From my own experience WhatsApp is just another way to keep in touch with friends and family. Haven't had any serious nisyonos with it, but that's just my personal take. It can be a time waster but otherwise it's harmless...

If you are careful to limit your participation in “groups” to groups that maintain the same standards as you do I believe you should be ok.

Also if you use the status feature you will see the statuses of anyone in your contacts that has posted something to their status.

I know that there are many people that have had problems on WhatsApp but to the best of my understanding it comes from being in groups.

I am in a few Daf Yomi groups. There was one instance that someone that didn’t belong joined the group and posted a bad picture. It only happened once and everyone quickly deleted the picture. It never happened again. I think they changed some settings on who could join after that.

Had a very hard shabbos. My mind kept getting plagued with bad thoughts and i kept fighting to get them out. I would go to learn, try listening to a shiur from one of the rebbeim in my yeshiva, but overall it was tough. I came out on top though thank g-d, and I obviously feel very good about myself right now!! I didn’t want to fall on shabbat (especially right before selichot…), but i was thinking to myself that maybe this is why the yetzer hara is trying so hard right now. He knows that the one thing that will get me down about myself right now is if i have to start selichot with a low self image. His tricks didn’t work though as i came out on top! I must reiterate that a big part of me being able to push through the hard times is by reading a chapter of the battle of the generation every night. It really is a game changer... Either way, I’m up to day 30 again on the chart (a third of the way to my next goal) and I hope that I will continue having the strength to keep fighting for what I know to be right!
-ftc

I've had that in a few groups... theres probably some way to prevent it

Just wanted to share some thoughts as we go into rosh hashana:

Last year rosh hashana time i was down in the dumps. Again. Memories of my life kept coming back to mind as I went through the various stages of my life. My thoughts were something like this. “I wasted last year on porn, i wasted the year before that on porn and so on and so forth for the last 14ish years... I’m going to ruin my life, never gonna be able to get married, I’m probably gonna die soon because of all the masturbating that i did. Hashem has no interest in my davening or learning—im just a faker anyway… if my parents or friends find out then I’m absolutely done for…”

Anyway you get the basic idea of what my mental state of mind was. Bad. Very bad. But i didn’t know what to do. Every year i had made a kabala (actually multiple times throughout the year) to quit porn and masturbation and whatta you know, it didn’t work. I was more mature at this point in time and i knew that making another kabala to stop wasn’t going to do anything for me. I had a chazaka that it didn’t work(-: So, i decided to do something different that year. I didn’t make a kabala to stop, rather i made a kabala that within ‘x’ amount of days, i was going to tell one of two of my rebbeim what was going on… I had never shared this story with anyone before and i was scared. I don’t know how i had the courage to to take the kabala on, but i ended up breaking down to a rebbi telling him what was going on. He listened to me and gave me chizuk, but at the end of the day it didn’t help me long term. He didn’t have any concrete things to tell me except to try and make sure that i keep myself occupied during bein hazmanim (which is true that i do have to do that, but i needed more advice than that). So, back to the next bein hazmanim (after i was back in America) I ended up falling yet again… but as usual after a fall you get some type of clarity to want to make a proper decision. And i was scared. I was scared because i was back in America, going to go into shiduchim in the near future and i didn’t know how i was going to solve my problems.

And that was the night that I discovered GYE and my life has been different ever since. I was welcomed with loving arms into a community of people that have been where i was, are where i was, and some of them worse off. I never imagined that there were so many people like me. I started getting practical advice of how to deal with this issue. I didn’t post often for the first 50 days as i was mostly just taking in all the information but after that i started posting more often. I got so much chizuk from the commutiny here and it was the most unbelievable feeling I’ve ever had. I started feeling like i wasn’t living a double standard anymore and i now had the mindset that i would be able to break free. I wasn’t going to be stuck in this matzav forever!

I managed to get all the way to 121 days before i fell. It had been a rough bein hazmanim and nothing worked out the way I wanted it to. I was also in a very negative mindset about the pritzus everywhere and i didn’t know how to deal with it properly. I posted about my fall which was one of the hardest things to do. I wanted to be that person of inspiration—the guy who was able to break free after 15 years and start helping others, but i felt deflated. I had fallen again and was back to square one. But everyone responded to me andI got so much chizuk from everyone here. You guys helped me to get back on my feet to which I’m forever grateful for. I realized that a fall after 120 days does not put me back to square one. Additionally, with the encouragement of Vehkam, i started reading a chapter of the battle of the generation every night. My entire perspective towards this challenge that we all face has thus shifted dramatically. I’m no longer depressed about the challenge that we have although at times it can be really hard and excruciatingly painful. I accept that this is the challenge of our generation and realize that this is exactly how I’m meant to grow bigger! It’s not despite the challenge that I will grow, it’s the challenge that enables me to grow!

