I can relate. I've been doing better with sleep lately. It all traces back to my addiction though, sleep issues and other problems. My sleep issues are directly related to the tension in my marriage and stress with my wife. The problems in my marriage are directly related to my addiction. B"H, the progress that I've made with addiction over the past 22 months has had the effect of causing great improvement in my marriage. At the end of a long day, I'm no longer trying to avoid going to sleep, because I don't want to be alone in a room with my wife.

Having intercourse with my wife is very important. It shows my program, my therapy (or whatever) is working. I can't fake it there.

So true, our marital problems are also directly linked to my acting out. Spiritually, verbally, thank G-d not physically. She doesn't have to get me out of jail or something like that. But I do believe that I am so linked to my wife, that she had stomach problems because of my acting out. The stomach problems are gone, Baruch Hashem, I am clean.

And suddenly I love her.

So, I am off to work. I am writting this at work. And this is a big trigger for me, procrastination and the feeling of being overwhelmed. I shouldn't be writting posts at work, but it is a mean to work better, honestly and without acting out.

I really want to learn, as its said in the SA green book in step one, to ask for and receive help to get of this toxic isolation. I can't change the fact that I have an illness. So I have to practice rigorous honesty. (from the green book)

All these words, now to live them.

All the best to you guys.

So honesty.

Two days ago I had a bad slip. According to the green book I described what a fall for me is: viewing porn and masturbating (sexual contact as well of course).

So two days ago I went from viewing Youtube with girls doing exercises to two graphic photos for a second (even less) and then turned it off.

Is this a fall? According to what I wrote in the inner circle as a fall, it is. Even for a second, still is a fall. But I did back away from that and turned it off. (I really wouldn't like to restart my count - Is this vanity or what? I restarted it so many times and still it is so hard)

Hm, I guess got my rush and then I got scared.

All the time I was fantasizing of being a woman and watching things that is not acting out, but of course I was getting to it, I was building it up. So if I were to stumble upon graphic porn, it practically wouldn't be my fault.

I did back away from it several times. Praying and then getting back to work and then going back to searches.

Hm. In any case. I know something is wrong with my program, treatment. I was on holiday for 5 days and didn't do anything, no running, no praying, no reading, nothing. Because I didn't want to trouble the other people (family) who were with me on vacation and yet I didn't get up early enough.

But to be honest, I felt kind of week for a longer time. I do try to run and work out every day, but I beat myself up too much over it, if I don't. The problem is also that the spiritual food that I get from NA testimonials, certain documentaries and books isn't enough any more. I need more food and I am unhappy. So that is dangerous and here comes my porn, it makes me forget I am unhappy and then I deal only with that, with not viewing porn. But in reality I missing something.

So I started meditating in the moring. I must also start a 10-day fast and start going doing hikes in the mountains. This is very important, I need to find my smile.

Is it a fall?

Easy does it, chaver.

Don't worry about "defining" a fall. Be makeil, and KOT! At best, it's a distraction from the real work. At worst, it will get you down, and make it more likely to fall again.

Get out of isolation! I just saw the Johan Hari piece from a chizzuk email. It drives home this point quite forcefully. I posted a link to it on my thread.

I reset my count.

6 days clean and proud of it. Every single second :-)

9 days

honestly i am procrastinating for more than an hour...

but got up at 4, did my run, shower, made my lunch, ironed my stuff, got to work.


Ok, back to work...

yehoshua wrote:


What about GYE! I think you're one of the most determined members, if not the most determined, to stick with the forum through so much for so long.

--Elyah

Dov wrote:


Dov, I was very surprised to read this, because this is basically how I have understood the program. Lust is a symptom, a pain killer. And we're in so much pain because we sabotage ourselves and our lives with our selfishness, self-centeredness, dishonesty, inconsideration, etc. We're in friction all the time with everyone and everything. When we learn to become un-selfish, G-d-centered (or whatever you want to call it), honest, and considerate of others, then life becomes all that much less painful, which means we have all that much less need for our pain-killing drug of choice.

Perhaps this doesn't explain every single time we want to look at porn or masturbate, but it does seem to explain and to help an awfully lot of the time.

Please email Dov and ask him to respond here. Send him the link. There is no guaranty he will otherwise see it.

wequithiding@gmail.com

serenity wrote:


I have been in touch with him several times today.
He plans on responding.

Eye.nonymous wrote:


Thanks for the great and well-explained question.

Oh...and Hi there, Eyeball!

Sorry if this turns into a megillah, but I want to do this right, if I can (and have some fun on the way, too!).

The issue with addicts is probably just as you described it, or as the late great Sandy B of AA would put it, "Our drinking wasn't our real problem - sobriety was!" And as Chuck C of AA beautifully explained, for an addict, living - being himself and the world being as it is - without his drug, is just plain disgusting and unacceptable.

So they and others explain this is why the basic 12 steps say nothing about abstaining from alcohol. They talk of practicing self-honesty, faith, much more honesty, giving up the defects of our character that put us against G-d, making true peace with other people, more faith, and of true gratitude and being of service. Nothing really about resisting temptation, staying sober, etc. The only step that alcohol is even mentioned in is the first, and only in passing. And right away in step 2 it goes on to talk of our lack of SANITY, not our lack of sobriety.

