1. A minimum of three 12 step meetings (S.A., S.A.A., S.L.A.A., R.C.A., S.C.A., S.R.A.) with Celebrate Recovery that has a purity group (or Samson Society, or Pure Desire Group or Faithful & True Groups) being a 4th meeting for a minimum of 2 years. However, mere attendance does not count. For this to count, the person must be meeting with a sponsor weekly (sometimes contacting them daily) with daily phone calls to others in the group. If in Celebrate Recovery this would mean doing a Step Study Group on top of the weekly meetings.
2. Weekly meetings with a CSAT or some other certified addictions therapist for a minimum of 2 years. Typically this means digging into your own life further from insights gained from (1) group therapy, (2) group therapy assignments, (3) going through the 12 steps (including the 12 step meetings), and (4) life as it happens while on the journey of recovery. Find a therapist here.
3. Weekly group therapy meetings for a minimum of 2 years. This typically combined with the weekly therapy group as it is usually a bad idea to have two therapists (one for therapy and one for individual), and typically the group will go through a book either Laaser’s L.I.F.E. workbook or Carnes’s Facing the Shadow workbook (there are others out there but these are the two Sexual Addiction leaders).

So, typically, this means about 10 hours of work per week that needs to be done, and I am discovering this is the bare minimum. As I am creating my recovery plan, I notice that for men there are other elements that must be included such as exercise/working out (30 minutes a day), spiritual disciplines (30-60 minutes/day), and adequate sleeping patterns (7-8 hours/day). So in essence it is a complete life change and transition. My wife and I were chatting about this the other day, and she said to me (referring to something that her therapist said when her therapist equated much of their recovery plan with the spiritual disciplines) that if we observe people we admire, we will notice that those who are healthy already do much of the 12 steps in the form of spiritual disciplines.

So, when a therapist or counselor repeats what Patrick Carnes says about sexual addiction recovery that it is “a 3-5 year process,” don’t be surprised and don’t change therapists as you may be tempted to do. Seriously, they are not looking to make a long term financial making plan with us. Instead, this type of honesty is essential and if they wanted to make money with us addicts they wouldn’t tell us. Then this would create repeat customers (per se) for a much longer period of time.

While at Bethesda Workshops, I heard two really profound yet simple stories. One was in response to a question similar to “Why does it take so long?” The therapist simply said, “How long did it take for you to get where you are?” And then he continued, “Recovery won’t take as long as it should or as long as it took for you to get where you are, but it will be longer than you expect.” The second one is also just as profound in our microwave, quick fix it society. The guy went into see his CSAT therapist regarding his sex addiction. He sat down and began to tell how his sex addiction began. Then the therapist asked, “Tell me about your dad.” The addict confused yet persistent replied with more of his sex addiction beginnings. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Then the addict frustrated continued to discuss his sex addiction in present times. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Then the addict becoming angry and thinking that he is wasting his time began describing his current consequences. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Then the addict extremely frustrated and angry demanded that they talk about his sex addiction. And the therapist said, “We are. What is it that you want?” Then the addict began describing his despair in such sorrow. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Finally in exasperation, the addict said angrily, “No! I am here to talk about my sex addiction—not my dad!” The therapist said, “What do you think I am trying to do? You want to talk about the behavior, and I am trying to talk about your addiction.” Full sex addiction therapy will investigate family of origin issues, trauma/impactful life events, and one’s belief system and thinking—not just the behavior.

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1. I am still trying to validate this statistic. However, I was able to validate something of the reverse. Carnes unofficially reported that people that went through treatment at the meadows and who were successfully following their aftercare plan, relapse rate was only 3 percent!

Denial. No! What is it, really? I hear it thrown around constantly, and you probably do too. If you are anything like me, when you hear something like the first step that says, “We admitted we were powerless over our addictions and compulsive behaviors, that our lives had become unmanageable,” we think, “Duh! I’m here aren’t I!? Why else would I be here?” And we think, “I have already got this first step done!” When I first really entered recovery, my sponsor would constantly tell me that I was still in denial, and like any good addict, I denied it! I denied it because I had no idea what he was talking about. And frankly, he couldn’t articulate why he thought I was in denial. He would simply say, “It just sounds like you are still in denial.” And I would ask, “Well, what makes you say that?” And he could never answer me…well, at least to my satisfaction because I was intellectualizing the conversation. So I brushed it off.

However, when I began therapy with my counselor, he walked me through Patrick Carnes’s 14 Types of Denial asking me which ones that I did. Then I realized, yes, in some cases, probably more than I’d like to admit, I was in denial. And immediately I wanted to deny it! And the thing about the 12 steps is that it is not once and done. It is a process that is continuous, and I must continually choose to step out of denial in my thinking and definitely any time I do something wrong.