I will always be fighting this battle. That’s just how life is. And I’m ok with that now. I know that I have an unprecedented opportunity to grow, in a way that no one in Europe could ever have imagined. I now have a new lease on life. I have a much more positive outlook and I’m much more emotionally stable. I don’t know what this coming year is going to entail, but I now know one thing for certain. This year really will be different.

Wishing everyone here a gmar chasima tova and a year full of hatzlacha and siyata dishmaya!!!
-ftc

Post Rosh Hashana:

Davening was not good. On the first night and day I was barely able to get into it. I didn’t have any strong emotional feelings like in years past. On the second day in middle of psukei d’zimra I had a total burnout in davening. I didn’t feel like I was talking to anyone and I was just growing impatient with the slow pace. I left davening for a 10 minute walk and came back and just learnt from a sefer while the shliach tzibur was going. I just learnt and learnt and tried keeping my mind off of davening. After a break for kiddush, I got back to shul and no longer felt the same way as I did during shachris, but I still wasn’t able to ‘get into’ the davening. During tkias shofer if i tried closing my eyes to concentrate, bad images would begin flooding my mind. All in all it wasn’t a very inspiring rosh hashana for me and I wasn’t in the greatest of moods.

Last night I restarted the battle of the generation. Read the first chapter and reinforced in my mind that the challenges that I’m put through is the reason that I’m in this world. I’m here to fight the battles and win. If I’m not challenged I won’t be able to grow. If I stop getting challenged, it means that there is no more hope for me. Challenges are what I’m in this world for. I reinforced this idea in my head over and over and over again.

During shachris this morning I was very tired as I didn’t have my usual hot cup of coffee. I was also mentally drained after davening for two days straight and not in the mood for another long davening. The yetzer hara decided that in middle of selichos would be the most opportune time to give me tons of flashbacks of bad movie scenes etc. (don’t want to get into to much detail) that I watched. These were scenes that were lying dormant in my memory for years. I hadn’t thought of some of these things in 5 years! But obviously they are going to come up now as I’m trying to concentrate on the words “ה׳ ה׳ קל רחום וחנון”. I was going to cry that I had to deal with this now. Can’t I just have a break from my bad thoughts? Will I ever be able to function like a ‘normal’ person? And then it hit me...

I took a deep breath and let out a big smile. I was being challenged and it was a really really tough challenge. But I was being challenged! That meant that hashem hasn’t given up on me! If he had given up on me there would be no point in challenging me. Challenges are only there for us to grow and come closer to hashem and I knew that if this was the challenge that was given to me, then I had the kochos to pass. So, I smiled. I smiled because I realized that I had an amazing opportunity. I had the opportunity, during the aseres yemei tshvua, to show hashem that I am not the same person who would love to dwell on my thoughts and fantasies from years past. I smiled because there was nothing else that could be done except to smile. Sure enough those images in my head started fading away. And as more thoughts and memories started to attack me, I just kept smiling more and more. And those images also faded away. And so it was for the next few minutes until the yetzer hara had enough of me and just left me alone…

While in the midst of an attack of desire and lust, it seems that there is no way out. There are feelings of despair. There are feelings of wanting to give up. But at that moment of despair you have to realize that this is your opportunity of greatness! This is the challenge that hashem gave specifically to you. So smile! Smile because that’s the only thing to do! Realize at that moment that you are being attacked and that you can show hashem how hard you fight to win. If you try this you will see that the yetzer hara won’t seem so powerful anymore. You will realize that you can overcome it and reach true gadlus! (But as for me it only works if I do some external action to show that I know I’m being challenged, i.e., smile, laugh, etc.— Knowing this idea in my head hasn’t done the trick…)

So, I may not have had the most inspiring rosh hashana and awe filled davening, but I have had the opportunity to show hashem my true colors and with hashem’s help I will be able to continue fighting day in and day out.

May we all have hatzlacha and siyata dishmaya in our challenges and be zoche to break free!
-ftc


Ps. I’m hungry…

wow wow Im floored! such gadlus! This post is probably the most beautiful thing I ever read in my life!

