In Today's Issue
- Attitude Tip of the Day: Your Father is Cheering You On
- Battle Communication: Gevald, How Common is This Today?
- Daily Dose of Dov: What I Was Looking for in Lust
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Attitude Tip of the Day
Your Father is Cheering You On
An addict who is experiencing withdrawal - and issues in other areas of life as well, wrote to us today:
Just sometimes, but more frequently lately, the pain, loneliness and restlessness become overbearing, and it is then that I desire to leave this empty world of "hevel varik", and be next to the kisei hakavod.
Response:
Your desire to be next to the Kisei Hakavod is your soul speaking... It is yearning for Hashem. And that is perhaps the underlying reason that you have this addiction. You are more spiritually sensitive than most people. Your soul has such strong yearnings for Hashem, so it seeks to fill it with whatever is available... But you should know that Hashem has no use for you near the Kisai Hakavod now. If He did, he would bring you there. He is sitting in the stands watching you play the game called "Life" and cheering you on. If He'd pull you out now, He wouldn't have what to really be proud of you, and you'd be ashamed to face Him. Instead, keep playing your best, keep looking to the stands and watching Him wave and smile to you... And when the game is over, He'll come down out of the stands to greet you and give you the biggest, most loving hug you could imagine. And He'll tell you over and over how proud He is of you and say, "wow, what a tough game you played!" And then you'll be shining with joy and fall into His loving embrace forever... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "7Up" (moderator of the woman's forum) responds: Hashem's love for you is total, unconditional and never ending. If any'one' wants only what's best for you, its Him.
I have no idea why he tests you the way He does and won't pretend to understand His ways. Whatever the reason though, one thing is for certain, He knows that this is for your eventual good.
Think of your own precious little children. On the most basic level, a child instinctively loves and trusts his parents. This only changes if the parents do something to destroy that. But assuming it is a healthy relationship, the child is willing to trust his life to his parents because he knows how much they love him. Now picture this: one day the mother takes her sweet little son to the doctors office. He isn't sick, but its time for a vaccination. BECAUSE she loves him, she allows the doctor to cause him pain and stick a painful needle into him! She is mature enough to realize that the pain of the needle is necessary, and far outweighs the pain of ch'v the illness itself. Yes it hurts her to see her son cry, and even more so, when he looks up with tear-filled eyes and accusing look on his face, "Mommy, why did you let him do that to me? Why are you hurting me?" But 10 minutes later, when the shot is a fading memory, that same little boy loves his Mommy just as much as he did earlier. Their relationship has been established long before and his doesn't question her love, or even the need to hurt him.
Take this one step further. When the doctor delivers the shot and the little boy starts crying, who's shoulder does he automatically bury his head in?? He doesn't run AWAY from his Mother because she allowed it, he runs TOO her!! He knows she is the ultimate source of comfort no matter what.
Think this through and relate it to your relationship with HKB"H. Your Tatty is hurting so much for you.
Sitting by the kisei hakavod is not an automatic once we leave this world. It's our reward for having trusted our Tatty for 120 years that there is a reason for all the pain and seemingly bad things He sends our way.
In the meantime, run TO HIM for comfort. He gives the most awesome hugs once you've learnt how to recognize them!
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Battle Communication
Gevald, How Common is This Today?
"NoWhereToTurn" posted this shocking post on our forum recently:
Sholom Aleichem warriors,
I am a regular 15 yr old yeshiva bochur in a top yeshiva in somewhere, but have internet at home. Besides for my own problems with watching my eyes and controlling my hotzoas zera that has been with me for years, I noticed something interesting recently. I noticed my father, a heimishe guy, by the computer late at night. My curiosity got the better of me, and when noone was around, I pressed ctrl H to see history, and found out that my porn problem is inherited from him. I also noticed a secret email address that he has, so I put my hacking skills to work, and got the password from a free keylogging program. What I found was heartbreaking - a bunch of heimishe guys from shul are all a bunch of porn addicts forwarding porn around to each other! How is a 15 yr old yesiva bochur from a good home supposed to deal with this - I can't confront him, and I can't let my mother know about this - she'll divorce him! So in addition to dealing with my own shmiras einayim/bris issues, how do I deal with this without destroying my home?
"Allaloneontop" Responds:
I know I'm new here... but I must express how much it pains me to read this young man's post... I mean that was me 20 years ago!
"Nowheretoturn", let me tell you what I would have told myself... Get help.
Get help now.
Get help before you spiral out of control.
Get help before you get married, have children, have a job and have other people rely on your success.
Get help before you have a rough day at home or at work and call a prostitute because the internet and the lap dances don't do it for you anymore.
Get help before you hit rock bottom and feel all alone.
I'm crying for you... because I know where you will be in 20 years from now if you don't get help... Like me, blogging on GYE in a hotel room alone... trying to get through your first day (night) of sobriety with the TV blaring in the other room.
Don't be embarrassed about it... As you can tell here, it's normal... Get help, young man.
You've come to the right place.
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Daily Dose of Dov Dov is sober in SA for over 13 years. See his story here.
What I was Looking for in Lust
At some time in recovery, I admitted that what I was always really looking for in all the lust and schmutz was true acceptance of me (or my body) for the sake of me (irrespective of my goodness or lack thereof), by someone that I really respect/worship. Someone I considered really Powerful. For me, that Someone was mainly: a pretty woman. After all, I had been giving them all my power by fantasizing their adoration of me for years. Isn't that what most of us do in our hearts with the schmutz? So, in short, I worshipped them.
(And I recognize today that in some small way I still feel some of that, even though I have Hashem and really worship Him now. I could ignore that sick part of me and pretend that it's gone - but I know I still have it. Whether or not it is immoral, is totally irrelevant to me, and b"H for that! It's just the Truth about me, and there is no place for shame about the Truth, at all. I'm an addict!)
At first, my Connection could be with someone imaginary, like a cartoon or photo. After a while, that was not enough. This was not a good development. The shekker got ever deeper and I became ever more ill and desperate.
Guys in recovery helped me admit that even if my wife did plug into my fantasies, it wouldn't give me what I really wanted. What I really wanted, she could only give me with Love, not just with sex. And certainly not with lust. Lust always ruined everything (except in my imagination! ). She could get lots of power by using lust, but I'd inexorably be drawn away from her one day anyway, cuz it'd all be about me, not us, at any rate.
When we are just beginning Recovery, a healthy and happy marriage relationship (including sexuality) - to paraphrase Mesillas Yeshorim - is "rochok mitziyur sichleinu". We often can't even believe it really exists! But we slowly grow, change, and become mentchen. Derech Eretz kodmah laTorah! Living right (Derech Eretz) slowly turns our heads right-side up so that we think right (Torah). Life finally begins to make sense and becomes interesting and fun.
It didn't come from thinking and figuring it out. Living right does.
Marriage is the same. Thinking won't fix it, only loving in action will.
Slowly we begin to know that the Connection that we really seek can't ever be fulfilled by lust, even within our marriages. It doesn't come close. Loving comes close, and the relationship works best when it's about loving, only.
The steps - not reading them, but working and living them - showed me for the first time in a way I could really see, that we need to start learning how to enjoy living with Hashem. We need to "give" our power to Him, rather than to our lust objects. It's what b'rachos and tefillah are all about! It's no longer all about us, cuz He really is the Shoresh (root) of everything. Perhaps that's where d'veikus starts. |
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