(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.
Sunday, February 25, 2018
Sunday, January 21, 2018
Who's in charge?
(The following is a post from one of our members.)
There's a great section in the Sexaholics Anonymous book "Getting an SA Sponsor" (p. 72-75). There is this really important sentence right in the middle of that section that is highlighted and set apart for emphasis in the book. Here's what it says:
"I wanted to stay in charge. That's why God and healing could never get to me."
I made this mistake. And I think every person I've ever sponsored has also made this mistake to varying degrees. I wanted to stay in charge!
Early on when I was dabbling in the SA program (a really insane thing to do, btw), I looked for just the right person who I thought would be just right for me. And then when he agreed, I went to work doing the Steps the way I thought they would work for me. When I talked to him, I would tell him my ideas about how I was doing things, and then I would ask his opinion, just in case he had something small to add to my well thought out plans.
The relationship did not last very long. I wanted him to be what I wanted him to be and to say what I wanted to hear, and to never tell me I should do something I didn't feel like I needed to do.
The problem was my attitude. I had not yet acquired the requisite humility to be willing to follow a sponsor's suggestions and do thing someone else's way. I needed a lot more humiliation, and I needed to experience my own version of the "incomprehensible demoralization" before I could start to develop the proper attitude of surrender to another human and thus learn how to surrender also to God.
Surrender and staying in charge of my recovery were incompatible. Finding just the right person was not only unnecessary, but truly impossible. God may be perfect, but the rest of us surely are not. And when I finally had the necessary humility (barely sufficient) and submitted to a sponsor and did what I was told to do someone else's way, the Steps actually worked!
There's a great section in the Sexaholics Anonymous book "Getting an SA Sponsor" (p. 72-75). There is this really important sentence right in the middle of that section that is highlighted and set apart for emphasis in the book. Here's what it says:
"I wanted to stay in charge. That's why God and healing could never get to me."
I made this mistake. And I think every person I've ever sponsored has also made this mistake to varying degrees. I wanted to stay in charge!
Early on when I was dabbling in the SA program (a really insane thing to do, btw), I looked for just the right person who I thought would be just right for me. And then when he agreed, I went to work doing the Steps the way I thought they would work for me. When I talked to him, I would tell him my ideas about how I was doing things, and then I would ask his opinion, just in case he had something small to add to my well thought out plans.
The relationship did not last very long. I wanted him to be what I wanted him to be and to say what I wanted to hear, and to never tell me I should do something I didn't feel like I needed to do.
The problem was my attitude. I had not yet acquired the requisite humility to be willing to follow a sponsor's suggestions and do thing someone else's way. I needed a lot more humiliation, and I needed to experience my own version of the "incomprehensible demoralization" before I could start to develop the proper attitude of surrender to another human and thus learn how to surrender also to God.
Surrender and staying in charge of my recovery were incompatible. Finding just the right person was not only unnecessary, but truly impossible. God may be perfect, but the rest of us surely are not. And when I finally had the necessary humility (barely sufficient) and submitted to a sponsor and did what I was told to do someone else's way, the Steps actually worked!
Sunday, December 31, 2017
It works if you work it!
(The following is a post from one of our members.)
As they say at the close of a whole lot of SA meetings: "It works if you work it!" And then at some they add, "It won't if you don't!"
Yep, my story too. I spent a lot of years working "my program". My program wasn't the SA/AA program of the whole 12 Steps, and I certainly wasn't "fearless and thorough from the very start." (AABB Chapter 5)
Turns out that the SA program is simply the 12 Steps. The AA book makes it so simply clear when it says, "Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery," and then promptly list the 12 Steps.
So I finally admitted defeat and worked the 12 Steps as my sponsor told me to work them. And by the time I had gotten to Step 12, I had had what the SAWB talks about as a result of working the first eleven Steps.
"If a person is experiencing the reality of Steps One through Eleven, he or she is manifesting the truth of that new life."
"Staying sober is our initial objective; a spiritual awakening is the unintended result. If our experience tells us anything, it is that there is no healing without such an awakening. And the difference between merely not acting out our addiction (being "dry") and healing is the new life. If we want the old life intact, simply minus the habit, we don't really want healing, for our sickness is the old way of life." (SAWB p. 143)
At this time in my working of the Steps, I'm continuing to work Steps 10-12. Some people refer to these Steps as the maintenance Steps. You just never stop working them, since they become a new way of life for someone in recovery.
