Summer Guide to Resisting Lust
It's summertime and that means a young, middle-aged, and an old man's thoughts turn to... the fact that women are wearing less clothes. Here are a few suggestions you may or may not find useful:
1) Re-direct your attention from the body to the face and hair.
Sometimes you can't look away. (This is especially true when you're driving a car - for best results, look straight ahead.) But you can look at hair and face. Not only is that not felt on a glandular level (aesthetic only) but it also reminds you of her personhood and that she's not to be reduced to an object of pleasure.
2) Remember the words of the 23rd Psalm: "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want". Alternative readings: "I shall not lack" or "I shall not lack for any good thing". Feelings of desire and want can be discarded since how can we want if God promises we shall be satisfied?
3) Praise God for his marvelous handiwork. Tell Him what an impressive job he did with her (sometimes this goes along the lines, 'perhaps too good'). This helps not only in helping us to step back and become outsiders rather than participants but also by invoking God we are given help.
4) Ask Mary to pray that we be given the grace to want to be chaste.
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