Cycle of Addiction

The Problem

Many of us felt inadequate, unworthy, alone and afraid.

Our insides never matched what we saw on the outsides of others.
Early on, we came to feel disconnected - from parents, from peers, from ourselves. We tuned out with fantasy and self gratification. We plugged in by drinking in the pictures, the images and pursuing the objects of our fantasies. We lusted and wanted to be lusted after.

We became true addicts: sex with self, promiscuity, adultery, dependency relationships and more fantasy.

We got it through the eyes; we bought it we sold it, we traded it, we gave it away.

We were addicted to the intrigue, the tease, the forbidden. The only way we knew to be free of it was to do it, "Please connect with me and make me whole!", we cried with outstretched arms.
Lusting after the Big Fix, we gave away our power to others.

This produced guilt, self-hatred, remorse, emptiness and pain.

We were driven ever inward, away from reality, away from love, lost inside ourselves.

Our habit made true intimacy impossible. We could never know real union with another because we were addicted to the unreal.
We went for the "chemistry", the connection that had the magic, because it bypassed intimacy and true union.

Fantasy corrupted the real; lust killed love.

(Reprinted from the White book of Sexaholics Anonymous)

Human Dignity

It is important, beginning now, to stop treating and thinking about people as mere objects to satisfy our desire for pleasure.

All persons are valuable because they are valuable to God, no matter what others may tell you.

Change must begin with our attitude -
We must start looking at people, who are objects of our lust, as beings created in the likeness and image of God.

They deserve our Love,
not our disrespect,
denigration and dehumanization.

You can break the cycle -

God is there to help you if you only ask.

The mercy of God is greater than the worst sins; it reaches out to all sinners, to all of us.