"The real struggle has been stress. In hindsight it seems that masturbation used to be my stress reliever. Does any1 have any etzuh for a good stress reliever?" 
I don't know how to copy and quote so I did it this way.

I have found STOP to work for minor stress related urges, and urge surfing and SOBER to work for powerful ones. They can all be found in the GYE toolbox.

There was a lot on the forum about watching your eyes

I could only share my experience

I basically gave up my struggle years ago, because it was worse when I didn’t look, because I got so exited what’s going on there…… and as we all know by now that 99% of this struggle is the imagination that makes you……

So what I learned

I needed to find a way not to look around, not because I’m strong and I’m able to FORCE myself not to look, only to find a place in me that’s not interested

So I practiced, urge surfing, mindfulness, and when I’m aware what in me wants to look etc. and you don’t give in, I’m  are not forcing myself, rather being in control of myself, being mindful and recognizing the urge, and not letting it hijack me, and not letting him take me over.

But this helped me to be happy not to look around and feeling in control, and feeling good not being controlled and pulled by my urges.

But still once I see something attractive I still have a hard time, but still much better than before.

But being in this mindful mindset is not easy all the time

And I do feel I need to practice daily urge surfing etc.

 I tried accountability, to have to report how my day was, but I see it doesn’t help me, because when I use force the opposite happens, I need to feel not interested in looking.

But to have a partner that keeps me accountable to practice urge surfing, F2F that’s a very big help.

Summary

1.       Practice urge surfing

2.       Review F2f, work on one thing each week

3.       Avoid triggering situations

Dear Reb Chancy, this thread was started by funnyfellow, a person that was banned from this site. Keep trucking, brother! I have saved a post from you about urge surfing, btw

simchastorah wrote on 14 Mar 2023 07:49:

Woooooffff…… this is incredible and amazing to see how you took the urge and cut it into tiny pieces…!! I loved it!
On the GYE phone line, they have a section of how to deal with an urge, and this kind of technique is called “urge surfing”, mamesh like you did. They call it “out of the box technique”

thanks for sharing!

It's been a tiring day. It was a good day b'h, but I really struggled with taava. Not while I was in a matzav that anything could happen b'poal, just riding on the bus.

It was like every semi attractive female that i passed was just so intriguing, and I had such an urge to look at them and think about them. I was able to resist mostly, but inside I feel exhausted from it, and I have a nagging voice telling me that I can't last forever, and that eventually I'll fall, and when I do the combined desires of whatever tkufa I'll have managed to stay clean will burst forth and make me fall again and again. And thinking this way I feel like a failure already. And I know this is atzas hayetzer. But what can I say? My yetzer has a lot of practice being a baal eitzah.

I tried doing the urge surfing technique and I did find it somewhat helpful. I saw in a post from HHM that once you realize that there's no real need to ejaculate you feel a real menuchas hanefesh. I would love to have that clarity. To have clear that there's no need to ejaculate, there's no need to have 'relief', that sounds so wonderful. That sounds like such a freeing feeling. 

'Oy li m'yotzri, oy li m'yitzri'. The shackles of this yetzer hara just feel so heavy sometimes. It feels good to get it out in this way, writing on the forum I mean. I kind of feel like I just want to scream. I want to be free. I want to know that the yetzer doesn't have any real power. But I've spent years teaching myself over and over that the yetzer does have power, and it's hard to unlearn a message that you've spent so long learning. 

How long can I go on like this? That's how I feel right now. My heart aches and I fear the darkness where I was a few weeks ago. Hashem please please help me to overcome this thing. Please I'm begging you. Give me strength. I need that clarity that the yetzer can't make me do anything. I need the clarity that my real ratzon is to be a holy Jew, and anything that I feel otherwise is a foreign party encroaching on my thoughts.

This is my meditation then. I am a holy Jew. I am a ben Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov. Maybe they would even be proud of me. I'm welling up with tears at that thought. And these thoughts and desires are not me. They are not me, and I don't have to listen to them. I am part of the Am S'gulah. Hashem loves me and has a mission for me. With Hashem's help I can rise above this.