My Step 12 action last night was to meet with a new member who has asked me to sponsor him. We worked on Step One together. Then before going to bed, there was time for meditation through literature reading, and this morning there was more time for reading literature and prayer (Step 11), before my breakfast meeting with my spiritual growth partner. The ongoing program is still about working the 12 Steps, "to practice these principles in all our affairs." This is "that new life."
It works if you work it! It really does.
As they say at the close of a whole lot of SA meetings: "It works if you work it!" And then at some they add, "It won't if you don't!"
Yep, my story too. I spent a lot of years working "my program". My program wasn't the SA/AA program of the whole 12 Steps, and I certainly wasn't "fearless and thorough from the very start." (AABB Chapter 5)
Turns out that the SA program is simply the 12 Steps. The AA book makes it so simply clear when it says, "Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery," and then promptly list the 12 Steps.
So I finally admitted defeat and worked the 12 Steps as my sponsor told me to work them. And by the time I had gotten to Step 12, I had had what the SAWB talks about as a result of working the first eleven Steps.
"If a person is experiencing the reality of Steps One through Eleven, he or she is manifesting the truth of that new life."
"Staying sober is our initial objective; a spiritual awakening is the unintended result. If our experience tells us anything, it is that there is no healing without such an awakening. And the difference between merely not acting out our addiction (being "dry") and healing is the new life. If we want the old life intact, simply minus the habit, we don't really want healing, for our sickness is the old way of life." (SAWB p. 143)
At this time in my working of the Steps, I'm continuing to work Steps 10-12. Some people refer to these Steps as the maintenance Steps. You just never stop working them, since they become a new way of life for someone in recovery.
My Step 12 action last night was to meet with a new member who has asked me to sponsor him. We worked on Step One together. Then before going to bed, there was time for meditation through literature reading, and this morning there was more time for reading literature and prayer (Step 11), before my breakfast meeting with my spiritual growth partner. The ongoing program is still about working the 12 Steps, "to practice these principles in all our affairs." This is "that new life."
It works if you work it! It really does.
Sunday, December 3, 2017
The God of my understanding
(The following is a post by one of our members.)
I used to have this belief that I could only be acceptable to God if I got myself all cleaned up before I could come to Him. In my sick thinking, I had to get to where I felt ashamed enough for what I had done and committed enough to being different in the future before I dared show up before God.
Of course as a growing sexaholic, that meant that "coming to God" got to be less and less often, since my ongoing and increasing lusting and sexual acting out meant I spent more and more time trying to clean myself up. Less connection with God meant that I spent more and more time trying to battle lust on my own. The vicious cycle became very well established. There was no getting off of this treadmill. I was stuck.
So my experience of God had to change. What I thought and believed about Him didn't work to get me sober and keep me sober. And since I was powerless over lust, I didn't have any other solution for my problem except for a God who "could and would" restore me to sanity.
These days the God of my understanding is best described in the story people refer to as the "prodigal son". Regardless of how I was the one who did the leaving, regardless of how much mess I made along the way of willfully running (ruining) my own life my own way, regardless of the filth and stink I've got hanging all over me as the consequences of my choices, the moment I turn to "go home to Dad", he's right there, picking me up and giving me a huge hug and ready to take care of the "cleaning up" Himself. The word "grace" comes to mind.
And it's to that kind of God that I can surrender my lust and my will and life.
I used to have this belief that I could only be acceptable to God if I got myself all cleaned up before I could come to Him. In my sick thinking, I had to get to where I felt ashamed enough for what I had done and committed enough to being different in the future before I dared show up before God.
Of course as a growing sexaholic, that meant that "coming to God" got to be less and less often, since my ongoing and increasing lusting and sexual acting out meant I spent more and more time trying to clean myself up. Less connection with God meant that I spent more and more time trying to battle lust on my own. The vicious cycle became very well established. There was no getting off of this treadmill. I was stuck.
So my experience of God had to change. What I thought and believed about Him didn't work to get me sober and keep me sober. And since I was powerless over lust, I didn't have any other solution for my problem except for a God who "could and would" restore me to sanity.
