Kunena Site Syndication https://guardyoureyes.com Tue, 11 Aug 2020 19:44:34 +0000 Kunena 1.6 https://guardyoureyes.com/components/com_kunena/template/default/images/icons/rss.png https://guardyoureyes.com/ en-gb https://guardyoureyes.com/forum/4-On-the-Way-to-90-Days/353438-A-Late-Night-Rant---We-Deserve-Some-RESPECT#353438 https://guardyoureyes.com/forum/4-On-the-Way-to-90-Days/353438-A-Late-Night-Rant---We-Deserve-Some-RESPECT#353438
Just wanted to rant about a few things. Yesterday i found out that a friend of mine had a broken engagement because the girl found out that he had a porn problem. I honestly feel that is wrong and horrible. I am under the impression that the majority of guys (at least from my circles) has seen/struggles with this. And they are still good guys. and honestly striving jews. I know this guy he is so sweet, has the best middos. And they think he is some evil faker. Its simply not true. That couple should have walked happily down to the chuppa. They could have had a wonderful marriage - sure he would have needed to get his issues in order at some point, but that's his business. Just like it is my business to get my issue in order - while I am bh in a wonderful marriage with a wonderful family. Guys shouldnt't be defined by this by self-righteous girls and mothers who wouldn't in a billion years understand what the struggle is like for a teenaged male in 2020. They will never understand. Everyone talks about how sad it is for the poor women when they find out their tzaddik husband isn't the tzaddik she thought he was. Well, first two things in response - first, welcome to the real world, honey. Second, he still is the tzaddik you thought he was, and, with all of his struggle and successes over the years invariably trying to get this under control, he is probably a bigger tzaddik than you will ever know. But as bad as I feel for the girls (who certainly go through pain of betrayal (even though the issue has NOTHING to do with them, having been a problem for years before he even met her) , and losing trust etc. etc.) I feel far worse for the men. Far worse for myself, selfish as it may seem. I have been the one suffering for nearly two decades. I have been the one battling an inner demon while my wife and the rest of them a floating on through life with nothing that comes near to this constant war ripping us apart. So yes, I think we deserve some compassion. Both from ourselves and from wives/wives to be who should find out that their husband is a normal male who knows how to use the interweb and has a working male appendage. But instead my friend is maligned and suffers the shame and indignity of being dumped like that. it's just not right. That could have been me. And it wouldn't have been fair then and its not fair now. Teachers have to educate girls about this. Kallah teachers have to educate kallahs about this. They need to understand the reality here. And it needs to be put in proportion, to cut it down to size. The same way we need to be told we are ok, we are normal, this is healthy battle, this is how hashem made us, the struggle of 2020 is monstrous etc etc - they need to be told the same exact thing. And we would spare ourselves alot of utter stupidity and pain and unnecessary hurt. 

And then I read on another forum here that someone got divorced because of this. It is honestly nonsense. It is beyond ridiculous to break up a family over this. PERIOD. In the secular world, couples (perhaps not a majority, but a good number of them) watch porn together. It is a joke by them, a stereotype of being male. I don't think they are right, obviously. That goes without saying. But just to put this issue into some sort of perspective - how do we go ahead breaking up marriages over this when healthy, normal people in the world live with this without a issue and remain perfectly happy etc. It's absolute stupidity and it rips my heart out. I was crying reading pickamoniker's posts. I wish I could yell at his wife. Couldn't she see his shining soul, his struggle for her? That struggle was probably a deeper expression of love and commitment toward her than ANYTHING she ever did/could ever do for him. Period. And the fact that she couldn't see that, and feels so stubbornly and self-righteously that she must destroy this person (and his faith, from the sound of it) because of her own small-mindedness and mistaken notion of reality is simply disgusting to me. This could have been avoided, All of this, with some health, perspective, and education could be avoided. 

I am in this for the long haul. I am in this, as mentioned in previous posts, for myself, for my wife, for Hashem. I get that this is the make it or break of it of judaism and a man's avodah. I know all the deep mystical ideas about shemiras hayesod. And I'm in. I get it. I believe it. But I also feel pickamoniker very strongly when he says,

"I know that everyone has their own life, their own journey and their own (often very mutually exclusive) core beliefs, but for me looking "back" it seems that the entire enterprise of treating this area like an "illness" and even more, the putting a moral spin on it in the first place was simply unhealthy. I was in a constant catch 22. I could be "sober" and struggling with every tiniest temptation lest I "fall", which led to a life of constant almost unbearable struggle, or I could be not "sober" and mired in shame and self loathing. Neither option was fun and life was at best tolerable for short periods." 

I feel that very strongly, I know the responses to this. I know that people have broken free and upgraded every area of their lives. I get it. But sometimes it does seem that we create this problem - both by exacerbating the issue for kids with poor education and an unhealthy approach to sex that is prevalent in the frum world (my father forcibly covering my eyes at age seven with his hand when we walked past a newspaper stand in the airport didn't make me want to look any less, trust me) as well as relationships by not preparing the women for the realities of the struggle that the nature of 2020 and man's natural makeup presents for every healthy man. 

We need more confidence, that's all. We deserve more respect. We need to climb out of porn, sure! But we also need to climb out of shame, guilt, and self-loathing over this. More things were done wrong to us than done wrong by us. In most cases (this is certainly true for my own) we didn't choose this sinful way of living. It was forced upon us. We don't take pleasure in acting out. The pain it brings far overshadows the pleasure. We hate this. We loathe it. And yet we are surrounded by a world that simply doesn't let us catch out breath before being knocked down again. We are WARRIORS. We are gibborei koach, who are still here, still trying after it all. 

Just my feelings. Good to get that off my chest. Keep trucking people. Love you all. ]]> On the Way to 90-Days Thu, 06 Aug 2020 21:54:33 +0000 https://guardyoureyes.com/forum/4-On-the-Way-to-90-Days/353438-A-Late-Night-Rant---We-Deserve-Some-RESPECT#353438