The Library

Someone wrote on the forum: It's been 12 days and I don't even have a desire to sin. I just decided to stop arguing with people, including my wife, my family, my friends. If someone disagrees, I smile and stay silent. If I get criticized, I smile, stay silent, and thank ...

I know a guy who got better just by saying the words when he really needed to. It went something like this: "G-d, if You are listening, please take away my lust/resentment/fear/(whatever) - because I have plenty of it, and that is the problem here - not this or that perso...

Dov wrote to "Tried-123": Don't give up, keep reaching out for help. Oh, and you may find that you will get more recovery by reaching out to help others rather than by mainly helping yourself cope. And one great way to help others is just by sharing your real pain them, s...

Meetings, steps, making calls, and posting (for those still more terrified about saying the truth about themselves to another real person than almost anything else...) - all these things can bring us to inner rest/serenity - to admit the truth about ourselves and live a...

Here's a personal understanding of a brocha that I concentrate on each and every ma'ariv:ki fodoh Hashem es Yaakov, ug'alo miyad chozok mimenu - What's chozok mimenu? Well, my addiction is inexorable, cunning, baffling and powerful - certainly much stronger than I. And He...

I beg of you to avoid the silliness of looking at staying sexually pure as an end in itself. Although it is playing with fire, stupid and deadly, do not fool yourself. Let's have a little humility here, folks. We are recovering perverts. In addiction, we naturally tend t...

To heck with your addiction. This relationship issue that vexes you was, is, and needs to stay (for you) all about learning how to give your wife what it is that she lusts after - what she really wants from you. One day at a time. Asking her what she would like in a rel...

The problem with a 'superhero' view of Hashem was first shown to me by Rav Noach Weinberg, Rosh Yeshiva of Aish Hatorah: Rav Noach zt"l told the story of a bike rider who visited Aish once and heard a talk about what yeshiva is about: getting a relationship with G-d. He c...

I haven't the luxury of being concerned at all with the afterlife, as I certainly never got sober because of yiras Shomayim, and - though the weight of guilt was devastating - it didn't hold a candle to my insanity. Though I certainly believe in consequences for aveiros...

Is listening in and even participating in 12-step groups called 'working the steps'? I think not. A good mussar schmooze, maybe. A chizzuk, maybe. If you water a field full of weeds very well... you'll get a ton of weeds! There needs to be a thorough and repetitive weedin...

The Gemara in Brachos brings a contradiction between two p'sukim: one says everything is Hashem's, the other says the earth is given to mankind. Nu? As you probably know, it answers: It all belongs to Hashem - until we make a b'racha. Once we say a b'racha, it is given ...

If things are still the same, you have to ask yourself, are you doing anything differently? Are you living the rest of your life differently in any way? I do not mean 'working with the lust/tayva vs sober/kodosh/whatever business....no! Not that at all! That part is not ...

One cannot come to know anyone else without having da'as himself, first. In other words, for a man to share yediyah with his wife there have to be deyos - tarti mashma. I cannot know her at all - much less connect with her in da'as - unless I bring my own self-accepta...

Meetings are free. Sponsors are free. G-d is free. Acting out is very expensive. Hatzlocha weighing what to do. In any case, whatever progress you have made should not be ignored. You are probably more open than ever now. Use that and build on it. If you want to work the ...

My wife and I were sitting and schmoozing last night. It was very nice, and we agreed that we need to do it more often. One of the topics we talked over was why I believe that my addiction is deadly to me. "Like, really...what do you really mean? How can you possibly be s...

Dear whatever-your-name-really-is,There are many, many frum families I have firsthand knowledge of (including my own) that were restored through recovery. The sex therapist you speak of might be a help, I do not know. I never went to one. Even though my addiction is all a...

AA, in "A vision for you" somewhere near the end teaches that "obviously you can't transmit something you haven't got" (italics mine). To me, that means that if someone is not an addict at all, the words he will try to inspire an addict with - be they Torah-truth, or not ...

Living "one day at a time" really boils down to being oseik in today's business today, and tomorrow's business tomorrow. Taking baby steps in turning our will and our lives over to His care. In other words, to start trusting that He'll make today's efforts work out right ...

L'sheim Yichud Kudsha brich Hu uS'chintei b'dechilu urechimu, hareini muchan um'zuman l'kayem mitzvos asei shel v'ohavta l'reiyacho komocha, v'nikdashti besoch b'nei Yisroel: I love Hashem. I love hisbodedus. Boruch Hashem I am sober today and have been sober one day at a...

Although I love what Hashem is doing for me since I started using the 12 steps to allow Him to do it, I sincerely believe there are many ways that Hashem can do that for his kids. Some folks clearly need a different way than the 12 steps in order to reach what the 12 st...