These days the God of my understanding is best described in the story people refer to as the "prodigal son". Regardless of how I was the one who did the leaving, regardless of how much mess I made along the way of willfully running (ruining) my own life my own way, regardless of the filth and stink I've got hanging all over me as the consequences of my choices, the moment I turn to "go home to Dad", he's right there, picking me up and giving me a huge hug and ready to take care of the "cleaning up" Himself. The word "grace" comes to mind.
And it's to that kind of God that I can surrender my lust and my will and life.
Monday, November 13, 2017
Serenity
(The following is a personal post from one of our members.)
Another member of our program was sharing about feeling a heaviness. That got me thinking about how heaviness contrasts with serenity. I definitely prefer serenity!
I've had plenty of years (decades) of heaviness before I found freedom in this program. Since I live with my wife, I have someone who observes me in as basic a state of being as I've got. And she tells me that she sees the difference in me that my years of sobriety and recovery have brought. I think sometimes I can't really see it myself, because it is happening to me "naturally" as I practice the principles of SA that I learned by working the Steps of the program with a sponsor's guidance.
Serenity is one of the things that has changed. Serenity is happening to me. The Serenity Prayer start out with "God, grant me the serenity...." It's not something I can conjure up in myself. It is a gift. It doesn't happen because all my circumstances just magically change. It happens while I am still in the midst of those circumstances. God grants it. The full Serenity Prayer talks about "accepting hardship as the pathway to peace", so circumstances may well be very difficult still. But serenity is still possible even then.
This reminds me that the whole point of this program is to bring me into a right relationship with God. Sobriety, recovery, serenity are all natural outcomes of a right relationship with God. It really is that simple for me. There really only is this one thing to focus on, and then everything else falls into place. And that includes accepting the things I can not change, having courage to change the things I can, and gaining the wisdom to know that difference. SA tells me that the Steps are the path to get there and that a sponsor can guide me. That's how it works.
Another member of our program was sharing about feeling a heaviness. That got me thinking about how heaviness contrasts with serenity. I definitely prefer serenity!
I've had plenty of years (decades) of heaviness before I found freedom in this program. Since I live with my wife, I have someone who observes me in as basic a state of being as I've got. And she tells me that she sees the difference in me that my years of sobriety and recovery have brought. I think sometimes I can't really see it myself, because it is happening to me "naturally" as I practice the principles of SA that I learned by working the Steps of the program with a sponsor's guidance.
Serenity is one of the things that has changed. Serenity is happening to me. The Serenity Prayer start out with "God, grant me the serenity...." It's not something I can conjure up in myself. It is a gift. It doesn't happen because all my circumstances just magically change. It happens while I am still in the midst of those circumstances. God grants it. The full Serenity Prayer talks about "accepting hardship as the pathway to peace", so circumstances may well be very difficult still. But serenity is still possible even then.
This reminds me that the whole point of this program is to bring me into a right relationship with God. Sobriety, recovery, serenity are all natural outcomes of a right relationship with God. It really is that simple for me. There really only is this one thing to focus on, and then everything else falls into place. And that includes accepting the things I can not change, having courage to change the things I can, and gaining the wisdom to know that difference. SA tells me that the Steps are the path to get there and that a sponsor can guide me. That's how it works.
Monday, October 30, 2017
God grant....
(The following is a personal post from one of our group members.)
I find the first two words of the Serenity Prayer to be crucial for me to focus on and never forget: "God grant." It is another example of how God does for me what I can not do for myself. I am powerless; He has all power. It's also one of the early steps in learning some much needed humility, recognizing this isn't all about me, nor is my progress of my own doing.
In our local group we pray out loud together the Serenity Prayer and the other prayers from our literature such as the Third Step Prayer, the Seventh Step Prayer, and Eleventh Step Prayer. I appreciate how in each of these prayers I am reminded that my dependence is on God.
"...Thee to build with me and do with me...."
"Relieve me...."
"Take away my difficulties...."
"...you now remove...."
"Grant me...."
"Lord, make me...."
"Lord, grant...."
Every time I hear someone refer to the 12 Step program as a "self help" program, I wonder if they really have any idea what this program is all about. When I was "helping myself", I was acting out. For me, this is a "God grant" program, because if he doesn't grant it, I'm not going to have it.
