breslover/Light of Efraim/mikvah-tikkun/Teshuvah-
gemurah worshippers and by the indisputable
facts of the issur, into making
being omeid b'nisayon the name of the game. Nobody seems to know what to do to help them - themselves the least of all. I meet these people every day here and elsewhere. They wander into GYE when they begin to see that their tools are not working for them, at all. They are scared. Many of them are
plotzing for a well-meaning guy like you to re-convince them that they
were always on the right track and that all they need to do is go back to Chovos haLevavos - but
this time, take it really seriously. That would be soooo comforting for them. They want to win!
I believe that hose guys often do not get better - unless their problem was not that serious a compulsion in the first place. The ones who I have seen get better are usually the ones who no longer
care if they 'win', but realize they cannot afford to do this garbage any more, peiod. They will even give up to win - as long as they do not have to continue living the double life. They want to be freed from the shame and misery of living the lie and from losing more and more.
And I have
never said that your suggestions are necessarily
wrong! All I am trying to clarify is how easy it is for "going back to CH" to play right into the hands of the problem in the first place and just be a smokescreen for the addiction - for an addict. I have seen it happen many, many times.
I believe that going back to CH may work just fine for many yiddin! And I certainly do not believe that the 12 step way is the
only way for
anybody.
Honesty with ourselves learned and practiced through being honest and open with other [safe] people; seeing our emotional complaints about life as shining a light on defects in our
own character rather than on Hashem's 'defects' or l"h on the defects of the people around us; learning how to be totally dependednt on Hashem to help us use our kochos; learning how to live for
His Will, rather than for
mine; and are certainly not necessary for everybody. And I am not being sarcastic.
But for those who want to try it, there are no halfsies. It is like breathing, period. I wonder if anyone considers their absolute and total desperation for another breath to be proof that Torah is not prime in their life. What does Torah have to do with breathing? Being responsible enough to make sure you will be able to get another breath is
Derech Eretz, not Torah. This is plain. That is again what I mean by "I am not interested which lav suicide is - I do not like the idea of it for other more personal reasons." Don't you feel the same? Is that
evil?
Do you get me?
For those yiddin who come here and feel they
are addicted and keep trying and failing, I am here to say: "Try whatever you see fit to try. If it
still fails, there
are other options. I am no great shakes, do not work a very strict program, and nonetheless B"H I have not had to masturbate in 14 years now, nor have I had a wet dream in all that time, one day at a time. I believe that it is due to my becoming open to Hashem's Chessed through this 12-step program that is teaching me how to get out of His way. To let Him run the show. And that option is
still Torah and
only Torah - because I choose to use it for Torah, to live a Torah life. Same as what I choose to use my breathing for.
But if this is what they want, they must confront the fact that they have a weak link - and it is not just an aveiro. It's more basic than that. It is in something that we share with all humans, even goyim.
The entire program is there to teach me honesty and how to be and remain connected. But honest with what? - and connected to what? Honest with myself and connected to Torah - Hashem's Will for me.
Now, 'Hashem's Will for me' means
what happens to me (chelki) in my life as much it does
the halochos and my obligations as a Jew. They are both
equally 'Hashem's Will for me'. They are all 'how Hashem takes care of me'. But the chiddush of how an addict can actually learn to
live this way -
that is the fruit of steps, for me. We don't seem to get it from what you keep calling "the Torah", for if we did we would not be in this mess to begin with - and it is not because the Torah has any weakness or lack. We just do not know how to get out of Hashem's way and everything we hear from the Torah and life motivates us to assert ourwill even
more and get even
more in his way! - for an addict.
I think you are mainly concerned with what
should be the solution - with a group of people who have already
learned to make it - the true Torah - part of their very problematic behavior pattern itself! When you get to know us folks, it becomes clear that our very way of using the truths of the Torah facilitates and enables our acting-out! Our guilt and awareness of the gravity of the aveiros
backfired; our choking ourselves to 'hold back' ("one day at a time!"
![](https://guardyoureyes.com/components/com_kunena/template/default/images/emoticons/new/tongue.png)
)
backfired; our romanticizing about the
madreigos we could have through Teshuvah
backfired. Paradoxcially, they all made us need to act out even more. It was shocking and bewildering.
We ended up in such a mess
because we have misapplied the Torah, misapplied our cheshbonos, and misapplied our bodily powers. Yet you suggest we do even
more cheshboning, try to use
more Torah, and focus on more
self-control of our bodies?
