Had a pretty decent day, hit 9 days clean tonight BH.
I'll post more tomorrow IYH,
OivedElokim

Thinking about starting to read the Battle of the Generation book every day to help me gain perspective and motivation in this fight, though atm things are going well BH.
Is it still possible to download it as an e-book from the site? Went to the library section and it looks like the took down the PDFs and now you have to read it online. Don't want to order a physical copy because it's an awkward book to be caught reading or have sitting on you shelf. Was planning on downloading it to my kindle, but idk if that's still possible. If you know please lmk.

Having a good day BH, got up early for a pre-shachris chavrusa (who didn't show up for the second day in a row...) and had a very enjoyable shachris. Been procastinating for the last hour or two, but I have a chavrusa in a few minutes. After that I'm going out for sushi with a GYE buddy to celebrate almost 10 days clean...

Hope y'all have a great and meaningful Shabbos Shuvah.
OivedElokim

OivedElokim wrote on 30 Sep 2022 17:10:

guardyoureyes.com/ebooks/item/the-battle-of-the-generation

there is a button on the bottom to download.  i tried it on my desktop and it worked...

Day 11
Had a pretty good day. Woke up early, listened to a shiur and davened with a minyan after which I chatted briefly with a friend.
Went home and wasted some time, ate then went out and learned most of the afternoon/evening.

Had a couple of urges, briefly entertained the thought of going to watch porn but dismissed it pretty quickly. Still find it incredibly frustrating that G-d gave me this challenge, but I'm not complaining about it as much anymore. There's no point...

Still can't believe that I managed to stay clean for this long. Looking forward to racking up a serious streak. I know some guys on here rail against day-counting, but I find it extremely motivating. I'm very competitive by nature and this plays into that. Whatever, to each their own.

Another thing-my counter counted the day I fell as day 1, so I'm technically a day ahead of my real clean streak. I don't know if that's the biggest deal. Should probably fix that.

Anyways have a lovely night
OivedElokim

Ok good morning. Here's the deal:
Made it to 11 days and then fell after a prolonged struggle. Still over 3 months clean from porn, BH. Have to pay a $100 and move on.
But don't worry, my morale is still high. Here's why-
This streak was really long relative to the past half a year or so (perhaps more) and I showed myself that I could still beat my urges for a sustained amount of time if I have the right system in place. I'm confident that with the lessons I learned from this fall I will have a much longer streak next time around. Maybe even forever.
I also noticed how the urges slowly decreased in frequency and intensity for the most part over the past almost two weeks. I'm sure that that trend will continue more and more as I get to 30 days, 90 days etc. It was very encouraging because in the beginning it's so overwhelming to think you'll have to confront these same urges forever-turns out they're not the same urges after awhile... 

Here's what I learned:

1. A knas is a great deterrent to falling. However you need to make it really hurt. Before I was doing $10/20 per fall (if I followed certain conditions). Now I'm doing $100. It's harder to convince yourself that an orgasm is worth that kind of money...
2. Don't tempt yourself, fantasize or pursue explicit material and tell yourself that you won't "finish". It rarely ever happens that way and even if it works, your torturing yourself needlessly. Better steer clear of the whole sugya and you'll do much better.
3. Related to 2-after a certain amount of fantasizing and tayva, most plans are rendered absolutely useless. If you're overcome by desire you'll convince yourself that $100 is nothing compared to the pleasure you'll get, which is absolutely ludicrous. Try to nip it in the bud immediately when the thoughts start coming to you, before it snowballs into something you can't control. I believe I saw once on here a quote from one of the holy books that after a certain stage of tayva a person looses their bechira. ובדידי הוה עובדא...
4. External consequences and incentives can only do so much for you. Internal work is an absolute must. You need to work on your motivation and drive and sincerely want to quit. You can't white-knuckle yourself to 90 days (& beyond)

1 is already under control and worked for almost two weeks. It stopped me many, many times from doing stupid things.
2 &3 need some work. I also need to add a time limit for certain apps on my phone which regularly don't pose a challenge to me but become a problem late at night when I'm lusting.
In terms of 4 I already started reading The Battle of The Generation on my Kindle as per the recommendation of many on this site. I like it so far, plan to read a chapter every night till I finish.

