Day 47/50: URGE SURFING – Practical Tip
וְהָי֣וּ הַכְּרֻבִים֩ פֹּֽרְשֵׂ֨י כְנָפַ֜יִם לְמַ֗עְלָה סֹֽכְכִ֤ים בְּכַנְפֵיהֶם֙ עַל־הַכַּפֹּ֔רֶת
The cherubim shall have their wings spread upwards, shielding the ark cover with their wings
Many people think that urges get stronger and stronger until you give in, but in reality, urges come in waves that grow and peak, before gradually subsiding. “Urge Surfing” is about learning how to ride an urge like a surfer rides a wave.
Urges almost never last more than 30 minutes, and usually much less than that. You may feel uncomfortable as the urge peaks, but the simple knowledge that it will pass, can make it much easier to ride it out. You see, when we act on our urges they become stronger and more frequent. But what we don’t repeat, automatically gets weaker.
A few ways to surf an urge:
1) Delay: Tell yourself “Not now, we’ll see later”.
2) Be Cool: Don’t make a big deal out of it (ever notice how the nervous surfers are the first ones to fall off the board?)
3) Breath: Take a few deep breaths and just let it go.
4) Distraction, Hesech hada’as (as we discussed on Day 45).
Try it for yourself! Next time you have an urge, ask yourself how strong it feels on a scale of one to ten. Then wait five minutes and ask yourself again. By the time a half hour has passed, you will almost definitely see that the urge has basically disappeared! The more you practice this, the weaker and more infrequent your urges will become.
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