Just as an update - As I mentioned in a previous post, I recently discovered a loophole in an app I have on my flip phone which enabled me have access to google search, and from there I can access any website. That's right! Totally unfiltered internet right at my fingertips, on my phone which I carry around with me all day (except for when I'm in the yoshon ofc...)

I've been slipping and sliding around with it quite a bit. To actually access the browser takes a few steps. You have to click here, then there then a few more clicks here and there. I find myself taking the first step... then exiting. An hour or so later I'll open the app again and try again. This time I'll get even closer. Then I close it. Open. Close. Open. Close. I'm actually watching myself in fascination at how back and forth I can go. It almost seems silly, yet here I am - the clown himself.

The simple solution here is to delete the app. However, due to some very interesting technical issues with my phone, I am unable to uninstall apps at the moment. The nisayon itself delivered straight to me on a silver platter! I have reached out to a number of flip phone techies and I hope to have a solution within the next day or so.

In the meanwhile... I've been doing a lot of soul searching trying to figure out exactly what's driving me towards the acting out. KInda been unsuccessful in that. It's interesting to me how I'm not feeling strong urges or desirous tayva for watching pornography, yet I find myself almost sucked in and just going through the motions to access the browser.

Trying hard to use this tekufa as a zman of shteiging and growing. Knowing that there is a solution to be able to uninstall this app, and just waiting for the guy to email me back with the correct instructions means that I know that there is an end to this particular struggle in the very near future. I keep thinking about the gemara about palti that when the time came to return michal to david, palti was crying over the nisayon that had just ended and the opportunity of growth that was no longer available to him. Trying my hardest to really look at this struggle as an opportunity for growth... although I doubt I'll be crying when it ends.

Going to end off with a "public" kabala - that instead of using the app for when it's needed and then risking the slipping and sliding, I'm just not going to access the app at all. I'll keep you guys posted.

Thanks to all the guys who keep checking up on me over the past few days. It means so much to me to see how you guys really care! 

I have had a similar problem. I am a bochur in yeshiva and I joined the Shovavim program from YES (highly recommended btw). I started a few days early when I signed up. It was Wednesday I think. Starting on Shabbos, I began to get mild headaches and anxiety for a couple of seconds at a time. This stopped by the afternoon. On Sunday I was in a depressed mood, which continued into Monday. By then it ended. On Wednesday and Thursday I went running, and it was very therapeutic. So far I have been clean for 10 days! This is the longest I have ever gone! Iy"h it should continue!

foolie wrote on 07 Jan 2024 12:42:

Why can't I? I believe what I wrote to be true, yet, at the same time I struggle with understanding everything that happens to me. My hope is to one day be able to appreciate how this struggle changed me. I hope to be able to see how much growth it forced out of me, and how I never would've gotten there without this נסיון. 
I think I can have my cake and eat it too! 

And just to add something else that makes me feel terrible.
HaShem gave me so many chances. Without going into too many details, I tried to be nichshol, HaShem prevented it, tried again, prevented, I had to really work in order to fall. It’s like HaShem was right there saying I got you, I won’t let you fall in this momentary lapse of judgment and I just kept pulling my hand away and saying no! I’m determined to fall, no matter what. 

sad, pathetic, feel embarrassed to face HaShem by Mincha.