Levi613 wrote on 05 Mar 2010 02:29:
I have felt so lowly in the past, and this awareness slowly but surely seeped in.
I was thinking about you and your struggle.
One thing came to mind that I think you'd like to hear:
The yeitzer hara plays awful tricks on us.
He tells us YOU CAN'T STOP, YOU CAN'T STOP, YOU CAN'T STOP, YOU'RE UNDER MY CONTROL YOU'RE UNDER MY CONTROL YOU'RE ALL MINE!
Then, right after we act out, he turns around and gets us to believe:
IT'S ALL MY FAULT! IT'S ALL MY FAULT! IT'S ALL MY FAULT!
See the contraction? We'd never let a maggid shiur or a chavrusa get away with a blatant stirah like that, but we believe everything the yeitzer hara says! We let it totally destroy our self-confidence.
For me, a big chiddush was from the handbooks--if we don't act out WE DON'T SUFFER ANY HARMFUL PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS. We won't blow up.
Part of the solution was knowing this. And, I thought FOR SURE, without a release of pressure at least once/month that I'd blow up! This, I now see, is totally false.
On the other hand, we are struggling with a powerful addiction, so we should be proud of any signs of progress, and not be angry with ourselves because we're not perfect yet.
And, the second statement of the yeitzer is also false. Did you try everything you know of SO FAR to stop yourself? Usually we do, but yet we stumble. We're not fully equipped yet to stay clean. So, if we tried, though we failed, it could be this battle WAS beyond our capabilities. As far as G-d is concerned, perhaps WE'RE NOT AT FAULT! Just stick with GYE and read through the handbooks again. Something will click this time that maybe didn't click last time.
I have found it very helpful to analyze each fall--why did I fall? What was I thinking before hand? What was going on in my life?
See what triggered the fall. You sound like a profound fellow, you can probably do this very well.
And, absolute honesty is essential. At first it was painful to post "I slipped," or "I fell," again and again. But, the brutal honesty is what eventually led to my recovery (in-progress).
Brutal honesty included other things as well--I REALLY DO NEED A FILTER! Or, I REALLY SHOULDN'T BE SEARCHING FOR SUCH-AND-SUCH!
I hope these words have been helpful.
Shavua Tov,
--Eye.