Welp. Let's see. 

Listened to some Vayimaen for chizzuk. Got told that my name will be left off the choshen. Got told that I never will be able to see the light of Torah. Heard an interesting story with the Sfas Emes and got told that if I just hang on to a moment of inspiration all will be good. Jeez.

At least no one promised that if I just look away one time I'll win the lotto.

Moving on. Somehow today is so different than yesterday. Somehow I went from the darkest choshech right back into the light in a heartbeat. It's honestly confusing.

Yesterday, I was being hammered by irresistible urges. Non-stop. I felt like I was going insane. 

Today is calm and smooth sailing. 

I'm very confused about what changed.  Was it the exceedingly random Hasidic vort someone stopped to tell me about how teshuva depends on techiyas hameisim because that is what ensures you are never out of the game? Was I suffering from nicotine withdrawal yesterday? Was it the non-judgmental caring and support from the boys? I suspect the most likely culprit is the vaad call -- I came off of that hour call in a totally different place than when I went in.

(No that's not marketing. It's just a really helpful tool for people at all stages of the struggle. But since someone brought up the vaad. Let me just mention it's not to late to join! And if you'd like to give back to the community, being a vaad gabbai is an excellent way to do so!)

I think it also helped that two different people pointed out that giving in after a long break re-sensitizes you to this powerful drug - strong urges after a fall like this are normal. It's interesting how helpful it is to feel like you're normal and not a piece of garbage who will never change.

Definitely not out of the woods yet. I committed to three days clean with my accountability partner. I think I can handle that. Then we'll take a breath and reevaluate. 

But very grateful to Hashem for this free gift of a drop of calmness.

Keep on trucking and/or eating your own heart

Sorry for late post, but just accessed this thread for the first time in a while. Great stuff expressed here. It' s an interesting fact that Hashem gave the salmon the ability to harness the energy of the water surging downstream to propel themselves upstream as they head to their birthplaces to breed themselves. We sometimes have to take that raw searing pain of confusion and disappointment and use it to propel ourselves upstream to head towards our goals. This is similar to the way Rav Hutner and others explain Shlomo HaMelech's famous statement - sheva yipol tzaddik, ve'kam. Through utilizing the nefillos properly, one emerges as a tzaddik.

You are a massive inspiration for so many. No doubt that this experience will assist you in understanding others and giving them even more useful chizuk and advice. The Satan wants to demoralize us; we answer "sorry buddy, nothing will be changing! we wipe off the dust and move on b'ezras Hashem."

chosemyshem wrote on 17 Dec 2024 22:10:

I think you meant it like this...


*Click here to learn about the project, click here to join.
Lookin' forward to hearin' y'all there!!

proudyungerman wrote on 18 Dec 2024 00:44:

Hey!!! Watch it!

cordnoy wrote on 18 Dec 2024 02:52:

Uh-oh...
What's gonna happen?

proudyungerman wrote on 18 Dec 2024 03:59:

Try it again and you'll find out.

FAFO!!

Checking in.

In the interests of being honest with others in the hope that it makes me more honest with myself (I definitely have an honesty problem) had a rough slip last night. Was reading a novel that had some spicy content and started masturbating for a second. Got a grip after a second (metaphorically) and was able to let go (metaphorically and literally). I'd consider it a light slip, except I picked a novel that I knew would have content like that. Ergo, the rough slip.

It's interesting. I think I posted about this previously but I used to read a lot. At some point, out of a sincere desire for avodas hashem, I cut out novels (which I would have sworn I could not do. I was much more hooked on novels than I was on porn.) And it was shockingly smooth and easy. 

At some point, not unrelated to my struggles with this stuff, I started reading again. But I already had this thing of not going to the library. So instead I read online. So instead of somewhat carefully selecting novels, I was reading random blogs, self-published webnovels, forums, news sites etc. etc. Obviously, sitting by the computer wasting time = terrible idea.

So this very special l'shem shomayim thing I did ended up biting me hard.

These days my space-out reading material of choice are these exceedingly stupid, poorly translated chinese webnovels. These bad boys are truly endless and incredibly dumb. And of course some of them are nothing more than really low-quality smut. So it's just a bad idea all around.

So I'm giving them up for 30 days. I don't know what exactly I am going to do to "relax" but perhaps I'll start going to the library again. I'd prefer not to, but what I'm doing instead is not kdai. At the end of the day, I need to be not sitting by the computer for the sake of living my life (also it'll help with porn).

Anyway. Today's been squeaky clean.

“Arry ! Whatayer doin with the Monster Book Of Monsters? Don ye know that if ye start ooglin’ the page with the Veelas it’s liable to bite yer!?!? Arry - watch out!”

chosemyshem wrote on 19 Dec 2024 21:07:

Listen to the Harry potter audiobook by Jim Dale . Its countless hours of mindless nonsense done very very well

cordnoy wrote on 19 Dec 2024 03:01:

I hafta say, this post has tempted me all day...I toyed with the idea of maybe, just maybe, I could play by with the old, grizzled Cordnoy...
Y'all think he can still swing his cane??

proudyungerman wrote on 20 Dec 2024 03:38:

You may need to prove. Goona need to see  Cane-Man-Avatar-Thing limping a bit more than usual

Checking in on this short clean Friday.

Blew through the no novel thingy instantly resulting in some filter poking. It's interesting. Sometimes the more gedarim you set just results in more of "oh I broke the geder, may as well go for the rest of the fall." I'm not removing my filter, but I suspect I'd avoid a certain amount of falls if "filter poking" wasn't available. 

Regardless, I'm not doing the novel thingy for porn. I'm doing it for life. Gotta take some time and internalize giving them up. Should be able to do that over shabbos iy"h. 

Hoping for clean and peaceful shabbos.

How was Shabbos, chaver?

Muttel wrote on 22 Dec 2024 10:20:

Thanks for asking,.

It was nice.  Nothing major in either direction

redfaced wrote on 22 Dec 2024 13:19:

What he said.

Only thing that was unusual was I was with my wife just for a release and it left me feeling verrry empty. I was pretty happy about it though. I saw I really had made some significant changes in this area since what I did was totally not unusual a year ago and it never bothered me then. Guess the GYE brainwashing is sinking in. Hopefully for good things.