a gut moed tayere yiddin!
hope everyone is having a great yom tov. i haven't wrote here in a while, here it comes.

bh i had a very nice first days at home, some of my siblings came over w their families which i like and look forward to. we really enjoyed each others company, and had some of the nicest sedarim i can remember.
pre pesach was also l'fee erech very good this year, we all chipped in and helped, and the atmosphere was as stress free as possible.
chol hamoed could have been nicer, as in I could of gotten up at a decent hour and utilize the day (and if I'm being honest I didn't get up too early on y"t either), but overall i consider it a good yom tov bhh.

right now I'm feeling just a liiiitle bit edgy... also, although i'm trying not to, some of the post yom tov life and stresses are getting to me. was thinking that I deserve to cut myself some slack, not to c"v look at porn, but maybe just look at some pretty women? I have two devices to choose from, one is more censored, it only allows some porn sites (50% kosher i guess) the other one is completely unrestricted! it even does that cute thing browsers do, where it suggests different searches, to make sure you make it to the tachlis.
i know how this goes, first I'll look at some women (it aint porn, and i have a cool enough streak to chill out a bit), then I'll move on to search for provocative stuff on a platform that doesn't allow adult material (safe there). from there I'll go on to a different platform that occasionally allows a slip or two (not my fault) my next step would be yet another platform that keeps the trash in a separate  designated section, I'll start scrolling some and then I'll find a piece or two that somehow made it into the clean section, (now this is a shanda!! the audacity to expose children and innocents to this material! a chutzpah that I'm seeing this on a 'safe' platform!!) I'm gonna skip a couple steps here but next thing you know, I'm knees deep into porn, and by this point there's no reason to stop. I'll suddenly realize that I'm actually very tired and am not interested in this, but hey, when's gonna be my next chance? I'ts mamesh a brocho l'vatola to just close up in middle.

one lesson I'm learning from this, when I first began fighting this, I had the technicalities kinda figured out, but I still wouldn't succeed for long. w time and work i learned that there's something underlying the porn (for me it's mostly connection). I have to work on the yesod in order to kick this thing. now I feel like things have flipped: I put in a lot of work on the fundamentals, but kinda neglected the practical aspects. as in most of life, there's gotta be the right balance.

excuse my rambling friends,
wishing you all a wonderful yom tov, and a shleimusdike zman cheiruseinu!

Excellently written buddy.

Lot of good thoughts here, Tayereh Chaver.

Yeah, it takes honesty to realize that sometimes there is something that compels us to "go looking" - there are situations in which we have learned to use the porn as a solution, and those patterns need to be understood and changed... But staying away is also important.

I think that being honest means understanding that starting off "chilling out" online is at very least getting into the "posture of pornography" and more often a disguised Razton to go and find a fall. Realizing that makes it easier to say no to the beginning of the slippery slope than on the way down. (And an understanding what's driving that Ratzon... Connection, you say? Would you care to elaborate, maybe? No pressure)

It helps to take an honest look at the entire search history at the end of the night to see just how that slope developed, to see, realize, and learn for next time. It hurts, but yeah... 

There's Chaim on the Horizon,
Hang on!
מאן דבעי חיים 

Sometimes when my family gets together with their own families I get a sense of longing and loneliness bc were are alone.
I think sometimes looking at porn and masturbating is a way to compensate for that loneliness.
This is not the case for everyone of course.
If this is a factor though then we have to remind ourselves that looking at porn or masturbating doesn't come close to that feeling of companionship and it actually distances us from it by feeling regret and maybe even hopelessness of ever finding that companionship.

Stay strong and keep on going
Gut Moed

thanks guys for your responses and insights. i appreciate the compliments!
i'm gonna take the time iy"h after yom tov to get in deeper to the points you guys brought up.

wishing everyone a gut yom tov
davening to hashem to keep my oigen open to be able to see the chaim on the horizon

Here comes the post i bli neder'd y'all.

Reb chaim, you politely suggest that just 'chilling out', is essentially a disguise for porning (as is evident in the end of night search history). it should therefore be treated the same as the porn issue itself, namely to be boidek and find the source driving that ratzon, that need to get a fix.

