>>1250
Ultimately it boils down to faith in God alone in some capacity.
>Be me.
>Be Orthodox.
>Struggling with sin of self-defilement.
>Try praying for Mary and the Saints to intercede.
>No dice.
>Try praying a lot and a long time out of prayer books and the Typica.
>No dice.
>Try Jesus Prayer a lot.
>No dice.
>"Spiritual Father" recommends fasting, because according to "The Ladder of Divine Ascent," Lust is supposedly linked to bodily appetite. Thus if you fast, theoretically it'll reduce your urges.
>No dice. Have some of my worst urge attacks on days when I eat like a bird. Have some days with no urge attacks on days where I eat normally or even stumble into gluttony. Link between Lust and appetite is superstitious tomfoolery.
>Try reading my Bible a lot during urge attacks.
>No dice.
>Start out crying and hysterical every time I stumble. Eventually, after repeatedly failing over and over and over again, reach a state of numb, detached, hopeless cynicism and a sense of futility and inevitability.
>Eventually reach a point where I start questioning aspects of Orthodoxy, like crypto-works based salvation, the crypto-paganism of "venerating" Mary and the Saints, and all of the other extra-biblical nonsense.
>In a moment of desperation, drop all of the above nonsense and say a simple, short, humble, sincere prayer from the heart directly to Jesus Christ.
>Have been doing this continually and have reached a level of self-control and continuous sobriety that I thought was a hopeless pipe dream.
>Realize that Jesus Christ's sacrifice on the cross was enough, that Jesus Christ himself is enough, drop all the extra Cathodox baggage and become Evangelical.
Jesus tends to build our faith by allowing storms to happen in our life, and then carrying us through to show us that He is indeed there, cares, and can be relied on. For me, it took being allowed to fall into the error of Cathodox belief in order to realize that He alone is enough. Your path to faith may be different. He answers prayers differently. Sometimes people are miraculously cured of their cancer. Most have to tough it out in chemo-therapy. You may pray to him with faith and overcome on that alone, or you may need to go to a 12 step program as well, like Sex Addicts Anonymous, etc. He can heal with miracles or doctors, it's all up to him ultimately.
Just remember what he said to give the disciples more faith: if you have the faith of a mustard seed, you can command a mulberry bush into the ocean (for context, a mulberry bush has an extensive and deep root system that allows it to live for hundreds of years, and would thus need great effort to move in a more conventional way, like digging it up. The mustard seed, while one of the smallest seeds out there, eventually grows into one of the largest trees out there, just like faith.)
Also, vid strongly related. Hope this helps. God Bless.