Anyways I need to get on with my day, 
Thanks for reading
OivedElokim

Good morning
Been doing fine since my fall, only paid $20 of the $100 of my knas because I have almost no money right now, getting paid for something soon and will pay up the rest then.
Otherwise doing ok. Slept in this morning and missed kapporos
Feeling a little disappointed going into YK with only 2 days clean instead of 2 weeks but that's the situation. I know Hashem appreciates my effort more then my streak, and I am firmly committed to doing complete Teshuvah in this area, and that's ultimately what counts.
Once heard a Chassidishe vort on the possuk  ולך ה החסד כי אתה תשלם לאיש כמעשהו- seemingly that isn't chesed, its mishpat!
The answer is that it's referring to maasim that haven't been done yet, if a person simply decides to change paths, that he won't make his past mistakes anymore, Hashem judges him off of those future actions and not based on where he is currently holding.
Feel like that's very pertinent to my situation. I'm on the right track, already had a taste of freedom and am staunchly committed to going all the way. 
I hope in that zechus I-and all of us-should be sealed in the book of life, a life that is full of meaning, happiness, clarity, purpose and success in every area.
Gmar Chasima Tova!
OivedElokim

Pretty uninspired YK, whatever.
Paid up the rest of my knas, going home for YT tomorrow morning
4 days clean BH

Don't have much else to say,
Have a good night/morning or whenever you read this,
OivedElokim

Dearest Oived
Its been 2 weeks and we have not heard from you
How are you doing?
How was YT?

GS
EYES

Hey. Thanks for checking in. Sorry for going MIA.

Haven't been doing great since YT. Hard to transition back into the regular grind, to get up in the morning and be productive. I'm not really satisfied with what I'm doing right now even though on paper there's nothing wrong. I'm learning and working for about three hours a day. My learning hasn't been gratifying as of late, more like a chore then something I enjoy, which was not the case before YT. Still on a learning curve in terms of my job. Don't love it but it's ok and somewhat rewarding. 

To make matters worse, I succumbed to watching porn after an over 4 month clean streak. Although I officially need to pay a knas for that, I don't have the money for it right now, as I started paying my own rent which is due tomorrow and I don't have an extra dime. Being that I didn't pay it yet, I allowed myself to watch porn several more times since my first fall on MS. I am mortified and am afraid I'm going to get sucked back into it completely. I think I need to make non-monetary consequences for falling because I'm absolutely broke. 

The timing is also terrible. My mom is really on my head right now about starting dating, and I spoke to someone last week who's opinion I respect who knows about my struggles and he was also very much of the opinion that I should start. I mentioned that I've heard that one should typically be clean 3-6 months from porn before dating and he said that's only true in cases of severe addiction. This was last week, before my fall. I think my subconcious took that remark as a heter, ("See, it's not that bad") whereas before I spoke to him I avoided porn like the plauge largely because I wanted to start dating at some point. So I feel like I seriously messed up both in regards to staying clean on its own merits as well as a major setback in my dating life. 

I need to figure out a short-term solution to this issue as well as a long-term strategy.

This is all besides for my almost daily M habit which shows no signs of letting up.

Feels good to come clean about all of this, 
Feeling demoralized and frustrated
OivedElokim

I don't know if any admins are gonna see this but I have a few complaints about the new format of the site:
Firstly you can't mark if a fall was P, M or something else, which used to be possible and was a great feature. 
Secondly when you report a fall they only count your last fall and none of the previous days, which gives many many cumaltive days clean that I don't deserve.
I'd be very happy if either of these things could be rectified. Maybe there's someone I could contact about this? Idk

BH am clean today. Helvai veiter...

OivedElokim

Hi Oived, 

I wanted to respond to your post from yesterday but ran out time, here is the belated reply. I totally resonate with YT throwing things off, I myself have been struggling and feeling very out of rhythm/very out of wack. I'm sorry you are having a hard time, but I am struck and impressed by your honesty. Such self awareness will certainly bring about the healing you need. Wishing you well and may things turn a corner for you soon.

Hakolhevel wrote on 02 Nov 2022 04:18:

Yeah I think that might be it, just not sure if I should look into SA as I think it's highly unlikely that I am an actual addict or I should look into SMART.

What do you guys think? Anybody care to share their experience with either?

I'll daven that Hashem gives you more money so you can make teshuvah
I think I calculated how much tzedaka I owe for (realistic) amount of illegal emissions I've had in order to do teshuva (based on the idea of a certain number of meals instead of fast days). It's somewhere between $2,500,000 -$3,000,000 (!!!!!!!)

hST2cKmqv3vpV wrote on 02 Nov 2022 10:53:

Do you think Hashem actually wants that?!