The Steipler Gaon's advise for someone with this type of struggle is for that person to move on and focus on all the times that he has succeeded in fighting the yetzer harah.
So first the first half of this year, I really struggled. I tried filters, havrusas, chizuk emails, but I kept falling. Eventually, I realized that the best way to handle this is to not think about it. I just keep moving forward and try not to think about my addiction. I have also stopped keeping track of the amount of days that I have been sober. I feel that was part of the problem.
Ignorance indeed can be bliss.

Good L-rd, why are you calling what you have 'an addiction'? Are you really certain that you are an addict and are a sick man? If not, then who dumped that label on you? The heroin junkies and drunks are addicts - do you believe that you are like one of them? I know I am as they are, for I feel perfectly comfortable sitting in a Narcotics Anonymous or AA meeting and sharing openly with the other losers-to-their-drug-of-choice - and I have discovered that it helps me just the same as sitting in an SA meeting does.

I also feel perfectly comfortable speaking with a person who has Diabetes, Cancer R"l, or any other chronic, progressive, and fatal disease and saying to them, "Yeah. I understand a bit of what you are going through, myself." For I also actually have a chronic, progressive and fatal disease just as the drug and alcohol addicts have.

Is this what you mean when you say "my addiction" - or do you mean a 'yetzer-hora'/really bad habit?

I am trying to be helpful by asking what you mean. And if you do not mean addiction as I and the drunks and junkies understand it, then it could be that you have yet another reason to let go of thinking about your 'addiction': you do not have one!

That should be very good news, in my opinion.

So, set me straight here, Amigo.

- Dov

hmmmm, it actually might be more accurate to say that is is a bad habit. however, I am not going to completely shrug off the term "addict."

sickofsubmitting wrote:


I think I know where you are coming from.

While the "classic" idea of an addiction is one that completely consumes your life, I find that, when I can wall myself off from many triggers, such as unfiltered computers, contact with certain women, etc., I can function reasonably well throughout the day.

However, it does seem to be more than a "bad habit". Most bad habits don't have you (me) thinking twice when driving by a place of ill-repute, looking at recycling bins to see if anyone left behind anything juicy (one "advantage" of the Internet is that there seems to be a lot less printed porn around) or battling myself not to remove the data block on my phone...

Is there such a thing as a mild addiction? Are these just withdrawal symptoms (In my case, from when I had no filter or was getting around my filters)?

Mild pregnancy? No, no such thing.

But the desire for schmutz is clearly not usually an addiction, for then what is all the yetzer hora stuff referring to?

If your lust behaviors and your obsession with them is driving you crazy and making it hard for you to function in any way, then it is worthwhile looking through Alcoholics Anonymous and seeing if it sounds like you, to you. Then see if you are willing to open up in person or at least on the phone with another person who calls themselves an addict and is in real recovery. If you are, then you are probably in some sort of real trouble. if you are not willing to 'go that far', then you are obviously not desperate enough - for it is obviously not hurting you enough - and so then you are probably not an addict....or are just not ready to face the fact that you really are in trouble and can't get out (that is: an addict).

Now, there are many frum guys who do not lust or use lust any more than any other frum guy does...but they are obsessive-compulsive, or they are suffering from so much arrogance that they expect perfection in taharas hamachshovah - so they get tied in knots about the little lusting they do. They create 'an addiction' out of their own arrogance that they call "Kedusha". They point to countless sayings of Rebbe Nachman and the Reishis Chochma and expect to be that way - and bemoan their shortcomings.

May our cheilek not be among them. For there is no real refuah for that makkoh - for it is not a makkoh! Rav Pliskin tells about the only jail Houdini could not pick his way out of. Exasperated, he finally gave up on picking the lock and leaned against the heavy jail cell door with a sigh - and it swung open!

One can spend an entire lifetime trying oh so desperately to unlock a lock that is not locked! There is no way out of an imaginary jail. You can daven your brains and neshoma out - and Hashem Himself cannot unlock it...for it does not exist!

Davening is the only way I know to be saved from this. Sometimes more suffering works, too, though.

yes, this could be form of a tzaara. however, I also have been davening, which I have found to be helpful.

I think that is part of my problem. The only reason I want to stop is for religious reasons. I have to find a different reason to stop.

Thanks for submitting and I completely Identify with DOV! Lord knows I have a sickness that is incurable by any means of knowledge of self-will. What my knowledge has given me thought is that awareness and certainty that I have a fatal illness that once I take that first drink( in this case activating my desire for lust) I am uncontrollable and no technique or self propelled solution is going to stop that aggressive spiral down. And that's just for me, because I have abused the privilege of lust so that for more than 15 years I was actively relying on this pleasure to cope and deal with my problems, I reached a point of no return and without admitting complete defeat and powerlessness and asking G-D to help me with a daily reprieve, I got no shot at allllllllllllll!!!!!!. I for me, my sobriety date is the biggest asset I have, I am counting my days with pride and if anybody feels the same way as I do, I suggest you sign up for the 90 day chart and start counting for yourself to and asking each day for G-D to give you the strength to fight off the uncontrollable. As for those that are not past the point of no return, like Dov said consider yourself lucky and put up those fences bec who can tell if he is completely protected from the grasps of hopelessness?

YC

yeah, tried that. doesn't help to keep track of the days.

It is my humble opinion that for me, though I'm a bochur, it's more than a habit, but not quite an addiction.

Since when does addiction mean that you're a heroin junkie taking several hits a day? I think the dopamine rush created by this, as well as the Y"H element, as well as I DO THIS WHEN I'M IN A BAD MOOD AS A MODE OF ESCAPE, qualifies it as an addiction.

Picking my nose is a habit. This, something I do to avoid stress and life's vicissitudes, is more than a habit. Obviously, I'm nowhere near the point of needing SA meetings and stuff--and this problem hasn't taken control of my life by any means--but this problem is helping me come to grips with other problems too.

I'm not an addict, but this isn't just a habit. It must be more than that.

It's a "Habbiction".

And I was struggling with the reason for stopping too. I've come to the realization that there is no reason for me, a 17 year old bochur, to stop other than for improving my quality of life.

It's not just for growing close to Hashem. That's part of it; but it's all a process to grow in ruchniyus while solving my problems.

Like Dov, I believe that my aim is also to "start living", and like Dov, I believe in his profound statement that "I don't care whether suicide is prohibited or not. I don't commit suicide for other reasons."

I was reading an article by Dr. Sorotzkin: drsorotzkin.com/pdf/TORAH-PERSPECTIVES-ON-BOUNDARIES.pdf.

For me, focusing on the spiritual maladies resulting from it isn't as helpful as focusing on the BENEFITS of living clean.

More power to you, brother! Agreed!