Us? Our very best fighting and our very
best attempt at thinking
is what got us right here in the first place. In fact, many of us developed our yiddishkeit and our addictions
in tandem, no? Same ages for both. Is it not likely that our yiddishkeit is just a bit infected? Not the Torah - but
our way of seeing life and
applying the Torah to ourselves. Who will straighten us all out? You? Are you a bar hochi? And if we went to R' Tzvi-Meyer (the closest person I can think of to a straight-thinker and tzaddik), would we not screw everything up in the application of it? I believe that is quite likely. And if you are a bar hochi, are you an addict and have you been fixed by what you call "the Torah"? If not, what will you say and how do you know what to fix?
Since none of us are such chachomim to know exactly what part of our yiddishkeit we are getting all wrong and how to fix it, the derech of the 12 steps
circumvents all these deep cheshboinos and says: first become a sane human being, OK? Make
that your focus. Let that be a source of humility for you. Learn how to truly become concerned with G-ds Will, whatever it turns out to be. Accept that you need to be concerned with His Will first, and with being usefuul to His people. Now starts what you call "the Torah".
Na'aseh v'nishma came from
somewhere - we know that Hashem first
healed them all before they could say that. They returned to simple shleimus first.
I think that you are just focusing on the
other links in the chain. They are strong, actually. We are frum! Except when it comes to this one thing we are failures. But you care so much to prove that Torah works. That it is all about "the nisayon" and bechirah rather than a sickness. To me, this means that you have but one tool in your toolbox - what you refer to as "the Torah" - so I get the feeling that you see
all people's problems with behavior as basically "a nail" - a problem with keeping the Torah. You see
one problem and hence only
one solution. It seems to me that this is the reason you have denounced the implications of some things that I have shared.
Here are some things selected from you posted above. I would like to comment on some. Please have the above in mind while reading the below, and you may see some answers.
o wrote on 02 Mar 2011 10:06:
My issue is with those that preach psychology/sa as the answer. Indeed, the White Book can help you gain prospective on the situation, and perhaps sow some ideas in your head.
But who here can take responsibility for saying that SA helped them and the Torah could not? I would never believe that! I just think it is unlikely, and am just reporting that most addicts who I know did not succeeed at it that way. Are you really great enough to push aside our mesorah of thousands of years because your blindly stumbling in the darkness and THINK you found the answer? No! I'm not suggesting that someone that stopped mast. because of SA/WB/etc should be discredited. I'm wondering why there sure that its THE way. I agree with you and cannot believe it is the only way, as I explained above.
Remember, testosterone wasnt invented yesterday. For thousands of years before SA/WB came around, Yidden have been struggling with spam. And yet none of them thought of visiting "Ovdei Gelilim" to find the answer! You include psychologists in ovdei gelilim, so I guess that you do not strictly mean that the steps are exclusively christian principles. That's why I want to point out only a little tiny point: Photography changed everything about 100 years ago. The dirty images and public consumption of the nudity and lewdness was disseminated by photography in a way that earlier generations could not possibly have imagined.
That having been said, I agree with you that there have probably always been addicts, and I believe that before most of the world basically lost it's simple faith in the existence of G-d the world about two hundred years ago, recovery was more natural.
Yet none of the gedolim of yesteryear were ever participants at a SA meeting! Dose that mean that we cant go? No, it doesnt. What it means is that there are other ways. Of course there are! Anyone who is in recovery and thinks that their way is the only way will probably not remain sober for very long. SA is not a religion, but secular (look up in a dictionary what hat word means - you may be surprised). And the humility to admit that my way is not the only way is a part of recovery, I am told.
There seems to be a theme on this site that if your here, your obviously at rock bottom. Your also helpless ("We admit that we were powerless over lust"). And hence, the only options are (besides this site) are SA and/or therapy.
Seriously? Are we realy helpless? Would Hashem put us in a nesoyon that we cant overcome? We may feel helpless - and thats why where here! We should be encouraging each other that were not helpless. That we can cope! Of course we can! In my case, it takes admitting that I am powerless and that I need Hashem to give me the power - but that means nothing at all until I admit that I am truly powerless first. To me, that is not dogma - just honesty and sechel. And it is necessary for me to believe that He gives me the power one day at a time and at no time is the power mine, at all. It is about getting out of His way and allowing Him to work through me and my ratzon.
Sending the the opposite message, especially the message that Torah cant help ur or that it "doesnt work for me, hence Ill disregard it" is a concept straight out of Modern Psychology - and is totally agains the Torah. I clarified already that I, for one, do not intend to send that message, at all - I just believe that some of the people I post to have too much failed frumkeit. Those individuals need to be opened to what's missing - not to what they already have. I tried to clarify this in a post a day or two ago. I desperately love these people and want to share with them that it is possible that their problem has nothing to do with Torah, at all. Rather, the problem is in them alone. If you still think that such a thing is a viscious and shaming put-down, then you are sadly mistaken. And if you still think I am disregarding anything from the Torah....well, you are wrong in that prat, too.