And the ever present YH already attacks me. As I write this he says, "don't say that. If you do, then when you fall you'll look like even more of a clown. Get off your high horse. Stop being dramatic. You'll fall in the end, and you'll look like such an idiot. Oh here's the guy who thinks he's a ben A,Y and Y. Here's the holy am sgula guy. No you're not. You're the guy who can't stop himself from watching porn."

I hope this doesn't bring anyone down. (if anyone's still reading). Maybe someone will find their own yetzer in the words of mine and realize that he's the clown. But either way that's not why I'm writing. I'm writing to get clarity. What do I tell the yetzer? How do I fight him. It seems like every path I take he's already two steps ahead of me

@chancy Thanx for your continued support.
I think you're right that I'm confusing diffusion and urge surfing. I think that I "get" diffusion for the most part, but for some reason urge surfing just isn't processing. Maybe I don't fully understand it yet.
Shouldn't diffusion be enough to keep me from getting overwhelmed by an urge? It seams to me that urge surfing is just a "playful" but unnecessary way to experience the urge.
Without diffusion, I'm assuming that you'll have a pretty hard time urge surfing because you're still stuck fighting your own brain, and the urge won't really subside since you feel it as a very real part of you (true?). But once I diffuse myself from the urge, there's no reason to get overwhelmed by it anymore, and I can just let it subside. To view an urge as a wave I guess makes sense, because it actually does rise and fall like a wave, and you'll be viewing the urge accurately, because those are the facts. But if I instead  just view it as an outside force that's "just there" but will go away if I don't fight it, it still doesn't make it any harder, since I'm not overwhelmed by it anyways.
What's the whole "avodah" of and how does it help for me to go out of my way to see and "feel" it as a wave?

BenTorah4L wrote on 27 Feb 2023 22:14:

Hi there. A great resource is the book The battle of the generation.  Send me a pm or email if you would like me to get you a copy. I read it every night and it has changed my perspective in this battle. 

best wishes 
vehkam

Hey, this is my first time posting here. I first came to this website about a week ago after a friend recommended it to me, and I felt somewhat lost because of all of the resources offered here. I am in AA and I am very used to a simple method of coming to meetings, getting a sponsor, and doing the 12 steps, so I felt super directionless when I came here. I read somewhere that a good thing to do is to get involved with people on the forum so I thought I would make my first post. I am a bochur in my 3rd year of Yeshiva, and I’m gradually growing in my yiddishkeit and in many other things. One thing that I have struggled with for years is Shmiras Habris and Shmiras Einayim which I didn’t even see as a problem for many years until I came to Yeshiva. Now that I’m here I am finding it to be extremely hard to stop doing. I am trying very hard to be consistent in my learning and emotional health but when break Shmiras habris it often throws me into a downward spiral. P is also a huge part of my issue, and i am fully filtered but when the urge really comes I lose all self control to the point where I will take friends computers without asking in order to watch P. There is also this shame that comes along with being 3rd year in Yeshiva yet still struggling with this. After trying to stop countless times unsuccessfully, I was recommended GYE and I have been navigating my way through it for the last week which I have been clean. I do the Progress report every week and I check in everyday on if I had urges. I also watched a few videos on urge surfing. I’m not sure what else to do… any help is greatly appreciated!

Thank you for your clarity. I saw a post of yours regarding the difference between 'urge surfing' and 'diffusion' (i think) and found that to be helpful as well. Any more clarifications from you would be very welcome

@Yosef Hamelech
You are getting it! Once you actually do it a bunch of times, you will understand it clearly and see what i mean thats it not what YOU are but a small part of your brain. 
To clarify, i spoke about 2 different ideas. 
1 is Urge Surfing, thats for when the desire starts burning, just to watch it rise and then fall like a wave, not too deep stuff.
2 Diffusion, this is where you learn to stop thinking about the desire as a part of you that you want, but rather learn to know what YOU really want and the desire is just something that your addicted brain wants because of some neuroplasticity that will weaken with time as you stop using those pathways. Its harder work but a game changer for people like us. 
And no, that problem i had 2 days ago went away BH, but im in more pain now, look at my post called Perfectionism and Addiction for more info.