So what did I mean??

OK, so here is a moshol (just a moshol, now) from Chaza"l on beating the YH:

The Gemora in Brachos says that if you feel the YH bothering you, drag him to the beis midrash. Oh well, but I know guys who have masturbated in the beis midrash, too....so that obviously doesn't necessarily work.

A similar Gemora nearby also says: Try fighting it. But if that doesn't work then try plan B: learning Torah - and if that does not work, then try plan C: saying Kriyas Sh'ma...and if that doesn't work, then remember the day of death - we are gonna die one day and all the excitement or kavod won't mean much. It's the nuclear option. The best shot we have at not sinning.

Two questions, an answer, and finally the nimshol, be"H:

So then why didn't Eisav remembering the day of his death ("hinei anochi holech lamus") get moved to some sort of Teshuvah or at least get straightened out a bit in his priorities for a minute? Yaakov Avinu offered him soup for the bechorah?? Gevalt what an idiot, no? He just killed someone, raped who-knows-who, and here the tzaddik offers him to keep his bechora --and he sells it for soup and is mevazeh it ("vayivez eisav es hab'chorah")!!

Another little question on the Gemora's eitzos: If remembering death will be our last and best shot at beating the YH, then why not just try it first? Cut the playing around with willpower, then learning, then Shma...just say, "OMG I'm gonna be dead one day!!" and that's it. Not a question?

So it seems that thinking about death will probably not help a person stop sinning. In fact, it might motivate a person to sin worse...as we see by eisav, the Epicureans, and others. Unless - unless he remembers his death in the context of fighting the YH, Torah learning, and Shma. Then it will be a powerful tool toward victory over the YH.

Nimshol: In the same way, those who say "work on the 12 steps, clear away your character defects, work on RID, make life a better place - and then you will not end up needing your drug," are selling snake oil.

Just as the Gemora's eitzos do not work out of context, the character refinement work of the 12 steps WILL NOT WORK WITHOUT A COMPLETE STEP 1. Without a complete first step inventory, in which the addict writes out (by hand on paper, not typed on a meaningless computer) his or her entire sexual acting out history and admits it fully and honestly to safe people who see him in person - he will not come to a proper recognition of his problem.

The 1st step is missing. The context is absent. It will not really work.

The addict who is told that his real problem is his bad middos and RID, is being comforted with sweet shekker. At the price of never requiring the humility and acceptance that are the entire context of the next 11 steps, he is being handed his 'self-respect' back by the very people who are supposed to help him!

But can you honestly blame the frum struggling guy for grabbing at whoever will hand him his self-esteem back? Can you blame us for jumping at the offer? We, the people who have been trashed by our own hands over and over in the deepest mud, sinning hundreds of times in ways that some sforim say there is no Teshuvah , faking everyone around us for decades and decades. It's absolute hell being a frum chronic porn-worshipping masturbater. Hell. But not because of the sinning - it's the day-in and day-out faking. It's exhausting. We need rest. Anything to make me stop feeling this way!!

And so, too often, I see people on GYE selling the idea to newcomers that 'the beautiful work on self-improvement is awaiting them right away'...tikun hamidos will save them from their addiction! Anything to quietly sneak right past having to admit all the truth about ourselves, first. Heck, no need to come into the room! You can do it by phone, no problem. Anything to minimize and guard us from being face-to-face with the truth about ourselves just a little bit. To skip over the 'really bad things we only did once or twice. "As long as you 'really' get the idea that you really, really have a problem, nebach.'

Gevalt.

But there is no shame in a truthful and complete step 1 inventory with an open admission to safe people. The shame and self-disgust come rather from having to hide it! The true shame and self-disgust comes from being encouraged to keep believing that: "It's so bad, I just can't admit this!" For it feeds into the lie that if we finally told out the full truth, nobody would truly love us or even accept us.

And no, a rebbi should probably not admit his own masturbation and porn use to a bochur coming to him for help with schmutz and sex-with-self - and no, a rov should not admit all his sins from the pulpit...these men need to tow the party line as standard-bearers. The problem comes when they are sicker than their flock and all they have is the standard (flag). But even the very same rebbe and rov sitting in an SA or SLAA meeting - that's another story altogether. Even if the same bochur walks in. It's a different world, Recovery. An amazing world where emess rules, not standards. Where we all come to see that open acceptance of the facts about us is just being on the same page with Hashem, who saw it all along and knows it all as it really is. Reality is the best thing, always. Wow, what a switch from much of the life many of us are accustomed to, where appearances and yichus are important (or maybe almost everything)...



So the 12 steps do not speak much of sobriety just as (lehavdil) R' Chaim Vital explains why the Torah doesn't speak much of tikkum hamiddos, and as Rav Hirsch explains why the Torah shebichsav doesn't mention the Torah sheb'al peh very clearly. They explain that since those things are the entire context of the Torah, it's unnecessary (and actually silly) to state it. In other words, there is clearly no real working step 4 - or any of the steps - without sobriety.

