I'm sure everyone on the 90-day journey, has made many attempts (more than we can count) to sincerely break the vicious cycle. We make good kabbalahs, promise money to tzadakka if we fall, almost make a neder not to go places that set ourselves up for a nisayon. Even as I write this, I am disgusted with my behavior, but at the same time I feel it's soooo hard to not give in. Like why not, a quick glimpse and that's it. 

I therefor decided to name my thread, "Following the Rebbe R' Zisha Ztz'l, as the holy rebbe used to say every night, "Hashem I beg your forgiveness for not properly doing your will, and I promise I will behave from now on. If you will say, Zisha you said the same thing yesterday, to that I answer, that now I mean it seriously! We all feel that way, but thanks to GYE, we learned that it is not enough for us, but we can use it for chizuk. As is stated in sifrei chasidus, for a tzaddik doing teshuva for not doing his avodeh on the highest level possible to him, is like the teshuva we do.

To keep the thread interesting I will spill all the beans of my personal struggle (not the seeds chas v'shalom, B"H my not ikkar nisayon, as you will see later on). So hear it goes:

As far back as I can remember (say 5-6 years old, sounds crazy, but I clearly remember trying to get an upskirt look while lying near someone's feet, how old could I have been, to pull that off) I was very interested in girls and women. I craved to see a nude. Even females in lingerie/swimsuits, when ever a catalog or magazine came my way I was all over it. Did crazy stuff, found ways to peek while my sister was showering or changing in her room. I found an open spot (2 separate situations) by the mechitza of the colony pool to watch women in their swimsuits. To sum it up, I am struggling with shemiras eyenim since forever.

As a teenager, I figured out how to turn our VCR, into a TV (with a simple safety pin, I managed to get signal). Spent a lot of my time looking at stuff a nice Jewish boy shouldn't. I was (sadly, still am) living a double life, overall a great bochur in yeshiva, but a shmutz kup when not.

Then the PC started creeping into houses (anyone remember MS-DOS, sounds sound yiddish, emes and daas, lol). B"H, not really much that I found on there was damaging. But then, a couple of years later along comes Mr. Nice Guy, a Jewish technician to repair our computer. He offers to set up a free dial up connection (who remembers those annoying screeches it made, not to mention the speed or lack thereof, ugh). My mother innocently accepts the offer. Oh well, can anybody guess where it went from there on? I was shivering the first time I discovered my (mis)fortune. But was in ecstasy,  I can look at nudes without any effort, a dream (or nightmare, confusing).

I don't know how, but I B"H never had serious issues with Z"l rachmuna litzlon. I can count on my fingers how many times it happened (awake). Even when it did, I did not have an intention to go that far it should happen, just was fooling around too carelessly in ways that cause it, and boom before I knew it, it was too late. But overall B"H I despise it, and I am careful not to cause it to happen.

My blog is probably boring because it's everyone's story. I just want people to understand, especially someone struggling and finally decided to join, that you did not join a bunch of losers. Rather realize by joining you are now in boot camp with people training for the Marines!

For instance, I am (considered by all that know me) a chasuva yungerman:

1. That has a chavrusa early in the morning 
2. That davens with kavanah (tries)
3. Learned 5 years in kollel and finished Yoreh Deah including oral and written tests
4. Earned a college degree
5. Has a good job
6. Runs a family, etc.

I would never suspect that such a person is struggling with such dark desires. But, I know a guy like that, ME!

I hope Hashem will see my will to get out of the rut, and lead me to a speedy recovery. 

   
 

 

Welcome my dear brother

I have to beg your forgiveness

I didn't read your entire post

Ill make a deal with you

You read all the dov quotes
(see the "Free Towing" page #3 Great links), and I'll read your first post

And I have to beg your forgiveness
but you don't have to shamedich ;-)

Thanks pal, I like your "הנני בידך בידך בידך לבד"! I think of my situation, when I sing that song! Will try to do as u suggested (Dov quotes). 

Ok surprise surprise

I read your long transparent post - very honest and nice

I did the same when I was 5 or 6 too. Curiosity sucks :-(

but
Curiosity got me to gye :-)

and now we are on a steady forward long haul beH!!!!!

Welcome to gye, 

You're definitely right about us not being a bunch of losers.

KOP! (keep on posting)

Welcome,

I guess we're all on the winning team.

B'hatzlachah

Btw, I don't mind admitting that in many areas of my life, I'm a loser.

Shamedich wrote on 07 Jul 2016 18:52:


Before I welcome you, I'm first asking you - zolts zich nist shemen!
now welcome and I wish you hatzluche in your journey.
Your right that our story's are quite similar, but most of us have had their life business marriage family ruined, and you still seem to be successful burich hashem.

best wishes
A Marine
 

Hey everyone! Thanks for all the chizuk! The positive attitude in this forum surely helps succeed.

So there I was day 2 of 90, at night when I should be going to sleep. I remember that I need to cancel a membership asap, or I will be charged after midnight. All goes well, until.. I have no idea and can't remember what I was searching for, but one of the search results is luring me to a personal blog. For some reason my K9 filter did not block that web page, and it was full of nudes and low low stuff! At first I'm hooked, and I scroll and scroll and scroll, suddenly it hits me, "What the gehenom am I doing!" The struggle begins, "Shut the browser", "nah, just one more". B"H, I can proudly say, GYE and y'all gave me the strength to close that browser before I checked out all the images!

I had set a motivational setting of donating $50 if I fall. I did so, and hope that this will help me in the future not even get to, where I did that night.

Shabbos was great, feels really good to be in charge of your eyes!

Until next time, be well and strong, mates!

