I "think" the chiluk can be seen this way. Don't at the outset think of Teshuva.

Just change our ways. Changing our ways can only be done through the help of the Almighty because our tendency to act out is stronger than us HOWEVER Hashem is much stronger than any tendency or addiction.

Connection to Hashem is what? not religious? In fact we are connecting in the most emesdic way, by being totally mevatel to him.

This connects many an addict to Hashem in a more meaningful way than 20 zemanim's mussar seders shockelling by the shtender.

This is not in any way a knock to yeshivas . Sometimes a life altering circumstance changes a person in a way you just cannot duplicate in a standard chinuch environment.
Examples: a great personal miracle, a loss of a loved one, an accident.
In gemarah megilah it states that the passing of the kings ring to Haman harashalsv"z did more for mass teshuvah than all the neviyim combined.

lavi wrote:


Hi Lavi,

Welcome back! I do remember seeing your name on some older threads.

I can't afford the brain cells to get involved in the discussion above about religion, and happily leave that to others. Just based on your thread title - by all means be a religious recoverer, and bring us along with you for the ride.

I just wanted to comment on your reference to movies because that is a big issue for me too and i haven't really seen it discussed a lot here.

I'm going to assume you are referring to "regular" i.e. non-pornographic movies, and for me personally I include secular novels in the same category. I'm struggling to understand how to relate to them. There are many books / movies / TV shows where 99% of the time they have nothing overtly lewd, and are as offensive to shmiras eynayim as going to the post office on a fall day.Sometimes I feel that the main reason why they are bad for me is because they represent a form of escape and I view escapism as the definition of addiction as it relates to me personally.

Actually, I see this as my primary struggle, and here's my shortlist of reasons not to watch movies or read novels:

1. x % shmutz even if I do fast forward those parts
2. Exposure to a low level of inappropriately dressed women
3. Cursing / violence
4. Wasting time
5. Escaping
6. The slippery slope to more explicit movies and books, which is a path well trodden.

May I ask why you also connect that to your overall recovery?

eslaasos wrote:



When i get some free time, i will try to respond to this email properly. i do have a separate thread just on movies. "movies and you"

eslaasos wrote:



yes.

i think that in this aspect, there maybe a difference in what comes first, some of our friends are addicted to lust before or without the introduction of internet access, and some of us may have started just looking for entertainment and started the slippery slope then,
for us, it may be a double battle, keeping away from lust and keeping away from unproductive internet usage.

Lavi,

This is the first i saw your thread. I want to tell you that I connect with you. Since I am an FFB and grew up my whole life as an orthodox jew its part & parcel of me. Honestly, I can list 5 reasons what brought me here. But I think yiddishkit is a strong drive for me. Its part of what tells my heart whats right or wrong even if its farshtupt. Without judiasm I don't know that I'd be here.

I think percentage wise there is far greater percent of yidden in SA or working on oneslef than of other sects. (I never crunched the data so I could be wrong. But thats my feeling. And in fact the SA website which is not strictly jewish lists alot of frum nighboorhoods. Out of the few places in NJ where it holds meetings one is Lakewood!)

My take on why there is a higher percentage of frum guys in sa is this: The vast majority of ppl in SA have a religious background. I think the reason is that b/c religious ppl have a moral backbone that screams at them every time they act out. Not to say that religoin = unmanageability. My life sucked not b/c of religion. I just think my religion was another thing telling me it was wrong. The reason why i walked into SA was b/c of religion but i realized it's much more then that.

Shlomo24 wrote:


it's a made up stat.

i have been in meetings in many locations and i have met one person someone who never had a religious connection. jews and non jews included. by religious connection i don't mean jewish b/c their mother was jewish. that is my experience.

(this is not a rayah but roy k was a priest)

Cords here are some facts not made up stat.

Go to the SA site and click on face to face meetings. Then click on New Jersey. I notice two locations in NJ. Guess where one of the two is? Thats right Lakewood

Next click on NY. The largest variety of options are in Brooklyn and in SA Orange and Rockland County Area, with 4 location options, in monsey, monore, spring valley and perl river.

In maryland Baltimore has by far the largest list.

It is plausibly possible that these areas were chosen simply out of chance. But I would suggest that the areas listed above are highly populated by people living in these areas more than other areas. Generally who lives in Lakewood, Monroe & rockland county? I think many orthdox jews. This all leads me to believe that living an orthdox jewish life does statsictly lead more people into recovery. Thus it does play a role in our recovery.

New Jersey

Cordnoy's link shows a different story but I don't like bashing our community. If it had been true, and I was going to hypothesize, I would say it's more likely that secular people are mostly of the opinion that masturbation is a normal activity, and complete abstinence is abnormal.

My filters block your link Cords. Its funny how I can caht with girls on-line but can't click on your link!

Anyhow I simply googled SA meetings and clicked on their site.

eislassos,

Then in that case we do have stronger moral values that bring us to the relization of what right or wrong?

waydown wrote:


I'm not sure what you mean by stronger moral values.
I believe we have a stronger Yetzer Hara, we have a different set of rules that are stricter, we are educated differently.

There are obviously non-Jews who are fighting these same battles; we have chatted with some of them on this forum.

Are you asking who is more successful in fighting the battles? I have no answer on that one.

Was there a different meaning I didn't think of?

9494 wrote:


Thank you, I hope I'm not being too kanousdig. I appreciate you're commenting on the people, not the religion. I was taught a lesson by a very choshuve Rav not to bash Jews. He said it was part of the issue with the Meraglim - saying Loshon Hora on Eretz Yisroel.

IMHO, from the little I've read, there is a reaction found in both Jewish and non-Jewish communities that when a moral lifestyle is valued and promoted in the education system, there will be some who rebel, and in the course of the rebellion will go to an extreme they might not have had they not been "restricted".

I don't know how to say this in a nice way. We don't have the Christian or Muslim mentality that if you don't convert to our religion you are eternally damned, however it is a different briyah when there is a neshama. Enough said.