I have never publicly committed to starting a 90-day period of abstinence/sobriety here, so here goes: As of today, I will not seek out and view inappropriate material, or masturbate to inappropriate material or to fantasized images of inappropriate material. I will write in my journal every day about how this is going for me. I will create a change plan and implement it. Please let me know if you have other suggestions about how to find success. Happy New Year to all. 

Congratulations for making the pledge/plunge!  If not here, where can you find others to support and keep you company throughout the journey, whether it be 90 days or 90 years?  I hope you will reach your goals this first time around, but if not, many of us here 'made it' on their 2nd, 5th, or 100th try (I'm not there yet).

As to suggestions, I see your pledge was worded carefully, and leaves some room.  For example, 'I will not seek out and view inappropriate material,' does that mean if you stumble across it somewhere it is out of the scope of the pledge?  How about giving a 3 or 5-second leeway for that? And, 'will not masturbate... inappropriate material,' why not ' will not masturbate period? Is there something appropriate to masturbate to? the wife? That may also fall under 'lust' and prevent full recovery.

My point is not to be strict with you.  It is just to point out from my experience (and that of many posters here) that allowing some 'side-action' usually leads to a full-fledged fall.  But maybe you will have to experience it to realize.  Or maybe I'm just being medayik in your words like (lehavdil) a Rishon.

Either way, we are all together on this journey, looking forward for your posts, lessons and heroism which we can all benefit from!

Very good points - I suppose I was trying to be precise although it's possible part of me was trying to preserve some room to operate. If I stumble across inappropriate material, I definitely do not see that as fair game. I should be able to turn away from it and not be triggered or, if it does trigger an urge, deal with the urge. This is akin to what will happen naturally in everyday life. 

Masturbation is not something I want to be pursuing, necessarily, but I recognize it may happen at some point. For now, as long as it is not compulsive/due to inappropriate material or fantasy, then it's not the worst thing. 

I am starting over my counter. I am trying not to feel too discouraged. But it seems like whatever I do, I go on auto-pilot back to porn and masturbation. It's dismaying. I know I can do this, though. 

in_ardua_tendit wrote on 04 Jan 2021 15:12:

How's it going buddy? 

Would love to here from you
Please keep posting, can only gain from it

So, I have been having a hard week or so. Binging when I have the opportunity, really. I committed today to refocusing, and I know and believe that I can do this. To that effect, today I read the Day 1 reading in Avrohom Neuberger's Positive Vision book. One big takeaway for me was that (paraphrasing): kedushah is not all or nothing. I can start today, and every small victory is a huge achievement.

This leads to a mindset of ability, as opposed to helplessness and self-victimization. I hope that this can bleed over into other areas of my life, as well, where I tend to feel overwhelmed, passive, and self-pitying. 

I also read the first aphorism in a book of aphorisms by Baltasar Gracian, a Spanish priest (these are not particularly religious aphorisms but deal with the self and with interacting with others). "Everything today has its point, but nothing is more important than becominga person. More is required to produce one wise person today than used to be required for seven . . . ."

I keep messing up. 

in_ardua_tendit wrote on 11 Jan 2021 18:16:

Very very fundamental. This is the the sole purpose of Man in this world...

in_ardua_tendit wrote on 14 Jan 2021 00:31:

Alright buddy let’s get started.
What is your situation? What do u struggle with? Which devices etc?
Whats your backround etc?
We’re here for you and together we will achieve success.

With love,

YeshivaGuy 

in_ardua_tendit wrote on 04 Jan 2021 15:12:

Commitment is key, and you have that thank God.
But we gotta set up some “fences,” too.
You got a heart of a lion. Now let’s act like one

The GYE motto is: "one day at a time" and "one battle at a time".

It is much easier to focus on staying clean on the today rather then having a massive goal with no end in sight.

You have the will and strength to win the battles..we are here to cheer you on and celebrate the Wins and be there when when things wind down.
Keep fighting!

Thank you, guys. It means a lot. I was so discouraged when I wrote that. Since then I've had a better couple of days. A big part of this was taking action, getting enough sleep, and exercise. Exercise really helped. I just felt more capable, and better all around. Such a change. Every day is different, but I know that I am capable. 

[quote="]Alright buddy let’s get started.
What is your situation? What do u struggle with? Which devices etc?
Whats your backround etc?
We’re here for you and together we will achieve success.

[/quote]
I have a great filter installed on my phone but I seem to always find a way around it in a moment of weakness. So I'm not watching streaming hardcore stuff anymore which is great but can still find pictures/videos if I really want to. The only other electronic device is my work laptop which I would never, G-d forbid, use for an inappropriate purpose. In my mind it is simply off-limits.

Background, not sure what to say exactly, I started with discovering pornography probably around age 11 or so. I don't remember what came first - googling out of curiosity, and finding things like the Playboy website, softcore galleries of nude women, etc....or around that time also, by chance (seriously, not looking for it at all) flipping channels in a hotel room by myself and coming across an actual porn movie. That was shocking but also fascinating to me.

I started using the family computer in secret, late at night or when others were out of the house - or even just across the house if I thought I could get away with it. I became a master of hiding this secret, flipping windows on the screen, sneaking through the house...looking back it was also a way of dealing with a sometimes-turbulent childhood (divorce followed by lots of conflict) and shyness in addition to the normal hormonal teenager motivations.

Then I went away to college and suddenly I had my own laptop, and my own room (single dorm). I was socially isolated and socially anxious, homesick, and grieving (not very well) my grandfather who had passed away the summer before college. So I sort of dove down a rabbit hole of porn, and I would say this is when addiction truly took hold. I did eventually develop friendships and relationships, but porn use became habitual and I began using it to mediate sadness, loneliness, to procrastinate, etc.

Since then, more of the same really. I am now 30 years old. I realized toward the end of college it was an issue and something I would like to stop; this desire and the attendant distress over not being able to stop intensified over the next few years after that. Since then I've had a couple times where I stopped for a week or so but that's been my greatest success. At times I've basically given up. Add in a stressful job, living away from family, and life's everyday foibles and porn became my mediator, and took up more and more of my personal time. It caused me to stay up too late, to come to work late, etc. etc. and takes away from my energy - I'm not fully living! I'm too old to still be doing this, and I shake my head to think of the ways in which it diminished my life in my twenties.

Thanks for sharing

Amazing how well you've analysed the situation. 
Unfortunately, the yetzer hora does not stop. Ever. 
The only way to stop is by making the change. 
Realising why it's bad for you (apart from being to 'old' to be losing control over your desires), making a plan, working on that plan and seeing how to avoid the most tempting situations. 

Motivation comes with awareness as to why it's bad for you and how badly its affecting your life, and soon, when you'll be married Iy"h you will also have to be able to differentiate between porn and real love which is only possible if you are looking at the concept of love as outsider, not if you're stuck in porn fantasy. 

So keep posting, both here and on other threads. You've got plenty to share. Let's see you more