I want to be מעיר that While I agree this is the case many times, there is also another aspect. what HHM calls the open cookie jar syndrome. namely the regular human tayvah to be male. all the vayemaan stories about tannaim and amoraim who had nisyoinos, although obviously we have no hasaga as to their madreigos and nisyoinos, there is still the simple p'shat that ein mikra yoitze mipshuto. now do we assume that these tzadikim had underlying anxieties/attachment issues that lad them to the nisayon? not mistaber. the toirah warns every yid (regardless of their specific situations) ולא תתורו אחרי לבבכם ואחרי עיניכם.
​(similar to someone who has a nisayonm to talk loshon hara. we won't start to scramble and find him the right therapist to help him uncover the fundamental problem pushing him to speak dvarim assurim)

The digging has to happen, when you have an ehrliche guy who's makpid on kalah kachamura, is matzliach in learning, and decided he wants to put this habit behind him, yet still can't get rid of his phone. and eventually when he does, he ultimately finds another and yet another device. This guy's ambivalence is tearing him apart: he passionately hates the device and what it brings him, yet he shudders to think of life without it. here we must ask, what is it that he's holding onto? What is he getting from porn that he can't find elsewhere?

In my case I think it is two things:
firstly a feeling of connection. see my parents are wonderful people. it would be so much more wonderful if i felt close to them. unfortunately i never really felt a connection with them. I attribute this largely to their personalities. To make matters worse, I had a fair amount of social anxiety and had a hard time making friendships. (bh nothing extreme, as i've heard from others who suffered immensely from social anxiety). The cherry on top was that my parents had me skip from seventh grade into ninth, going to mesivta a year early, and I felt inferior to the guys there.
I was explained a theory that porn gives the illusion of connection. cuz it uses an act that was intended as a means of the deepest connection possible.

Another underlying factor I had was that I felt unseen. like people don't know me. (heck i barely knew myself). In part I think it's because I had a big focus on conforming and fitting in. which resulted in my being inauthentic and people not really seeing me. in porn I found people being exposed and seen. This was also reflected in the type of porn I like(d) watching.

An interesting tzad hashave between those two, is that I always had a meshicha to porn, much less to masturbating. I take it as a brocho when I read guys who struggle so much w the latter. I wish them all hatzlacha.

thank you reb chaim for no pressuring me into thinking about this and writing it, you brought me clarity.

hatzlacha to all,
there is light on the horizon

horizon wrote on 01 May 2024 20:30:

Wow, really insightful post. 

Just thinking a little about the quote above. Why can't it that even this driven guy is just holding on to porn? Porn hits some of our deepest human drives, provides all the little chemical pleasures etc. So while perhaps sometimes someone has a porn issue because they are compensating for the love they never felt etc. But my gut feeling is that 90+% of the time it's just they ate from the cookie jar over and over until they wired their brain into that pleasure. And then every time they feel an emotional pain of any sort, they run to sooth it with their favorite pleasure.  Without getting into the sugya if that person is then technically an "addict", porn is an addictive sort of pleasure.

This is my question. My ignorant ramblings on why I think it's a good question are below.

L'mai nafka mina? Major nafka mina. If pornography usage is a symptom/siman of an underlying lack in life then you can't fix the porn without fixing the ikar problem. But if porn is the siba/root problem, and the emotional lack is just one type of tickle that porn uses to justify itself, then porn is the problem that needs to be addressed. Fixing the underlying emotional problem is also important, but wouldn't necessarily solve the porn problem, and also wouldn't be required to solve the porn problem. 

Maybe this is me trying to convince myself I just have a porn problem, not deeper emotional problems. But I'm generally leery of navel-gazing about the "source" of pornography usage. Note that I 100% agree that it's important to identify your triggers so you can be on guard, and if that trigger is a feeling of emotional distance then it's very impressive self-awareness to catch that. 

chooseurname wrote on 02 May 2024 14:50:

I enjoyed the nuance of your question. I also appreciated the way you explained how many people can get stuck in the porn trap. Though I’m not sure if I’m understanding the nafka minah.

