Lesson 4: my real problem

Lesson 4: Acting out sexually is not my real problem.

If you said this to me a few ago, I would have thought you'd eaten paint chips as a child. But that's the truth, whether or not people know it. I used to think to myself over and over and over again, "If I can just stop acting out, then everything in life would be fine." or "If I can just stop this ONE problem, then..." etc etc.

I wish someone would have told me this years ago - that down beneath my addiction were character weaknesses and tendencies that led to it... that my addiction was not the issue itself, but a manifestation of deeper issues. Addiction is simply the fruit of the tree that I have chosen to nourish. It's a bad tree. It's ugly. It's still pretty big (it takes a while for trees to die).

I chose to nourish it because I was dealing with or escaping various things in my life that I had NO idea were there or that they were connected with my issue. Anyone seen Hercules? I'm a Disney nut thanks to my family, but addiction reminds me of the hydra. Earlier when I was working toward recovery, all I could see was those gross, ugly, hydra heads and I thought "KILL!" So I would proceed to frantically chop at the heads of the hydra one after another, and there just seemed to be more and more of them as my addiction got worse and worse despite my efforts.

I just wish I had a little satyr to tell me: "WILL YOU FORGET THE HEAD-SLICING THING?!"

Luckily I had a sponsor tell me a little later. He helped me to prayerfully work steps 4 and 5, as well as identify the real roots of my addiction, and why I continued to nourish that big, ugly tree. Most of it was learning to deal with stress, anger, anxiety, depression, and other negative thoughts/feelings that I would experience each day. I turned to lust to fix all my problems for so long, and all that time took its toll on my character. I had gotten good at bottling my feelings up and turning to lust to "fix" each of them. I'd gotten so good at it that I had no idea that was why I did it or that they were even connected, and it seemed I would get from point A (feeling fine) to point B (acting out) in no time flat and without warning.

Anyway, if you've seen the movie, you know that Hercules almost dies trying to kill the hydra. I feel it very similar to our situation as we must basically kill the old natural man and start a completely new way of life if we are to be free from addiction. It can't be a little secret thing we "take care of" and we can go back to our lives. It takes a complete character overall if we are to emerge from the claws of this evil monster that has tormented us for so long.

I pray that I might continue to make that character overall. I pray I can continue to starve that big ugly tree so that it no longer bears fruit. I pray I can always remember that chopping heads doesn't bring lasting results and that I must go for the root/body of my addiction to continue to stay in recovery.