I just fell...

Don't know what to do with myself...

wilnevergiveup wrote on 26 Mar 2020 09:51:

So sorry to hear that you fell... 
maybe the thing to do now is forget about your "self"...
-rely only on the help of Hashem 
-pray for others
-try to help others  
-connect (virtually) with others for support...

we're all in this together! 

dust off, get up, restart... Hashem loves you!

Okay, starting fresh now!

I am not invincible. I can fall and I must then get up!

There was a snake inside me telling me what to do, but now that snake is gone.

I got to 33 days clean which is longer then I had in a long time, so that is pretty good. Also usually it takes me 2-3 days to get up after a fall, but this time I was able to start counting right away (because I am counting).

Wishing everyone hatzlacha in their struggles and an end to this crazy time.

It is so ridiculously tempting to fold after after a fall.
Kudos for pushing through it. That mindset is what make all the difference in the long run.
Keep it up!

You tripped you fell. You didn’t fall off the mountain. Every time you said no until now is still worth the same. 

Remember what you named yourself. 

If you would only see Hashem's smile from you picking yourself back up after your fall, you would surely go another 33 days with ease!!!

Hashem loves every success and if you just do the best you can, you will see tremendous results!! 

Thanks to everyone for the chizuk, it's really nice to hear from you all.

This year I am making Pesach for the first time (as are a lot of people) and it is so busy. B"H having something meaningful keeping you busy is a huge blessing, keeps you satisfied and keeps your mind off your struggles. This has been the first 5 day stretch I can remember where my mind was too busy to wander to inappropriate things so B"H for that.

Just one point, I realized that while Pesach prep is really a blessing, I have to be really careful not to get stressed because stress is a huge trigger for me. Also making sure to get enough sleep which is also a challenge this time of year.

Wishing you all have an easy pre Pesach madness.

Hatzlacha

The Gemara (Bava Metzia 36:) states, “What difference does it make for the malach hamaves, (angel of death) here or there?” If it was destined that someone will die, no matter where he is, the malach hamaves can find him.

The Mabit writes that nevertheless, there is a benefit in running away from troubles (which is what people used to do when there was a plague). The Mabit explains that the self-imposed exile of running away is an affliction, which atones. So even if it was decreed that he will die, he can be granted life because his sins were atoned for.

I repeat this to encourage those who have to be in quarantine. It definitely is not a pleasant experience, but accept Hashem’s decree with love, because it might be that this temporary uncomfortable situation is the yesurim (suffering) that will save you from much worse, chalilah.

Hey all, hope everyone had a nice Pesach.

I am now 22 days clean, but really almost two months since I got here and started working with GYE.

Having this forum and the 90 day challenge has helped me tremendously in my struggles although the fight is still a huge challenge.

I sometimes ask myself, when will I be able to look at a woman as a regular person who laughs and cries and gets stressed out. Who has feelings cares for others and can be cared for. She is after all a human being. If it's the right setting (person/place relative, coworker) you can even make a joke or give a compliment without your mind wandering off to who knows where. 
When will I be able to walk down the street (or go to shul for that matter) and see beyond a woman's physical appearance?

A wise was once describing to me a particular girl and she kept on saying "she is soooooooo pretty" and she used this to describe a few different girls all of them were "sooooo pretty". Some were, some weren't. Some were really not pretty so I asked her how she defines pretty and she answered me that pretty means when the neshama shines so bright that you can see it through the skin. And if it shines so bright that you can't even see the skin that is really pretty.
Hopefully one day this will be my view too.

Imagine if you live near the Niagara Falls, would you be interested in looking at a two inch high waterfall? It would not be hard to look away from that. The physical beauty of woman is just a two inch waterfall compared to the beauty of the soul. Why would we want to focus on this insignificant thing and miss the true beauty instead? Perhaps this is what Lust addiction is after all, just a fantasy that some insignificant thing will make us happy, when of course it can't, because we are missing the true beauty and the things that will really make us happy.


Sometimes when we're out there in the big world surrounded by all the temptations, with beautiful women wherever we seem to look, we cry out in our hearts "Dear G-d, where are you? I can't see you, I can't feel you! All I see is a beauty of a different kind, wherever I look!"... But then the answer comes to our hearts from G-d, "my son, does there exist any beauty besides me? I am in the beauty you see as well!". For G-d is indeed everywhere, and he is the source of all beauty. The beauty that we see and crave here on this world is truly only a mere shadow of a manifestation of G-d's beauty. We need to train our minds to realize that there are no two types of beauty. There is only one source of beauty in the world. What we see in women is also the beauty of G-d. But G-d has decreed that in order to merit perceiving his true beauty, we must first learn to turn our eyes away from the physical beauty that is also his creation and manifestation. In his great wisdom, G-d determined that only one who is ready to give up the physical manifestations of G-d's beauty, will be worthy of experiencing the true beauty of G-d, in a much more sublime way.

