Shalom everyone. I just put my name on the 90 day list yesterday. Today was fine, just now, last thing at night I can feel myself almost falling. I haven't installed the filter yet. My YR had it all planned for me. I found out about Rimon internet a while ago, tried it and signed up. I thought that i would then just cancel my previous internet provider. But no! I was already obligated for another year and to cancel would cost over 900 shekels - not such a huge sum, but not so small for us at the time.
So i became like these people with 2 mobiles (here in Israel everyone has two mobiles) one kosher - to show everyone and make myself look and feel good, and one non-kosher one for the places the kosher phones just cannot reach. So here i am with two internet providers - one very kosher and the other completely open, and it only takes a minute to switch my router between the two. I actually wanted to listen to a meditation by R' Ginsburg and found i couldn't on Rimon. So i switched to the open internet and lo and behold it worked.
This is where my lust stuck up his head - just one search - you don't even have to click on the link. Pround to say i decided to not listen, and then had the thought to start this post. I will install K9 on this computer with my wife's help so i don't get the password. Bli neder i'll do it tomorrow.

Chazak V'ematz everyone

Hashem's smiling down on us. For today, i won.

Aaron

Aaron,

Hats off to you!

Keep up your work.

Fill us in tomorrow after you put the filter on.


David

ashrecha vetov lach, keep up the good work!
put the filter in asap, the yetzer is a wily fellow and loves getting good people like you messed up

Hey good luck to you.

I just installed a filter and put my wife's email address as a notification address. I would be mortified if my wife happened to get a message stating "Joe has tried to enter so and so website", that I think 10 times over before even accessing a kosher site!

GOOD, GOOD and GOOD!

Good that you're here

Good that you're serious about a filter and putting one in

Good that you posted.

Take it a day at a time.  Don't eat the whole salami all at once.

There's so much here at all different levels.  Welcome to a new life.

AA, we r happy that u joined us, we need everyone with this problem to come out of the closet & only bachdes we can win this battle
The filter is step # 1 and very important thing it saved my life & many others here, get used to the forum & share with us ur thoughts & concerns so we can iy"h try to support & to get chizak from u as well

thanks for the replies and encouragement. My wife doesn't have her own email so i've got the license sent to the gabbai and i'm waiting to hear from him.

Still, my wife knows that she's meant to be helping me today to install it.

I'll report back once it's on and i look forward to supporting all of you too. That's another thing, i want to get my own partner - but one step at a time.

Chazak V'ematz everyone - we're bringing the Geula closer and closer. When it happens we'll merit seeing the big YR shechted before our eyes - and we'll know that we contributed to it!!!

AA, how's it going so far?

Borich Hashaim ( I lived in Belz for a while)

Still haven't installed the K9, despite having the license codes from Gabbai.

Don't worry, I'll do it, but i do feel it's a bit of a cop-out. I've had filters for a long time, and know what it's like to sit there trying to bypass it.

I want to be like Dov, who wrote the other day about being alone in his parents home - where there's still a whole lot of stuff that triggered and fed his addiction for years and yet he had NO FEAR WHATSOEVER OF LOOKING AT THEM.

But this is just arrogance. He's him and I'm me, and right now it's better for me to have the filter. I've had these periods of respite before where the YR seems to take a break and i fall into complacency - "Sure, I'm not addicted. I hardly ever mb. Don't spend much time on it, etc, etc." I think I just repress my sexuality for a while. Then - BOOM!!

Thanks JIP for your concern. So far I'm tuning in each day to give some chizuk here and there. I also sent out the email to everyone on my contact list and have applied for a partner.

So far - BH

I hope that I and all of this here can really make this year be different (and better) than last year.

