To more specifically address your question of how simcha can help you stop masterbating, the answer is that addictions are fueled by a desire to kill pain. That's assuming the behavior is destructive. If you don't view masterbation as destructive, and you're doing it just because you enjoy it and there are no negative consequences, then that's different. But I'm assuming you're here because something inside you is telling you to stop and you can't. So the question to ask yourself is why am I doing something that I know is self destructive? When we are b'simcha, we can rise above our pain without needing to masterbate it away. A major goal of the 12 steps to change our attitude into one that allows us to have some comfort in life. To feel better without having to resort to our drug. In other words, to lower our pain, which in turn obviates the need for our drug. Letting go of resentments, sharing our pain with others, learning how to have gratitude, these are all tools to lower the inner turmoil which fuels the addiction. For more insight into this dynamic I highly recommend that you connect to Duvid Chaim, either one on one or through his phone conferences. I hope this helps to answer your question.

There is not necessarily one single tool to stop acting out, but there are some that are very good ones, including genuine happiness (i.e., simcha). Also, the claim that someone in his active addiction can be genuinely b'simcha...well...I don't buy it. I think you may be getting a feeling of excitement and temporary joy confused with simcha, and therefore need to research what genuine happiness is from a Torah perspective.  There are many books on this subject, but I recommend Twersky's: "Simcha, It's Not Just Happiness".  It might also help to do some deeper introspection and see if you are really feeling genuine simcha or not. If you are, then you'd be the first person I've met in ten years of being in this program who walked in with a genuine sense of simcha and positive outlook, but is unable to stop acting out. I'm not saying it's not possible, but doubtful. As Twersky says: "I've never met an addict with good self esteem" - and self esteem goes hand in hand with simcha.

So this is what I am actually saying from my first comment in this thread...
Hypothetically speaking.
Let's say I would have come to you for advice, a few short months ago, before I started recovery, and told you all my dark secrets, and explained to you that no matter what I do, I cant stop acting out when the compulsion takes me over, and in reply you would have given me the following advice;


I would have said back to you, "but I am b'simcha!... In fact very often, when i am really happy, and elated, I go get me some porn against my real desires. And my life is great its not just good!
Would you then say to me


I would then have replied back to you saying my attitude is great! And i am really satisfied with life also. I am also a happy person. Ask anyone who knows me in real life.
BUT I CANT STOP MASTURBATING.

To add to it, many people have this additional argument with themselves over whether they should be fighting the yetzer hora or surrendering their lust. They are two VERY different methods. Addicts need to surrender their lust, addicted non-addicts need to fight the yetzer hora which they could also do with simcha. But as an addict, simcha doesnt seem to be a tool i can use to get sober.

So my question (as an addict) is, how is genuine happiness going to be a tool to help me to stop masturbating.
The complexity of my question that complicated the discussion was the fact that there is a vicious cycle which has been brought up a few times in the past 24 hours here in the forum, which kills all genuine happiness when you act out. And that's why I added how do you get to genuine happiness when that bubble bursts after you act out. If its genuine happiness that is going to stop you from acting out.
I ask because i want as many tools in my tool shed as I can gather, and many others may also gain from this advice.
Or as they say on the interwebs.... asking for a friend.
Feel free to say this advice was when you get to step 12 or was for non addicts - but if it was for addicts i would really like some more clarity.
Thank you !

workingmyprogram wrote on 26 Mar 2017 14:58:

II like it as my identity.

I like knowin' what to do.

I don't want to be hidin' under false pretenses.

I'm not referring to CBT. I think one can say he's a sex addict but still not let that become his identity.  Just like one can say he has diabetes but not let it become his identity. Its about whether we choose to associate ourselves with our weaknesses or strengths.

workingmyprogram wrote on 26 Mar 2017 14:46:

CBT says to say, "I have addictive tendencies."

12 step meetings say to say, "I am a sex addict."

To each their own.

Baruch HaShem we all get to choose how we identify ourselves. I am a sex addict as well, but I don't let it define my essence like some others do. I have no idea how you truly identify yourself, but I just wanted to throw the concept out there that being an addict shouldn't define us as an identity. This was taught to me very early on in recovery by an addiction therapist.  To each his own! In all honesty, I have no idea what you're referring to when talking of Reb Chaim's test of truth, but sounds pretty intense :-)

Your question was "how do I get to real simcha if I'm acting out?", so I believe I answered your question. Hatzlacha!
GrowStrong wrote on 26 Mar 2017 04:11:

i don't think someone who knows the truth and strives towards it is considered a double standard it just means that lo alecha hmelocho lgmor where as someone who has a part of him that doesn't or can't care like an addict that can be a double standard because he is escaping, meaning running away from himself
witch creates a double life and double standard 