 

B"H, another clean day! "Lulai Hashem Ozer Lo, Lo Yuchal Lo - If Hashem wouldn't help him, he couldn't overcome him (the Yetzer hara)". So, thank you Hashem! And thank you my dear friends of GYE, for being the shluchim of Hashem. Special thanks to all following on the forum, your chizuk goes a long way.

The Rebbe R' Elimelech of Lizshensk, writes in his Tzetel Kuten (small notes) paragraph 13;

One should relate before ones teacher, who instructs him in the
way of HaShem, or even before a good friend, all of one's thoughts
that are contrary to the Holy Torah that the Yetzer HaRah causes to
arise in his mind or heart. [This is the case whether they occur]
when he is learning Torah, or praying. Sitting in his bed or during
the day.  And he should not withhold anything because of shame. He
will find that by relating these things he will gain the power to
break the strength of the Yetzer HaRah so that it will no longer be
able to overcome him another time. This excludes the good advice you
will receive from your friend, which is the way of HaShem. This is a
wonderful remedy. http://www.chassidus.net/tzetel.htm

I wanted to share one more thing today. I mentioned that I had come across a blog that was indecent, but was not blocked by the K9 filter. I decided to do something about. Blue Coat, the company that makes K9, has a portal for checking and reporting website ratings. You can find it at; http://sitereview.bluecoat.com/sitereview.jsp

I reported that this specific page is not rated properly, and I am happy that they accepted my rating of the web page and it is now categorized as it should. (see below)I hope this will at least help the innocent () from bumping into it.


 WebPulse Site Review RequestThe page you want reviewed is *******************************************   (Check another site)
This page is currently categorized as Nudity and Adult/Mature Content  Last Time Rated/Reviewed: July 08, 2016 17:35:43 GMT 
 

Special thanks to taharas.halev, he made a very good point that the 90 day chart is much more important this time of year, for who can afford coming to Rosh Hashana empty handed! The count down (or should I say, count up? Sounds more positive!) has begun!! If you haven't started yet, don't despair, start today and the "kishiu hashibud" will be mashlim to the count!  

Lets Go Marines! With the proper weapons, we CAN do this!!

Good morning everybody! Day 10 here, B"H!

Shabbos is a life saver, if only the OTD would do themselves a favor and let Shabbos do its magic on them.

Of course everyone heard about Yanky Kraus' death, may he rest in peace. Very sad. 77 people in the past year, are no longer with us. 77 is an unbelievable number! Even one is too many!

I nebech know too much about these cases. Have a couple of KiPs (Kids in Pain) in the extended family.

I really hope Moshiach comes very soon, apparently the situation is not getting much better until then.

The Heilige Barditchiver Z"l once said, "Avinu Malkeinu horim keren Yisroel amechu" take out the keren (like when you tell someone take out your initial investment) because "Revuchim vet nisht zein" there won't been any gains." (end quote) If he said so in his days, it's ever more true, in our times.

On a positive note, I heard a vort, we know that Moshiach won't come until the world is either kilo zakei or c"v kilo chayiv. What is the solution? We can't improve the world but we can be everyone dan l'kaf zechus, and then we will have a world of people that are zakei! 

Hatzlacha to everyone b'chol inyonim!

Shamedich, unfortunately, many of the OTD's are OTD because of the way Shabbos went down in their homes. For many of them Shabbos was a day when their fathers were free from work and could abuse and demean them. A day when the frimme faykerei was above and beyond what we can imagine.

We are fortunate that Shabbos for us has a different connotation.

It reminds me of the last stanza of "Der Shabbos Lied"Sort of makes you warm all over.

But when did that prevent me from masturbating? Maybe years ago...

I could get all Shabbosdik on Shabbos, and totally messed up during the week...

A guten Erev Shabbos my dear friends!

I would like to share a tool, that I have been using for over two weeks now (actually almost three), that has helped me refrain from watching indecent stuff. But before I get to the actual details of how it works, let me tell you how it all began.

One day, as I checked in to GYE and browsed the Public Chatroom, I saw a user had posted a typical "anybody on?" but somehow I felt that this was a distressed call for help. I gave the guy a shout out, and a couple of minutes later he contacted me on Private Chat. We hit off right away, once we realized how alike our common suffering is.

Then we switched over to email (which is more practical for serious communication). That same day we made a contract, this was the other guy's idea. It works like this; since the struggle of porn, is due to the fact that we feel "safe" that no one knows, we committed that if we fall, we need to reveal our first name. Then if ch"v it happens again we need to reveal more of our identity and so forth. We started with a contract for only one week, and we renew on a weekly basis.

​We also committed to be in touch at least twice a day, to hear how each other are doing. 

B"H this has worked very well for both of us! I had one particular day that I was so messed up inside, are literally did not feel well, and typically I would have probably given in to find some comfort (ya' know the illusion) only to feel even worse off, after giving in, then before. B"H I was able to stand up to the nisoyoin.

I'm sharing this, so that others can try it and hopefully see the benefit of using it. The purpose of using this tool is to help us get to the 90 day milestone. And bez"H once we are there, our second nature will have been uprooted from within us. 

​Wishing everyone a meaningful and delightful Shabbos! 

Can be a good idea, if done with a safe person

Do you ever see/read this:
People may offer to be in touch via email, cellphone apps, phone, etc. Unless you have chatted with them to the point that you feel comfortable with them and feel that they are stable, this is not recommended.

best wishes

Thanks for reiterating the importance of being vigilant of whom you are in contact with.

In my case, I did have someone, (won't mention a username) that I felt is trolling this site and trying to get people to call him. But with my current partner I had signs that this was a safe person, to get to know.

Thanks again, for making this point as it is indeed very important.