For Sobriety - my absolute need to be abstinent from my drug today - is the product of a full and honest 1st step. If a guy is acting out/drinking, he has simply lost his 1st step. And pretending that one can 'work on his middos' (steps 4-10) while still partaking of what feeds his dependence on others, his unmanageability, and his craziness, is happy denial.

But who wants to be sober first? We'd rather be fed a lie: that the steps were made to eventually enable you to be sober. But they weren't. They were made to enable us to stay sober. That's why Ch 5 in AA says things like, "We thought we could find an easier, softer way. But we could not. With all the earnestness at our command we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. Some of us have tried to hold onto our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely." Old ideas...like 'I can be frum, cry during davening and in yomim noroim and take on being makpid on kli shlishi or to not carry in the eiruv or to be in the asora rishonim davka - while still masturbating over incredibly sweet, intoxicating pornographic movies every other day...for years....and years...and years. The fact that we lived that way for years and years while 'growing' in Torah and avodah, just proves how sick and twisted we are - we can accept the incredibly unacceptable. Public Enemy Old Idea #1.

Moshe Rabbeinu saw the eigel and broke the luchos, because he saw the total unacceptability of 'coexistence' of these two things. Old ideas had to be broken. He ground up the eigel and made them drink it. Yechh. Taking full ownership is the only way out, period.

Instead, how many of us have broken our computers or cellphones or tablets or $50 DVD's? We break the wrong thing.

The easy way out is the way we always try first, second, and third...

Like the derech of pretending that 'it was out RID all along that made us act out' - without first accepting the fact that we are mentally ill and in need of serious treatment if we are addicts. That (especially if we are frum yidden) we are first-rate liars and fakers. That first and foremost, it is the lying and hiding that must stop. If we are addicts, it's time to admit all the truth face to face with safe people. That comes first.

If we just accept Hashem's gift of clarity in how sick we really are - even in recovery - we will eventually have all the self-esteem we need. For we will remain sober and trust in Him and have a G-d of our very own. How can anyone with a G-d of their very own feel like a piece of trash? Doesn't happen.

And afterward, we will come to see that if we do not see and accept the moral shortcomings we really have (steps 4 and 5), we will return to use our drug all over again no matter how much sobriety, faith, and goodness we possess. We are addicts. We will surely act out if we are not OK for a while. (and so, steps 6-10)

Does that mondo-megillah answer your question? I sure hope so!

[Addendum: On the other side of all this, is what many addicts have discovered. That [i]even in sober recovery[/i], we do not always need RID in order to end up acting out! There were times I went for lust and my sponsor asked me if anything was bothering me. I said no. We talked things over.

Nope, nothing was bothering me.

Hmm...what about RID?

So he asked me, "Then why'd do do it?" And I said "I don't know,"...till he helped me remember that I'm an addict. It's normal for a drunk - even a sober one who is not suffering with any pain at all - to drink sometimes. As AA writes, "When we seemed to be succeeding, we drank to dream still greater dreams." Pain is NOT the only reason an addict will end up acting out.

So not only are character defects and RID not the first thing a new addict should be introduced to as 'recovery' - but isn't the last thing, either. It fits nicely right in the middle of the program:

Step 1 is about our sick-ness just cuz we are sick; and coming to terms with the fact that we actually have no choice other than to be abstinent - which truly feels like a tragedy in the full sense of the word for any addict. But we need abstinence because we simply cannot manage living with our drug any more. Our lives are actually unmanageable as we are.

The next steps (2-11) are about the way to actually remain serene enough to keep the gift of Sobriety that G-d gives us right now as a result of our total surrender of the right to drink in step 1.

And the 12th step is, in part, about the fact that if we do not share this gift with others, we won't end up keeping it. After all, we had no right to our first sobriety, did we? It was a gift. So we can't pretend we can hold onto it. It's not ours.

So it seems to me that teaching that "if you work on your middos and get rid of RID you will be able to stay sober", actually denies a role for G-d in the continuing life on an addict. The powerlessness persists. Working on our defects of character is just a tool to opening ourselves up for Hashem. As the Kotzker would say, "Where can G-d be found? Where people let Him in."]

yehoshua wrote:


Great post.

But the Green Book is not SA's it is SAA's.

Just felt like clarifying that.

Love you, chico!

yehoshua wrote:


Wow, another beauty. I just wanted to take this opportunity to admit clearly that over the past few days my searches on line have been dangerous. I have clearly felt like 'if schmutz came up, it would not be so bad, would it? Nahh."

Crazy man, no? After all the crap I've been through, to really feel that way and endanger my precious life.

But I'm an addict and will go there just because I'm an addict. Without any RID needed.

So I am smiling, and when I see myself doing that I shut it off and smile, often chuckle, too...and I shake my head a bit and say to G-d and to myself, "There I go again, heh...ready to chuck it over shtuyot. Nu." And I smile all the way to the bank. Seeing that I lust doesn't scare me...it's NOT seeing it that really scares me!

And like you say, "Off we go to another hour of real life!"

Thanks for helping me share that, sir!

Thanks, Dov.