Afilu im timtzah loimar that there are no dramatic emotional issues, this person potentially has the same amount of painful work to do. He is presently wired to lust when tired/stressed/etc

Yes, there are the emotional triggers, and yes, we have unfortunately taught ourselves (sometimes beyond our control, i.e. earlier in life) that sweet porn is the answer, so even if there is no dramatic emotional issue, there’s still a manifestation of a “problem”, meaning, that just simply explaining how bad porn is etc. (or, whichever way you meant by “dealing just with the porn”) or regular shmiras ainayim ruchnies talk, will not work for too long. It is still agonizingly difficult to not run back to that cozy haven when emotional stress builds.

So, whether a dude is thinking he’s tzad one, two, or somewhere in between, there is still all that painful emotional work of dealing with these emotional triggers, in other words, learning how to live like a balanced, normal, healthy person.

I may not have understood your point, feel free to correct me if you feel I am wrong. 

Keep churning out those great nuggets of wisdom, I am really appreciating it! 

youknowwho wrote on 02 May 2024 17:13:

Good point and a very well articulated post.

Let me clarify what's bothering me (picture the thumb in the air for this one). IIIIff the problem can be resolved regardless by learning better responses to urges then fine - my chakira has no nafka mina. But it seems like looking for the emotional reasons behind watching porn is sometimes saying this emotional issue is the problem, I cannot respond better to urges that come from this trigger, and the only cure is for me to remove the trigger by resolving my emotional pain that's driving me to porn. And then a whole emotional journey is required before I can stop watching porn. 
But if porn is the problem, and emotional pain is just one trigger among every other trigger. Then just like I can urge surf, reach out, or whatever tool, when I'm hungry or angry I can do the same when I'm feeling unloved.

I agree emotionally triggered urges are harder to fight as they are strong and attack motivation too. And I agree that removing triggers is very helpful - unfiltered devices are a trigger for me and having everything around filtered makes me have less urges (in addition to making the urges harder to follow through on). If someone is often triggered by feelings of ex. abandonment or inadequacy, then working through previous trauma may resolve that trigger completely and make their fight much easier. 

But @horizon's original, very thoughtful, post posited that there are two groups of people: 1) people who like cake, and 2) people who have emotional lack driving them to porn. And he hypothesized that people who can't give up this porn they hate may be in group #2. The danger with this categorization is it opens up the door to saying, "It's not my fault, I just have this pain." If someone avoids this trap then I have no problem with the categorization.

Just some thoughts. It could be I'm just viewing things through my journey, where any excuse for porn was gleefully embraced. 

chooseurname wrote on 02 May 2024 20:04:

At first, as I pictured your thumb waving, I completely lost you,   but now, reading this paragraph, the bolded part in particular, yes, I now understand what you are trying to say. 

It definitely is counterproductive and dangerous for one to say, hey, I'm a "wounded, tortured soul", so therefore I can justifiably do whatever I want. 

I would still imagine though, that this danger of rationalizing exists whether one initially got into it through dramatic emotional trauma, or developed a flavor for it and it is now triggered into it by emotional triggers, or whether he is addicted to it, or just a bad habit etc.

And, it may or may not be very challenging, in any of these categories, to break out of this unhealthy pattern of thinking and living. 

I appreciate your point, now I'd better get back to work!

i'm watching this conversation unfold, and i thing it may be above my pay grade. i'm gonna sit back and listen to the ideas being discussed (for the most part).

now i understand what you're saying.
a couple thoughts:
1. playing victim isn't really a good life strategy. you might even be right, but you're not getting anywhere.
2. do we want people to be thinking "it's my fault"? (my responsibility, yes. fault? idk.)
k i guess its just two thoughts:)

Terrific conversation. Kol HaKavod to Horizon for bring out such good stuff (and for being vulnerable, that must have hurt a lot to write. Here's a hug, friend.)
Lot of great points and food for thought. I would like to drop my two-cents into the mix, starting with addressing Horizon's original point and then the spin-off discussion between YKW and Chooseurname.

1. To Horizon's question - I agree. But to clarify - I think there's a big difference between a person who falls when he finds himself in a situation of Tayva  and a person who "Goes Looking To Fall". A person who falls when confronted with the YH is first and foremost a healthy male. We don't need to bring proof that the YH for Arayos can be overwhelmingly powerful within the situation. The stories about Rav Amram Chasida and so many other Taanaim and Amoraim that showcase the fact that everyone is potentially vulnerable typically relate stories about a person who finds himself in a compromising situation and either fails or doesn't. That's why pretty much everyone needs a filter, period. Chazal legislated Yichud and taught us that if you're alone with a woman there's a good chance you'll fall, regardless of who you are. A phone can be the same.