Hi Yosef Hatzaddik, @chancy is the posek on urge surfing, so I'll let him pasken, but to me it looks like you really got it! Keep inspiring us all with all the amazing work you are putting in!

chancy wrote on 14 Feb 2023 16:11:

Thanx @chancy for elaborating. I  didn't respond right away to your post (I needed some time to think it over), but if you're still having a hard time like you wrote, I just wanna say that you're really a chizuk to me and many other guys here, and it'll give us all strengh to see you push through this nisayon.

I think that I'm BH finally starting to understand urge surfing. Here's what I was thinking.......
I get very strong urges because this is what I created for myself. These cravings are just this illusion that I'm imagining of me getting immense pleasure if I masturbate. The reason why these illusions are so elaborate is because I watched porn which hyper stimulated how i picture sex, and because my brain really wants the feeling that I get from masturbating (again), so it makes me imagine that it will be much more enjoyable than it actually is (like many of us, I don't even enjoy it anymore at this point.....). These intense cravings aren't something natural, they're something external that I created over time from acting out, by making my brain crave more and more of it. If I don't give in to the urge, it will go away because it's only a mirage, not actually a part of me that I need to fill.
With this in mind, all I need is to put in a little bit of strengh to take a step back from the urge and see it for what it really is instead of letting myself get overwhelmed and giving in to it. If I do this, the urge will just go away because there's nothing fueling it anymore. This will train my brain that when I feel an urge, it doesn't actually mean that I need to act out, which in turn, will cause the urges to get less and less with every time that I don't give in.

Urge Surfing is about feeling the urge and desire from a outside preceptive.
So lets replay your story from Shabbos, Il focus on the first fall, (the second one after a dream is harder because it more like watching porn, for me its actually more arousing because in the dream you were a part of the porn scene, so lets leave that for now).
Rather lets talk about the fact you were overwhelmed with desire in the bath room. 
The desire comes from your brain that remembers how good it feels to be aroused, just like a drug addict or alcoholic feels when they think of or see the alcohol/drug, there is a actual reaction in the brain, its not mental its physical! The brain starts releasing hormones that make you feel good and you crave that feeling, that pattern happens once you starts experiencing sex, its a part of us for some its bigger then others. 
The addiction to porn comes if your brain sees that you cant get enough pleasure from fantasy alone and you need outside stimulation, so you look and that completely overwhelms the normal functions and sort of like hotwires the pleasure sensors. I remember that when i gave in to porn, it was almost impossible for me to stop. Later i learned to actually stop while watching porn and just see how the desire decreases because the images never match up with what your brain wants, which is what causes the viewer to constantly look for other stuff.
However, if you stop watching porn, your brain will slowly give up on that, and will instead just give you these fantasies ether in dream or awake where you start craving that feeling, its an incredible high as we all know. But here is what you do.
1. Get out from where you are! teach yourself not to be lazy, you can change the whole thing in one second if you just get up and go between people, just go on the street, go to shul, anything to remove yourself from that situation if you feel you cant handle it right now. Not only will this help in the present moment, it will also help you train your brain that you can get aroused but you can unplug, your brain will start learning.
2. If you know there is nowhere to go, (its too cold and the shul is closed and nobody is in the house) learn to recognize that this desire is NOT part of who YOU ARE! its just an outside force that got logged into your brain and is hacking you, you have the power to not let him in and not let yourself get drawn into his fraud. imagine you go on the street and you see someone standing over a dead animal bent over, you go closer and you see he is drinking the blood from the animal.....(sorry for making you throw up a little but hang on). You start screaming at this guy "what in sams hill are you doing? you disgusting piece of whatever! and he answers you "i cant help it, i need this, makes me feel good this is part of me" I dont know about you but i would feel immense pity on such a person, he is stuck thinking that he cant help himself when of course he can! just stop doing it. its stupid. 
For some one that's not addicted its easy to see how disgusting it is what we do and how we can stop. but for us it isnt.
You need to start looking from an outside perspective and not from the eyes of an addict.
ITS NOT US, ITS A HORMONE THAT GOT USED TO THIS DRUG AND WANTS MORE!!! Do not give it more fuel to work with. Learn to recognize the outside force. step back and look at it from an outside perspective. the more you do this, the faster your brain will learn that this is not working anymore and will decrease the frequency and power or the desires. 
This is called diffusion- Which means to stop fusing (becoming one) with the thought. The more you give in to this drug the more  you fuse with it and you become inseparable. The more you learn diffusion the easier it will become to remove yourself and move way from that desire and to be able to see it as an outsider who can make a clear decision. 