I don't think you really answered my questions.
You just repeated yourself.
I think the answer is a simple single word.
Recovery.
I have absolutely no background of who you are or what you are struggling with. Are you struggling or did you get cured since your last visits here in 2012?
Maybe re introduce yourself somewhere- it sure sounds like you made it past 5 days since your last foray here, your story might help inspire others here how they can change.
Did you conclude you are an addict or just someone with a big yetzer hara.
As for your last paragraph that doesn't describe me at all.
But I don't really think you fully read what I said in both posts.
I was not talking about when one is in recovery.
I was posing the question for the soul who is not in recovery yet.
I totally do not identify with anything in your post, and I find Simcha to be a key to living and life.
I also wasn't talking about myself in the now, BH, but I never said I wasn't entitled to Simcha. I said that true Simcha is not so simple or easy to get to when you are involved in the opposite of what Tatty/Abba wants from you.
As an addict I can tell you that telling me to Be b'Simcha would have not helped me whether I was actively actin good out or having one of my off days.
Especially as someone who is so full of Simcha

MayanHamisgaber wrote on 25 Mar 2017 22:20:

Regarding your first question, I'm not sure. I also don't know what that big word means. But it's one of the ways I can try to understand myself....maybe.

Now, speaking of messages and understanding them, here's this one: I decided about ten days ago that my marriage needs working on (to say the least), so I thought that instead of my wife watching stuff upstairs alone (and me watching stuff downstairs alone), I should suggest to her that we should watch something together (upstairs of course). However, in the past, that has not been healthy, for I am interested in intimacy (sex bilaaz) and she is interested in escape (maybe she's an addict). But, I thought, maybe I should give it a try. I searched for a series that is just beginning, clean, lawyer stuff and somewhat riveting (for otherwise, she falls asleep before the title appears). I settled on a show (not sure if the mods want me to specify), but let's call it: columbia's junkyard. I went back and forth and decided against it. For various reasons. A few days later she was in her bed watching something and I forgot exactly how it transpired, but I was somewhat invited to join. What do you think she was watching? Yep, you guessed it (it was a basket filled with food): it was columbia's junkyard!

Now, what do you think God was telling me? Watch shows together. Watch them by yourself. Don't watch anything. There must be some message. But I haven't the foggiest.

Oh, and by the way, the invitation didn't last for too long.

Bottom line, it's all her fault.

GrowStrong wrote on 25 Mar 2017 20:39:

The answer is to focus on what you're doing right while continuing to work on not acting out. You say that "you're not really doing what He wants you to do". Is that true? Are you doing NOTHING that He wants you to do? If you think about it I'm sure that you could find many things that you are doing that are exactly what He wants you to do. Or are you saying the unless you are doing EVERYTHING he wants you to do then you'll allow yourself to be happy? But is that ever going to happen? Are you ever going to be so perfect that your midos and actions are exactly as Hashem desires them? You know that the answer is no. So I guess you'll never allow yourself to be happy, nebach.

Do you have children? Are they perfect? Do you love them even though their not perfect? Of course.  So why is Hashem any different?  As a parent, all I want to see is that my children are working on themselves. They are constantly making mistakes, and I could care less because I talk to them about, maybe discipline them, and then I see they are trying to improve.  I don't even think I want them to be perfect, I would rather them be human. Hashem is the same way.  At least He should be, if He's not, then you need a new Hashem :-). I hope what I'm saying makes sense to you.  

We make such a big issue out of acting out, with the sobriety dates, charts, wall of honor, etc...... that it becomes the central issue in our life, which completely defines our whole sense of self worth. If we don't act out, we feel we are amazing, tzaddikim, successful. If we act out, we feel worthless, a failure, miserable.  What if a business was run that way?  What would happen if the owner of the business decided that the WHOLE business was worthless just because there was ONE product that wasn't selling well, even losing money, while the others are selling ok? Should he view the whole business as worthless? Of course not.  Sounds like crazy thinking to me, but that's what were doing when we say we're not entitled to simcha because we are acting out, even though we're working on it. Sounds like the yetzer has you where he wants you, forcing you to focus on the area that you're struggling in and ignoring everything you're doing right. NOW FIGHT BACK!!!

workingmyprogram wrote on 24 Mar 2017 14:36:

How do you get to real simcha if you are acting out?
You didn't paste the second part that I said.


Do you just ignore it (The fact that you are not really doing what he wants you to do - all the time) ?
And I am not talking about guilt here.
I have been blessed in my life, and I have also experienced BH much simcha, but it didn't stop me from acting out within a few days, and that vicious cycle of then not really being able to be in simcha just went round and round in circles. 
But you are right that punish is likely the wrong word. What I experienced after acting out was the punishment. (The disconnection)

Welcome,

Recovery should be with hatzlachah.

I don't put a lot of stock into the addict/non addict discussion, but I certainly wouldn't make up by mind by the words of one meetin' fellow.

And I disagree. I am a sex addict. It is not a defensive mechanism.