But, as Horizon said, a guy who hates the habit and can't bring himself to get rid of the phone; or the guy who goes looking late at night because he feels a deep unsettledness that is driving him in a way he doesn't necessarily quite understand to "go looking" - and he starts on an innocuous website and "somehow" always seems to find himself hours later in the dark and hazy pit of lust - it seems to me that in the latter case usually there's something there that worth digging to uncover.
I want to emphasize - it doesn't have to be a psychosis and the guy doesn't necessarily need therapy. But there is often some kind of pain or discomfort that he has that he has learned to use porn or masturbation or lust to numb, distract or comfort. And therein lies an obstacle to breaking free, beyond the desire to give up the delicious yet unsavory pleasures thereof. [To share - This work helped me a lot, over years. And I never went to therapy.]

2. Chooseurnames points are extremely well taken and qualify this point.
Firstly - in the society we live in, a guy who got used to finding porn on devices can get to the point that he is almost perpetually in a state of Nisayon. It's like always being in a state of Yichud because there's always a device down the hall, waiting.... Someone in that state doesn't necessarily fit the description above. But honestly, a lot of guys here think that's what it is all about initially. But it's not the whole story...  There are often just too many times when one goes looking when he wasn't initially in a state of lusting, to legitimately explain it that way....

3. His second point is equally important. But I want to qualify it and mix in some of what YKW pointed out.
Yes, of course, sticking your hand deep into the sticky, sweet and smutty cookie jar of the pink hazy lusting has a deep and profound effect, and you can get hooked (habit, addictive behavior, whatever). All true. But this experience and habit can then also become wired into and connected to whatever other stuff you have going on inside. 
You see, I don't believe that a guy who feels disconnected and lonely will necessarily seek out porn and lust מעיקרא to fill up the hole in his center if he had never been exposed. But if he was exposed, and he got somewhat hooked on the stuff, it can then go and fill a NEED, too, and then he will start developing patterns in which he uses the lust to fill a hole and need, not just because it's delicious. So the points are not contradictory - rather they are both true. 

4. You Know Who is very right, in his real and pragmatic (and slightly dark) way (of course you are dark, Tom). 
Once we have twisted thinking in place, and have broken boundaries and tasted how the sickly sweetness of lust not only tastes good but also can help ease whatever emotional pain we carry, we have a bigger problem than lust itself. But to use this to absolve us of the responsibility (or ability!) to break free, is further twisted thinking. Because we have to break free if we want to live, amomg other reasons.
So i agree that it's healthier, probably, to call them "triggers", when trying to work to understand the patterns. But I also think it's important to identify the vulnerabilities and needs we have to be able to honestly address them.
And yeah, to break the patterns some guys could use therapy. And some people should use The Program, which has saved so many when nothing else could. And some guys can manage with a conversation with a loving sledgehammer, or with a good friend who understands and can empathize and has some experience. Or can maybe figure it out on a long walk and introspection, or a little Hisbodedus. Or Davening and whispering and pouring his heart out. Whatever works for you.

It takes work to dig. Friends can help. It hurts, too. One of my Rabbeim used to say that understanding a problem is halfway to solving it. The other half aint easy, through. 

Thanks for listening.
I am,
מאן דבעי חיים

thank you for taking the time to clarify these dakusdike nekudos. i'm gonna read this another few times iy"h.
and thanks for the hug:)

I'd like to add one thing to this incredible conversation, which is that once the brain has been wired to respond to things by reaching for porn, further indulgence can undo progress being made, because it re-reinforces the script. This can hold true whether there is an underlying emotional issue or  the porn itself has become the issue. Having an underlying reason is More of a reason to not do porn now, because that twists the knife further while one is trying to take steps to recover and get healthy from the underlying root causes in cases where they are present.

I'm glad this conversation brought up all these great thoughts, thank you all for participating. while on the one hand i don't fully understand everything that was brought up, and on the other hand i don't completely agree w everything, i greatly appreciate the voices which shared their thoughts and insights to this discussion.

jack, you're last point can be tough to swallow. 

P.s.
i'm glad to be seeing you around, and honored that you graced my thread w your presence.