Chazak V'ematz

AA

Hey AA,

I know exactly what you mean. I remember thinking the same thing when walking down the street. Why can all those people go into a mall or work in a mixed office and not have desire to stare at an another women, while I feel myself as if I'm fighting door-to-door in urban Close Quarter Combat and sometimes, yes I would like to believe that I have a handle on things. But I have come to realize that this is one of the YH's primary tool (being the conniving and manipulative force that he is) and that is exactly what he wants me to believe that I "supposedly" have a handle on things. Then as soon as I take off my battle vest he strikes me with a mortal blow.

Though There is one piece of advice which I truly believe and which has given me great strength when my armor has been depleted - Hashem will never place an obstacle before us which is not in our power to overcome. Meaning that all we need to do is believe in ourselves first that we can overcome it and then let Hashem help us with the wonderful tools he has placed before our eyes.

Good luck and this year will indeed be different!

Your brother in arms,

Joe

aa1977 wrote on 07 Oct 2010 23:24:


hi AA,

as Joe pointed out, i think the idea that having a filter is a cop-out is a tactic used by the YH to get people to avoid installing one. we are not allowed to put ourselves in a situation of temptation/nisayon. what greater nachas can there be than if a Jew says "Hashem, i don't wan't to even have the possiblity of straying from You, even though it might feel better and more macho for me to be able to stand up to the YH on his turf and fight him".

our job is not to see who can be the more macho manly tough-guy, save that for the basketball games, rather to guard and protect and neshama, which is a spark of Hashem's glory, from getting sullied. so if you hear the idea whispered in your mind that you don't need a filter, or you can shop in the mall nonchalantly etc., it is the Yetzer speaking.

i don't mean to lecture you, i am sure you know this on your own. but i have entertained the same thoughts in the past and want to save you the pain of finding out on your own.

bracha vehatzlacha
zemiros

Don't worry. That filters going on. I'm just more aware than ever that having the filter isn't by any means the end of the story, and that's what I want to sit with now. I need to work harder than that, because I've had filters till very recently anyway.

This is about really facing the issue. Giving up lust. Taking that leap. Lettting go of it. Real change. Accepting that this is a part of me that's holding me back in so many ways and really and truly sacrificing it for Hashem. I can (and have) hide behind a beard and peyos and think, as others do, that I'm really serving Hashem, but He knows that I haven't really given much of myself for His sake. It's been easy. My whole life has been easy.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not going crazy now and driving myself mad. But it's reality that I need to put more effort into my life. Being here and posting is part of that.

Giving up lust - that feeling and belief that I need female beauty - that's that all there is, that that's the only tachlis. I need to move on from this already.

It's incredible how R' Nachman in the story of the "Master of Prayer " talks about how each group of people chose what they thought to be the tachlis of life. One group chose intellectualism, one chose bodybuilding, and one chose - you guessed it - female beauty. This was their emunah - they believed that this was the tachlis of existence and worshipped it. Take a look at the world today. And a large part of me is still clinging to this belief.

One day at a time. If this post helps no one but me, it was worth it.

AA

Hey AA,

Before I hit the sack for the evening, just wanted to let you know that you're doing a good job so keep it up, you're on the right path to sobriety.

Remember my friend, This year will be different!!

Have a good one,

Joe

Have installed the K9 filter to my computers. I can see that there's still room for some bechira, which i feel is good. I have to be honest with myself.

If i sit and try to find things - I'm serving the lust idol, even if i find nothing, or turn away when i do.

This used to happen a lot. Anyone else experience this? You have a filter in place, then at some point during the day, a thought pops into your head - "I wonder what would come up if I searched for ....." - something you've never tried before. As if in a trance you find yourself by the computer trying it.

That happened many times to me.

If it happens again, bli neder, I'll be posting about it here.

I did test K9 a little, partly with my wife present, partly without her. Enough to see that bechira is still involved, but I'm not marking myself down as having had a fall. Somebody can shoot me down if that's wrong.

That's all for now, folks

AA

Harav dov says curiosity didn't kill the cat but it will kill us .We don't look for bechira . Harem gives it when he wants . We daven al tivieini liyiday nisayon.