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GuardYourEyes Chizuk E-Mail (No. 1185)  

Getting stronger every day!
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In Today's Issue  

  • Torah Thought: Guarding My Eyes, Making a Friend
  • Member Chizuk: It Is, However, Bad for You! 
  • Audio of the Day: Rav Belsky on Marital Intimacy
  • 12-Step Attitude: Using Appropriate Tools
  • Torah Q & A:
     Choice or Not?

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Rabbi Feuerman's Friday Phone Conference
  
Parshas Toldos - "Is Our Character our Destiny?"

 


 8:30 AM NY Time

3:30 PM Israel Time

The call-in number is: 
U.S: 209 255 1000              Israel: 076 599 0060
Participant PIN: 637207#

For archive of previous Shiurim see here.

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COMING UP SOON! 

A new shiur series by Rabbi Feuerman beginning Friday, Dec 26: 
The Chosson (and Kallah) Shmooze you WISH you had, but never got!

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Category: Torah Thought 

 

Guarding My Eyes, Making a Friend

Amazing Mashal given by the Chafetz Chaim

 

By Once.innocent

 

There was once a man who was summoned by the King. He was nervous about going alone so he turned to his best friend, asking him to come for support. His best friend turned around and said, "You know, I am your best friend, but I don't want to be there in case you're punished, because everyone knows how close we are, and I don't want to be associated with you during that time".

The man then turned to another friend, not so close, but the reply was the same: he didn't want to be associated with this man receiving a punishment. He was left with no choice but to ask an acquaintance, whom he barely knew by name. This one willingly agreed, understanding that everyone KNOWS that they don't have much to do with each other.

This is a parable to what is going to happen to each one of us at the end of our days. We will turn to our "best friends" - the things we attached the most value to during our life time - be that love, money, lust... whatever we chased. They won't accompany us, for fear of being associated with us in the World of Emes. Then we'll turn to our regular friends - these being our family and friends. But if we've been interacting with them for the wrong reasons, even they won't accompany us. 

After, we'll go to the acquaintances we don't know so well. These being our mitzvos: the small bit of tzedaka we gave, the smile we once greeted someone with... We're going to wish we'd been real friends with these acquaintances. We can't begin to conceptualize their value. 

Every time we say 'no' to our Yetzer Hara, avert our eyes, turn away from our unhealthy desires, we are creating an 'acquaintance' who we should learn to get to know more and more. They're all we've got to accompany us later! 

The Mishna says that a Tzadik in Olam HaEmes would do anything in their power to come back down here just to give one more coin to tzedaka.

Don't underestimate the power of our struggle. 

When we win, we are indeed hitting the jackpot.

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Category: Member Chizuk  

 

It Is, However, Bad for You!

 

By Reb Yid

 

I work in a drug treatment center for teenage drug addicts. One of the biggest issues we have with the kids is the idea that marijuana is not bad for you. They all believe that. Maybe, they are even right. Maybe, it should be legal. But that's not my business. My point to them is always the same: "To me, it's not about if it is good or bad. It's about if it is good or bad for you!" 

 

When dealing with addiction we are dealing with a sickness. Sick people can't do the same things that healthy people can do. Not because the stuff is bad, but because it is bad for them. Peanuts are not bad, but to a guy with a severe allergy to peanuts, they are not good for him.

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Announcement

 

The Nesivos Shalom Conference Call

 

SUNDAY Mornings from 9AM to 9:30AM EST 

 

Reb Noach Schwartz, LCSW will give a shiur in Nesivos Shalom specially geared to GYE members, followed by insights, sharing and Q&A.

*Kindly call in for an enjoyable, educational, and chasidishe schmooze!*

 

Call in number:

From U.S: (605) 562-3131

Israel: (076) 599-0060

(From other countries, see this page)

PIN# 952533 (for all countries)

 

For Reb Noach's therapy page  here. For Reb Noach's website  here.

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audioAttention Married Members of GYE!


At this link, you can download two MP3 clips (together about 20 min long), where Rabbi Yisroel Belsky discusses important and sensitive issues al pi Halacha and al pi Hashkafa regarding marriage and marital intimacy, including how to properly prepare for marital intimacy. (You will be asked for your forum log-in info).

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Category: 12-Step Attitude


Using Appropriate Tools


If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.
-- Abraham Maslow


When we can take a long view of our problems, we can sometimes see that we're using inappropriate tools to try to solve them.


What's necessary for us to do is to move away, to detach. That may show us a whole new context into which our problem fits, and in which it may not even be a problem. Detachment is hard to achieve when we're deeply hooked into a situation. When we send ourselves drastic messages like "now or never!" we're pressing our noses right up against the problem - a position in which it's difficult to maintain a balanced view. 

To stop and say, "If not now, then perhaps some other time," unhooks us and lets us remember that life is richer and more varied than we thought when we were hooked.

Crisis thinking can be like a hammer - it flattens everything. This can be our way of trying to control the outcome of our individual struggle. 
 
But when we remember that we make up only a small part of one grand and beautiful design, we can surrender our problems to the Designer.

To be a competent worker, I will seek out the tools that are best suited to my task.
 

Care to comment? 

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One-liner

 

You do not need to attain perfection in order to lead.

You need only to discover which way is forward and begin moving in that direction.

 

- The Lubavitcher Rebbe

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Category: Torah Q & A


Choice or Not?

Question: 
Rav Dessler (Michtav Eliyahu) asks: How does it make sense that Esav was already 'bad' in the womb? If we're only given our Yetzer Hara from birth, why does it seem like Esav's path was predetermined?

Answer:
The Maharal explains that Esav was NOT GETTING PUNISHED for what was simply his NATURE! However, the point of Bechira comes at the place where Esav would have to fight his own Yetzer Hara (given at birth). Rav Dessler continues: the man's nature that he is born with only determines the point at which he is going to be fighting from. Therefore, this doesn't lessen his bechira in the slightest. He'll fight from his own place, as will Yakov...

This is an amazing insight for us to learn from. We may feel like we have it harder that everyone else, we may even feel more of a failure than everyone around us. But know that we are only responsible for fighting from the point in which Hashem placed us as a result of out nature. 

May Hashem help each one of us climb up from our individually-crafted points of bechira.
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Quick Links 

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Important Links

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The GuardYourEyes Handbook - Breaking Free of Lust Addiction, Step by Step.

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