:-D.. "Al cheyt she'chatanu that we heavily involved ourselves in diligently helping others while simultaneously helping our own neshomas"...  "V'al cheyt che'chatanu that we spent all this time on GYE instead of doing averos....

Oh such 'sinners' we are :-)

 

Thank you daat for your comprhensive response.I appreciate it,and I dont think you got carried away.

and thanks for the guidance

mechazek wrote on 14 Jun 2011 17:41:


Hi, and thanks for starting this thread.  I have been watching it keenly, since much of it applies to me - I had a serious issue with this, too - Halevai should it have been all virtual and self-related.  Was it an addiction?  Who knows.  What I do know is that for a few years now, I've been what SA would consider "clean".  However I still struggle, I know that I do not yet view people the way I should (but I know how I should view them), and I also suffer from a similar (but not identical) detachment to that which you describe.

I think (I could be wrong) that I am "past" SA.  I think it would have been perfect for me 10 years ago, but that I am in a different place to those fine people.  I've blundered into my own semi-recovery, and...  Now what?  Perhaps had I actually gone to SA, I'd be a much healthier person - but perhaps not.  Hashem is surely doing the right thing for me, and I am where I am.

The fact that I am not acting out, that I am trying and struggling where I do - I think that means that it is not sobriety that I need, or even assistance to stay sober.  It's rather like cleaning up all the leftover debris after the party, and learning to live properly as a sober person.  Until I can do that, I'm in a slight state of limbo.  I do not know how to do this, but I am guessing that reconnecting with Hashem is the way to go.  As such, I am trying to work on my learning and davening, which were woefully deficient until recently.  I'm trying to work on issues other than pure ruchnius, such as my body and my mind.

As I've written elsewhere, I am petrified of what I believe is lurking within me.  I don't want to let it out ever again.  I want it to die.  But it's really difficult to truly want that, because it is a part of who I am, or at least who I was for many years.  I am at the stage where I can control my actions if I want to (I was not there before).  The thing I need to work on (if I am right) is maintaining that desire.  I have no doubt that in my current situation, I am "OK".  My fear is this: what if my situation were to change - would I still be "OK"?  I believe that teshuva, sobriety, whatever it is called (I'm not playing semantics) is where I would behave properly in the changed.  And now that I have "stopped", I am at an impasse.  Am I OK?  Is my struggle supposed to happen like this?  All I can think of for my own situation is to repair the connection between myself and my family, myself and other human beings, and myself and Hashem.

At the very least, nothing can be too wrong about trying to achieve those things.

hi jester thanks for saying thanks,and writing what you are going through.I am so happy to hear or read for that matter that you are clean for the last 2 years.Over the last few days I I feel within myself that my battle right now is to be conscious  of my feelings and not to fool myself.That means not being scared to question my thoughts,to speak out to others what is going on in my head and heart.

mechazek wrote on 20 Jun 2011 19:13:


THAT'S the right place to start!  Especially talking things out with other people.  If we keep these things to ourselves, no matter how enlightened we think we have become, it is likely that we are still fooling ourselves.  That's the nature of addiction.

--Eye.