I was thinking about it (and talking it over a bit with HHM) and it seems that when it comes to urge surfing, I gotta work on not panicking when they hit. When I get a normal urge or something even a bit stronger, many times I'll try to distract myself, or make a phone call etc. and it'll usually be enough; but sometimes, I will get a really really strong urge outta nowhere, and I feel like I absolutely need to masturbate, and the feeling is so overpowering that I can't think about anything else, let alone think about distracting myself, or releasing the tension with excersize. I guess what usually happens is that I panic, lose all focus, see no way out, and give in.

It sounds like I gotta internalize the point that @Eerie was making (and what everyone said in the past): Fighting the urge will only make things worse. What I have to do is pretty much accept it and not be afraid to feel it. Don't give in to the urge, instead do my best to distract it or release it in a healthy way; and it'll eventually pass on its own.

I think that I understand the concept pretty well, it's just that I guess, because I've always been too afraid to accept and live out  a massive urge before, it feels like it's just impossible for me to do. It feels like it'll take superhuman strengh to not give in, and I don't have that.

For now, I don't know how I can work on the urge thing any more than I am; but either way, I'm Be"h gonna keep thinking about it and continue being very careful not to fantasize at all, which as y'all have said, has BH been a huge step for me in the right direction.

First of all, my holy friend, you got 17 clean days! 17 days of shaking the world with your kedusha! And by your own admission, even your falls were not as terrible as things that happened in the past. So you are doing gevaldig! Give yourself a real pat on the back!
About urge surfing, I hope @chancy won't mind mind if I copy paste a piece he wrote last week that explained it so well:
the more you fight it, the more power you give it, and your brain will keep on coming up with ways to arouse you because it sees that you really want it...... 
What you can do based on my experience is to take a time out and take a few minutes to make a few things clear. 
1. You enjoy the feeling of desire and lust- its a fact that you cannot and will not change. 
2. You are normal and not sick, this has been the human condition forever! 
3. You do not want to use that desire in a bad way, obviously or you wouldnt be here on GYE..... so you know what you dont want.
4. You can understand where the feeling of desire comes from and you are ok with the fact that its there, since you cant fight it anyway, just make place for it. so you are not in a fight with the actual desire anymore, that would be like fighting with your left hand because you want 2 right hands..... its there, just accept that fact. 
5. Now you can decide what to do when you see something that arouses you. You can think, i know i have desire and i understand it and i cant fight it, however, i dont want the desire to carry me away and then i will do something stupid that i will regret, and therefore, i am moving on from the desire and not continuing to pour oil on it. 

I would add, on Shabbos there are also things you can do to distract yourself, you can take a brisk walk, go find a friend to shmooze with about something that's on your mind, or better yet, go find a friend to learn some Torah with. Hope something helps. remember my friend, we are war here with the YH. You took so much ground from him, you are amazing, and a fall means nothing more than that you fell. You'll be great, just stand back up, shake off the dust, and keep trucking! Keep posting and inspiring!