I recognized early on that I have a problem that is slowly but surely killing me, and we all know that that's not an exaggeration, because a ruchnius death is far worse than a physical one.
Years ago, in a good moment, I decided to try to postpone my suicidal activity by an hour. Yes, one hour. I knew that a single hour of self-control can generate alot of good.
Yes, I SHOULD, and I probably COULD, but WOULD I? I was vacillating between Yes, have one kosher hour and then you can go back to the poison, and between, What good will one hour do except drive you crazy while you are fantasizing and looking at the clock waiting for the hour to pass?
I finally decided to give it a try. And to make the decision concrete, I decided to make a Neder. Now, I may have a yetzer hara for certain things, but breaking a neder is not one of them, Boruch Hashem.
"DON'T!" screamed the other side of the struggle. "I can't wait that hour!" But my mind was made up. And then I said to Hashem, I'm going to formalize the neder for this hour of restraint by snapping my finger. Snapping my finger is the siman that my mind is made up and this is indeed a neder deoraysa.
So I snapped my finger, and guess what? The yetzer hora evaporated. Poof!
Sometimes, after the hour passed I would rush back to the putrid rot. But most times, the hour passed and found myself occupied with other activities, or I would renew the hour with another fingersnap.
Once I have had a clean period of several hours, I would extend the time period of the next neder to perhaps a day, or several days, or longer. It is Boruch Hashem very rare for me to relapse.
I unfortunately did have a yerida about two months ago (which is why I searched for and found this website, but that is another story), and after a period of disgust with myself, I used this technique (which has served me so well in the past) and postponed the activity by a day at a time, each day formalized with the fingersnap. I am now fingersnapping for periods of a week. Yesterday, I sighed and snapped for yet another week. My weeks end on Friday afternoon, so now I will stay clean at least until Shabbos.
Each fingersnap is easier than the one that precedes it.
To recap:
- Decide that you want to have a clean period, and how long you want it to be. It has to be manageable, of course.
- Make a neder (forgive me Hashem, I know what the gemara says about nedarim, but this is pikuach nefesh) to stay away from XYZ for the amount of time you intend, and snap your fingers to formalize it.
- At the end of the period, decide if you are able to extend it further, and if so, snap you fingers to the new period of time. If you are able, try to increase the amount of time.
This works for me. If you find this helpful, please let me know.