(The following is a personal post from one of our members.)
In the Sexaholics Anonymous book there's a chapter titled Getting Started (p. 63). It's fresh in my mind, because I have just read through that chapter with a newcomer who asked me to sponsor him. The specific section I want to reference is titled The First Test--Surrender (p. 66). Here is what it says:
Joining a group doesn't automatically make the problem vanish. Most of us had tried stopping countless times. The problem was we couldn't stay stopped; we had never surrendered. So, the first time the craving hits again, when we get that urge for a fix, we give it up, even though it feels like we'll die without it. And at times, in our new frame of mind, the craving may seem stronger than ever. But we don't fight it like we used to; that was always a losing battle, giving it more strength to fight back. Neither do we feed or give in to it. We surrender. We win by giving up. Each time.
After reading through that section, I shared from my own experience how I had never found freedom, never stayed sober, because I had never truly surrendered my lust (and my will and life). Just as the paragraph explains, I spent years vacillating between fighting lust or giving into lust. Naturally, feeding it and giving into it was the easier of the two options. Fighting it was terribly difficult and required so much effort that my strength eventually failed every time. The best I could ever muster by fighting it was to temporarily postpone the inevitable. Eventually my strength would fail, and I'd be feeding and giving into it once again.
Surrender was the only solution that actually worked, and kept on working. I had to give up control to a Power greater than my own, a God who has all power.