I find the first two words of the Serenity Prayer to be crucial for me to focus on and never forget: "God grant." It is another example of how God does for me what I can not do for myself. I am powerless; He has all power. It's also one of the early steps in learning some much needed humility, recognizing this isn't all about me, nor is my progress of my own doing.
In our local group we pray out loud together the Serenity Prayer and the other prayers from our literature such as the Third Step Prayer, the Seventh Step Prayer, and Eleventh Step Prayer. I appreciate how in each of these prayers I am reminded that my dependence is on God.
"...Thee to build with me and do with me...."
"Relieve me...."
"Take away my difficulties...."
"...you now remove...."
"Grant me...."
"Lord, make me...."
"Lord, grant...."
Every time I hear someone refer to the 12 Step program as a "self help" program, I wonder if they really have any idea what this program is all about. When I was "helping myself", I was acting out. For me, this is a "God grant" program, because if he doesn't grant it, I'm not going to have it.
Monday, October 9, 2017
Hope for Freedom
(The following is a personal post from one of our group members.)
One of the greatest hopes in recovery for me has been the realized hope for freedom. I say "greatest", because I didn't believe it was possible for me to have freedom from the obsessions and compulsions of my addiction. As an addict, I am powerless over lust, so what hope could I have? As I sat in meetings in the earlier years, the majority of us were still showing up week after week to report on our latest acting out episodes. I was definitely part of the majority. The majority clearly had no hope for freedom.
But there it was in the literature: "If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness." (AA The Promises) "We discovered that we could stop, that not feeding the hunger didn't kill us, that sex was indeed optional. There was hope for freedom, and we began to feel alive." (SA The Solution) And there it also was in the experience of the few. There were of course those few members who somehow had realized the "hope for freedom" that the rest of us said we wanted, but never saw happen.
As for me (and I suspect for the others in the majority as well), I now know that it was because I still wanted to play with lust, but not have to suffer the consequences. I wanted to be free from lust's power, but still depend on my own power to win the battle. I wanted God's help, but still wanted to avoid turning my will and life over to Him. I wanted to be rid of the habit, but still be able to keep the rest of my life running on my terms. ("If we want the old life intact, simply minus the habit, we don't really want healing, for our sickness is the old way of life." SAWB Step 12)
Immersing myself in the literature, going to meetings, and working the 12 Steps as my sponsor told me to do them was the key to beginning to have hope for freedom. And that hope has been realized. Today, God gives me freedom from lust and the obsessions and compulsions of my addiction! It is true. It will happen. But it comes at a price, a price I now wondered why I ever questioned if it was worth paying.
One of the greatest hopes in recovery for me has been the realized hope for freedom. I say "greatest", because I didn't believe it was possible for me to have freedom from the obsessions and compulsions of my addiction. As an addict, I am powerless over lust, so what hope could I have? As I sat in meetings in the earlier years, the majority of us were still showing up week after week to report on our latest acting out episodes. I was definitely part of the majority. The majority clearly had no hope for freedom.
But there it was in the literature: "If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness." (AA The Promises) "We discovered that we could stop, that not feeding the hunger didn't kill us, that sex was indeed optional. There was hope for freedom, and we began to feel alive." (SA The Solution) And there it also was in the experience of the few. There were of course those few members who somehow had realized the "hope for freedom" that the rest of us said we wanted, but never saw happen.
As for me (and I suspect for the others in the majority as well), I now know that it was because I still wanted to play with lust, but not have to suffer the consequences. I wanted to be free from lust's power, but still depend on my own power to win the battle. I wanted God's help, but still wanted to avoid turning my will and life over to Him. I wanted to be rid of the habit, but still be able to keep the rest of my life running on my terms. ("If we want the old life intact, simply minus the habit, we don't really want healing, for our sickness is the old way of life." SAWB Step 12)
Immersing myself in the literature, going to meetings, and working the 12 Steps as my sponsor told me to do them was the key to beginning to have hope for freedom. And that hope has been realized. Today, God gives me freedom from lust and the obsessions and compulsions of my addiction! It is true. It will happen. But it comes at a price, a price I now wondered why I ever questioned if it was worth paying.
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