Chastity Office 178

Saroshe, Saleh, Syad and I were listening to Saleh snd Saroshe reading the Doctor’s Opinion, with me commenting.

We got to the line that appears twice: the  “ Moral Psychology “, that is needed for “ Permanent Recovery” from addiction.

That can appear abstract and even abstruse, but, it is neither.

The “Moral Psychology” that you must embrace to recover from sex addiction is very simple: “Selfishness-self centeredness! That we think is the root of our troubles”.
Page 62, Big Book.

That is the motivation, for good, that you must have to drive yourself, with enough torque, to get, and stay sexually sober. 

That simple desire…to stop being selfish.

Because porn…is incredibly selfish.

Chastity Office 179

Detroit Dave has mentioned the word holy several times when checking in recently during the meetings.

Holy is a very interesting word.

A man who was, at the time, described as “the meekest man on earth” once said “Be holy, because is God holy”.

Holy is an interesting word, functionally, because in our Third Step we try to start doing God’s will.

What does holy even mean?

Is it even God’s will to be holy?

In Greek, Holy means “sacred, pure “.

Is using porn sacred or pure? No.

If you have problems with alcohol, is getting drunk pure? No.

If you have problems controlling your eating, is eating too much pure? No.

Is sexual fantasy pure? No.

Is sexual intrigue pure? No.

Is objectification pure? No.

Holiness is a direction…Not a destination

Progress…rather than perfection

Chastity Office 180

I am “sure of my life”…that is really, really different, for me.

I am feeling hurt, sad and lonely tonight, that meta-feeling of grief, but mostly hurt.

I just want to feel better.

As an addict, my knee jerk reaction is to do something addictive to relieve the pain…anything.

But, I will pray instead. I am sure the will work just fine…

Chastity Office 181

One of the guys on PrayerCall gets selfish, dishonest, short-tempered and punk-assed when someone messes with his food.

I’m that way when someone messes with my sex, or love, supply.

That’s because food is his primary addiction and sex is my primary addiction.

It’s important, with multiple addictions, to correctly ascertain what your primary, secondary and tertiary addictions are.

Otherwise, you can’t “Put first things first”.

But, you have to have good judgment.

Addicts are afraid of being “judgmental “, because they have been shamed so much in their lives.

Good judgement comes from one thing, honesty…and that’s the most important thing in all of recovery.

Chastity Office 182

Intrigue, Objectification and Fantasy 

“God asks only that we try as best we know how to make progress in the building of character.”
AA 12&12 Step Six, p.65

In 34 1/2 years of sex addiction recovery I’ve never fully understood how this applied to sex addiction.

Now I do… 

The acting out behaviors, the compulsions: Masturbation, affairs, pornography, etc, have to fully stop.

They are actions…

But intrigue, objectification and fantasy are mental processes. It is the “character” of my mind that creates these things.

Actually, intrigue involves speaking.

Objectification, involves looking.

Only Fantasy is purely mental, So that is a good place to finish up my building character.

Intrigue is the most egregious of the three potentials for “character building”, because I’m talking trash. I’m lying to some woman.

Objectification, is in the middle. It needs to be dealt with next.

But finally, Fantasy, where no one can hear it and no one can see it, but me, is where I need to shut the door on disease.

That’s where I need finesse in my character building… One day, three hours at a time