Plastered in Public

We live in a generation where the evil inclination has never been mightier. Daily, like a steamroller, it gains more strength and momentum with all its ever-expanding tools of internet, social media and lust-stimulants available at one's fingertips. It's hard to imagine how the evil inclination could be stronger in its ability to spread so much filth so quickly and so far and wide.

A person's main challenge in this world is overcoming sexual lust. The evil inclination therefore uses every tool and makes every effort to tempt a person in that area.

Never in history has there been a generation so morally decadent, where debauchery is freely displayed everywhere in the public domain, on billboards and on public transportation, even in such seemingly respectable places like banks. It's always in your face. Even professionals in posh offices spend their lunch breaks web-surfing behind closed doors on the most despicable of websites. The evil inclination has aggressively pushed its way deep into people's lives, even penetrating their cell phones. Unwittingly – virtually every moment of the day, people are faced with a ruthlessly cruel enemy that desires to destroy them. Before they realize it, their brains are devastated and the souls are contaminated; they then wonder why they're not happy.

The only way to be rescued from the fiftieth gate of impurity is to strive for the fiftieth gate of holiness. A daily hour of personal prayer is the way to reach holiness and the only way to avoid the raging fires of sexual lust and temptation.

In the war against the evil inclination, a daily hour of personal prayer is the only effective weapon. Without personal prayer, a person is like a defenseless soldier on a battlefield. He has no way to fight the enemy. He won't be able to successfully withstand a test of temptation. Therefore, everyone must learn how to perform personal prayer.

Why is personal prayer one's only weapon? By succumbing to temptation, one not only forfeits his world to come, but he'll suffer in this world as well. Pornography and sexual lust destroy a person's income and happiness. Like chocolate-covered poison, they're easily ingested but ever so deadly.

The daily hour of personal prayer is so important, for if Hashem doesn't help a person, he won't be able to overcome the evil inclination. If any temptation to transgress is strong, then temptations of sexual lust and breach of holiness are virtually insurmountable, stronger by a thousand-fold. In this area, one especially needs Hashem's mercy and assistance.

In former generations, a person's temptations would be private, but not plastered all over the public domain. In days of old, a person would have to overcome obstacles in seeking debauchery; today, the debauchery literally runs after him, every single minute of the day. It's on his telephone, his computer, in his office and at the train station. He thinks he's looking out the window at a nice view while riding home in the bus, train, or his car, and some indecent image on a billboard flashes before his eyes. Things that used to be unacceptable to society are now the norm. If a person doesn't have an hour a day of personal prayer, there's no way to protect himself.

Rebbe Nachman of Breslev calls sexual lust, "the general evil". If a person rids himself of sexual lust, he can easily overcome other types of lust and bad habits. Therefore, our first priority in personal prayer is praying for assistance in guarding our eyes and ridding ourselves of lust: "Master of the World, remove all the sexual lust that's within me. Help me be free of the lust of fornication and the craving of the flesh."

Every day, one must call out to Hashem with renewed strength, seeking His help and compassion.  This is especially important in this generation before Moshiach, which the holy "Ohr Hachayim" described as the fiftieth gate of impurity, in other words, the lowest of the low. Who could imagine that people from upright backgrounds would come to commit the worst transgressions of adultery and promiscuity? We must beg Hashem to guard us from these dangers, for no one can be sure of himself.

Our sages tell us that a person who observes the Torah's commandments is a partner in creation. One asks, "How can I possibly be a partner with Hashem? He creates everything!" The answer, in light of everything we've discussed so far, becomes apparent: Hashem creates us, but He expects us to refine ourselves, for by doing so, we become the human beings that He intended us to be.

The Gemara describes personal prayer as "obtaining one's world in one hour" (see tractate Avoda Zara, 17). By "one's world", the Gemara is referring to one's portion in the world to come. Accordingly, Rebbe Nachman promised that anyone who devotes an hour a day to personal prayer will not see the face of purgatory and will directly enter Gan Eden. In addition to attaining his portion in the world to come, he'll benefit in this world as well.