Struggles with the Covenant of the Brit

With Hashem’s help,
 
Hello and blessings, my dear friend,

First of all, I am sure that Hashem loves you very much; He sees your efforts for Him, your good intentions, and your personal pain regarding your spiritual state, and all of these indicate that behind all the shells and trials stands a pure and righteous soul that seeks to connect to its Creator genuinely. For that, you should love yourself very much.
  
I truly hope that the following words can be beneficial to you. You should know that the real battle begins in thought.
First, you must love yourself. The trials in this generation are very tough, and the mere fact that you are trying to overcome, and even just want to be holy - that itself is a tremendous achievement that elevates your soul.
  
In order to love yourself, you must fight against every thought of self-hatred -
Know that your physical desire is completely natural (without it, you cannot establish a family and a relationship), and know that your desire is external to you (meaning, the desire is not part of who you truly are; it is something separate that has been placed in you in this world for a purpose. The fact is that as a child, you did not have such desires).
Do not let the desire lie to you that you are "disgusting" or "repulsive"; you must remember that the desire is not part of you; it does not define who you are; it is just a Nisayon you have received.

 

Why did Hashem give you such desires?
Know that desire is completely natural for a young man of your age and for every man. What you are going through - every boy your age goes through the same. This is how the Creator created man, with desires that will lead him to marry and establish a family - which is a very important part of his purpose. The desire is meant to bring you closer to marrying in the near future. If you did not have this desire, you would be in significant trouble.
Know that most of your life, you will be married, and the desire will serve you to serve the Creator, to live with your wife in love and peace, and to establish a kosher family in Israel. Thus, your desire is completely natural and meant to serve you, and to help you serve the Creator in the most important stage of your life.
However, even now, this desire has a role - and it is your restraint, you holding back, because when you fight your desires - you build your personality and manlihood, your spirituality, and you come very close to Hashem. Therefore, you must have discipline and control your desires to the greatest extent you can, for these years are the foundation upon which your entire life is built. Your struggle is an opportunity  to build mental resilience to control yourself and your desires, and to be a true servant of Hashem when you have a wife and children. Because of this internal battle, you will be a merit to be a better husband and a better father. Only in this way can you become a true man. A man who can establish a family, with a personality and mind above the blind cravings. All these battles with the evil inclination are meant to forge you, to strengthen your character, your courage as a man ("Who is the hero? The one who controls his desire").
 
* * *
You are no doubt wondering how to conquer this desire. 

For this, you must first define victory.
There is no such thing as "I find myself falling again"; simply because there is no "again." Our sages said that every day, the evil inclination renews itself to bring a person down. Every day is a completely new trial, a new field for you to conquer. Of course, you need to repent for your past sins and correct them, but you also have to treat each day as a new page, and as a new project to tackle the desire. Never look at your failures until now as a pile - they are battles that took place, and today you are in a new battle. 
What is victory? Our sages said in Pirkei Avot that a person should not believe in himself until the day of his death. There is no such thing as "beating" the desire; you were born to fight for Hashem, to conquer as many days of victories as possible. Throughout your life, you move upward step by step, and even when you fall - you must get up, even if you have fallen a hundred times - you must get up, because every day is a new step you can rise or fall in. You must keep climbing and never become discouraged.
I once heard a wise saying (I recall it in the name of Rabbi Eliyahu Dessler, zt"l): Hashem does not expect you to win; He expects you to fight!
 
You must try as hard as you can. This is a war without winners or losers; every battle is a trial in itself, that you can either succeed in or fail. Of course, you need to protect yourself from sin, but you must never despair or give up because you have failed. Our sages taught us: "A righteous person can fall seven times and rise!" - a righteous person is called righteous not because he falls but because he gets up, time after time. Do not lose hope. 
 
* * *
 
But before you ask how to win, you must know how not to lose.
You must know what true loss is, so that you do not fall into it.
 
True loss is despairing of yourself, hating yourself, falling and entering despair, saying to yourself, "I am lost", "How can I even pray?", "Hashem surely hates me", etc.
This is the true loss, when the evil inclination succeeds in distancing you from Hashem.
Never allow the evil inclination to distance you from Hashem. Because this is also the real victory of the evil inclination: to cause you to disconnect from the Creator due to fake feelings of "shame", and to descend into heavier sins because you already "sinned." Often, it happens that a person who sins says to himself, "A sinner like me, what difference does it make if I sin again?" or "With sins like mine, what more can I lose if I speak slander?" or "How will Hashem forgive someone like me or even want to hear me calling out to Him?" or "Hashem hates me" - all these words are the words of the evil inclination, and they are meant to bring you down in the real battle, the greatest battle there is - your connection with the Creator, your innermost soul. The desire seeks to harm your relationship with Hashem. Therefore, you must strengthen your faith that Hashem loves you in every situation and will not give up on you (and the proof: He gives you life. As long as you are alive, the candle is still lit, and there is still a possibility to rectify. This means that your mission here is not yet completed, and you still need to grow and move forward. If Hashem had known that there is no remedy for you, you would not be here now). Hashem loves you; therefore, He created you, and therefore, He gives you life.
 
* * *
  
A great way to overcome desires is to fill your time and keep busy.
Some fill up their schedule with work, studies, and a schedule that keeps them away from sin.
However, in a generation full of temptations like ours, even active people can fall.
 
It is very important to also prevent unnecessary temptations that create a "vicious cycle" of falling time and again. Therefore, it is advisable, first and foremost, to switch to kosher filtered internet access in order to prevent you from accessing promiscuous sites.

In Israel, there is "Rimon Internet" that is aimed at traditional and religious individuals, it is open to all sites except for clearly immoral ones.
And there is "Nativ Internet" that is aimed at Haredim and those strengthening themselves who want to completely shield themselves from the dangers of the internet, and it restricts most sites, except necessary ones. They have a program for Baalei Teshuva as well that allows full access to sites like Hidabroot.

After you have put up the necessary boundaries, you should know that the best way to victory is: to increase holiness.
Until now, you fought against the darkness, but have you tried to increase the light? When you add light, darkness fades away by itself!
Thus said our sages (Baba Batra, 16): "Hashem created the evil inclination and created for it the Torah as a remedy".
If you want the war to be easier and to achieve more victories than failures, you must strengthen your Torah side. When you constantly surround yourself with goodness, you will not want to sin. You will be so happy and close to Hashem that you won't even have the temptation as much. 
You must be connected to the world of Torah. Listen to Torah lessons, watch lectures every day, and best of all - start studying in a Yeshivah for those strengthening themselves. In Yeshivah, you are in a world of Torah, and it is much easier to overcome the evil inclination.
  

I wish you much success in all your endeavors!