I think the question is, is there any way to appreciate the physical beauty of a woman without lust, meaning, it's inevitable that we will encounter a women or two in our lives, and of those there may be one or two that attract our attention but that doesn't have to lead to inappropriate thoughts. 
G-D made many beautiful things in the world, art, scenery and the like can a beautiful woman be looked at as the same?

I guess, to sum it up my question is this. Lets say we are talking about someone who we can't avoid seeing like a neighbor or relative, how do we proceed? Am I supposed to take off my glasses every time I see her? or is there a way to view her physical appearance as a thing of beauty but not associated with lust?  

Your post has generated so much great advice and encouragement. 

I want to address your question literally.

Are you going to suffer for the rest of your life? Absolutely not.

You are motivated enough to have written here, and therefore I assume you will have read all the replies to your post. You will overcome the suffering, I have no doubts about that. You will learn to deal with that monkey. 

But know that the Yetzer Hara doesn't suddenly disappear. It just becomes tamed. It becomes controllable. One eventually learns to divert one's thoughts to something else. As crazy as it sounds at first (think telling someone "Don't think about pink elephants!"), with practice it does become possible to concentrate on other things, whereupon the Yetzer Hara gets bored and moves on.

Most of us will spend our lives with this battle, batting away these thoughts like swatting at mosquitoes, but it does become a matter of fact and we no longer suffer.

So, will you suffer forever? No. You will learn to overcome this Yeitzer. And although it will not go away, it will become weaker and weaker and more and more pathetic the more you deal with it, until it becomes a matter of course. Improper thoughts..... consciously focus on something, anything else, and the improper thoughts are gone

The struggle is hard. It gets harder before it gets easier, this much I have figured out. I am in it for the long haul and I thing that makes the Y"H nervous. As soon as the excitement wears off that's when the real battle begins. I know I struggle, I know why I struggle, I know what needs to be done to change but that's just it, CHANGE IS DIFFICULT. I don't know what I can do to change but here are some of the things that didn't work for me.

Learning mussar helped me get closer to Hashem but I have not been able to make it real enough to use in this struggle for any sustainable amount of time (once the lust hits you kind of forget about everything else).

Telling myself that I am/will be a complete looser/failure if I don't change my ways just made me feel like a looser/failure because I couldn't change.

Making kabalos just gave me something else to feel guilty about when I fell.

Getting married just added another layer to the guilt. The feeling of not being transparent as well as the feeling of betraying her are both enough to drive a man insane. 
(The only thing that marriage did for me was make the struggle more desperate. It raises the stakes that's it. Eventually I shared to some extent what I was going through with my wife and she was and still very encouraging when she found out about GYE.)

Rewarding myself for accomplishments also helped to some extent but the Y"H is a very talented negotiator and he usually convinced me that between the two pleasures that await me the one that I can get now at my fingertips was the one to be had and the one at the end of the tunnel can wait. He is so superb a negotiator he even used the Hakol hevel idea on me that I shouldn't sacrifice anything for a materialistic incentive. 
In the end I would usually fall then feel so terrible that I would give myself the thing just to lift my spirits so that I can start over again.

Getting a filter also helped for the most part with content but not for my real problem.

I realize that I obviously need to do something different but I am not sure how. I know that I need to rewire my brain, to think differently, to view the world differently. I need to set my priorities straight to do a mental overhaul and with G-D's help I will.

A plan involving gradual change often is the best way to attain self-control. A person should start by focusing on one area of his battle against desire. You  should firmly commit himself to keep a certain halacha or aspect of self-control. Alternatively, you can decide to exert self-control in one particular common situation. 

It takes great effort to decide to change, and even more effort to stick to that resolution for even a short time. As we know, effort is all that matters, and every instant of effort is priceless. The battle against desire is a challenging, lifelong battle, and it was not created to be easy. It is supposed to be a struggle, and the odds are strong that some battles will be lost. But by keeping his determination to fight despite the difficulty, a person can achieve the ultimate success: emerging victorious from the most intense battle ever. A person should feel proud and encouraged about every ounce of effort he has exerted. As a result, he will emerge stronger from his errors rather than losing his will to fight.

Thanks DavidT for the honorable mention in your article.
Btw that's not how I look, but close:smiley:.