I don't usually like to post this because I don't think I personally can tell people to daven but given that it's the Aseres Yemei Teshuva:
Per Rav Pincus it's totally fine to call out silently to Hashem to give you inspiration for davening and to take bad thoughts away.

BTW smiling is huge

Face the challenge wrote on 28 Sep 2022 18:03:

Beautiful post.  I can relate to all of it.  

Inspiring post, thank you for sharing. I'm sure you know this already based on how you write, but there is a big difference between feeling close to Hashem and actually being close to Hashem. Someone might "feel" close to Hashem while they play guitar on Shabbos or riding an emotional high during davening without actually focusing on Who they are davening to. While you may have not felt close to Hashem, you most certainly were close to Hashem. Keep sharing the inspiration.

Kavey wrote on 28 Sep 2022 19:31:

I definitely hear the idea in theory, but as for the practical application i felt that when i davened to not have bad thoughts, it was just a gateway for more bad thoughts to come in. I try to avoid bringing bad thoughts to the forefront of my attention even if it’s for the purpose of asking hashem to make me not have them as I find it ends up being counterproductive. That’s why i didn’t opt for that option… But hey, if it works for you, then keep it up! I am only talking from personal experience. I’m not trying to say other ideas won’t work, rather, it hasn’t worked for me.

Thank you so much for sharing your story.
I am in a similar situation. My older siblings introduced me to P and they all went OTD. I am the pride and joy of my parents who were Balei Teshuvah and desired that all their sons should be sitting and learning and I am the only one in yeshiva. My parents have no idea the struggles I am facing, all they see is one of the top guys in yeshiva with a wife and child being shomer torah and mitzvos. All the nachas they have makes me feel worse about my struggles.
It gave me a lot of strength to know that there was someone out there with a similar story. Thank you!

Face the challenge wrote on 30 Sep 2022 04:30:

Correct. The only thing that putting your mind's spot light on lustful thoughts will do is strengthen them. The only way to move on in life from "impure thoughts" (what I know as lust addiction) is to muster the strength and courage to move your mind on to better thoughts and busy yourself with better actions. Of course you have to daven, but attending to thoughts you want to get rid of is the classic blue elephant parable.

The brain circuitry of lust addiction is not something that will probably ever go away completely for those of us who spent years fantasizing, polluting our minds with garbage, or worse. It certainly does get fainter and fainter as time passes, though. We have to learn how to deal with it in a healthy way and then we can stay in remission. For example, I am Baruch Hashem over a year clean now, but just two days ago, I had a moderate and real struggle after some "thoughts" entered my mind that I didn't want to think about. Around a year ago, I would have continued to focus and focus on them until ultimately falling, maybe even several times. What did I do two days ago? I calmed myself down and closed my eyes. I then had the following discussion with myself in my mind: "Hm, I'm having some lustful thoughts. This is certainly uncomfortable! But, Baruch Hashem, I am attracted to women and have a healthy, working hormonal system! Man, this is definitely uncomfortable. I feel physical discomfort right now! I am in discomfort! I sure would love to go to be מוציא זרע לבטלה and get rid of this physical discomfort! But, you know what, what else in life do I have to accomplish right now? I have LOTS to accomplish. So, let's move on now, brain, because we a have a lot do in life." I moved on. I didn't look back. I went and got some exercise and learned. Here I am 2 days later. I didn't fall. I meditated on and acknowledged the physical discomfort I was in, meditated on the feelings pulling me towards my past unhealthy habits, I was real with myself in the midst of a struggle, and I made the decision to just move my mind on instead of wallowing in lust and guilt and falling after so many days of success. This is how a person recovers. Is it easy? OF COURSE IT"S NOT EASY!!!!! YOU HAVE TO BE READY TO ENDURE PHYSICAL DISCOMFORT TO ACCOMPLISH ANYTHING WORTHWHILE IN THIS WORLD!!! Recovery means learning how to thrive in the midst of discomfort because we want to be be something greater in our lives than to be masturbators and porn addicts!
Good Shabbos and wishing everyone a wonderful Yom Kippur.

Chevra! we are united for this battle reb motel zilber said this purim that the bucherim who went through the internet hashchasa and came back will be the ones to bring moshiach in which the world will befilled with godliness and all the klippus from znis will simply fall away and be shown as nothing Im joining this battle with all of you and Bshem Hashem Yatzliach!

Hopefulposek wrote on 30 Sep 2022 14:49:

Do you have someone to confide in?  With the right perspective you can shed all of those guilt feelings.