So I wanted to share these 14 with you guys. While some of these may overlap with one another, it helps to have these 14 categories to really know what denial really is. While most of us don’t use all twelve, try to pick out your top 3-4. The twelve taken from Facing the Shadow (adapted by me) are:

1. Global Thinking: This is attempting to justify something with absolute terms like “always” or “never” or “whatsoever.” It also can be something along the lines of “every guy does this.”
2. Rationalization: This is justifying unacceptable behavior saying things like “I don’t have a problem, I’m just sexually liberated,” or “You’re crazy,” or “I can go months without this, so I don’t have a problem.” As Rick Warren states, “Rationalize is telling yourself Rational Lies” (Twitter).
3. Minimizing: This is trying to make behavior or consequences seem smaller or less important than they are saying things like “only a little,” or “only once in a while,” or “it’s no big deal,” or simply telling the story in a better light than it really should be.
4. Comparison: This is shifting focus to someone else to justify behaviors such as “I’m not as bad as…”
5. Uniqueness: This is thinking you are different or special saying things like “My situation is different,” or “I was hurt more,” or “That’s fine for you, but I’m too busy.” This one can also be considered Entitlement.
6. Distraction (Carnes, Avoiding by creating an uproar or distraction): This is being a clown and getting everyone laughing, having angry outbursts meant to frighten or intimidate others, threats and posturing, and doing shocking behavior that may even be sexual. This can be when we simply blow up upon being confronted hoping that our explosion will draw attention rather than the actual issue.
7. Avoiding by Omission: This is trying to change the subject, ignore the subject, or manipulate the conversation to avoid talking about something. It is also leaving out important bits of information like the fact that the lover is underage, or the person is a close friend of your spouse, or revealing enough information while keeping back the most “dangerous” information that will get you in more trouble.
8. Blaming: This is when you shift blame and responsibility from yourself to another person, and many times this is done unconsciously since in the depth of our being we really don’t want to be held responsible for something. I call this the Adam Syndrome as this is what Adam did in the Garden (Genesis 3) by wrongly blaming Eve for his rebellion. This includes, “Well, you would cruise all night, too, if you had my job,” or “If my spouse weren’t so cold…” or “I can’t help it, the baby cries day and night and makes me nervous.”
9. Intellectualizing: This is avoiding feelings and responsibility by thinking or by asking why. This person tries to explain everything getting lost in detail, rabbit trails, and/or storytelling. This often includes pretending superior intellect and using intelligence as a weapon. If you watch the TV Show Bones, Dr. Temprance Brennan does this often.
10. Victim Mentality (Carnes, Hopelessness/Helplessness): This is where a person says, “I’m a victim,” or “I can’t help it,” or “There is nothing I can do to get better,” or “I’m the worst.”
11. Manipulative Behavior: This usually involves some distortion of reality including the use of power, lies, secrets, or guilt to exploit others.
12. Compartmentalizing: This is something that almost every addict does (I actually want to say EVERY but will hold back). This is separating your life into compartments in which you do things that you keep separate from other parts of your life. This is like a Jackel and Hyde or a separation of Public and Private life to the point where it is unhealthy driven by thoughts of “If they only knew, then…”
13. Crazymaking: This occurs when we are confronted by others who DO have a correct perception…we simply tell them that they are totally wrong. We act indignantly toward them attempting to make them feel crazy by simply positing that they cannot trust their own perceptions.
14. Seduction: This is the use of charm, humor, good looks, or helpfulness to gain sexual access and cover up insincerity.

For me, while I struggle with many of these denial types (rationalizing, minimizing, uniqueness, distraction, omission, blaming, intellectualizing, compartmentalizing) and probably have done them all at one point or another, my Big Three are Minimizing, Omission, and Intellectualizing. Well, at least that’s what I think they are. It is a good practice to take this list and mark the ones that you think you do, and confirming it with your spouse and/or your sponsor and/or someone close to you that knows most of the story and has lived through things with you. The goal is to identify which ones we tend towards so when we are facing our secrets and/or our problems, we can identify some of these behaviors in order to face the truth at all costs and comfort and live out the Stockdale Paradox.

What are yours?

The Noose of Sexual Addiction consists of four issues:

Click for a Larger Image

1. The Addictive Root
2. The Addictive Mindset
3. The Addictive Lifestyle
4. The Addictive Cloak

So the addiction is not just about the person’s behavior/lifestyle, but about a wide variety of other issues. As Ted Roberts says, “It is about his past, the way he thinks and the defense mechanisms he has developed to keep from being exposed. Sexual Addiction isn’t ultimately about sex; it is about the way the person deals with life!” (Pure Desire, 49). And as many therapist say, “A sex addict knows nothing about sex because they know nothing about intimacy.”

Addiction has three interlocking elements:

1. The problem has become unmanageable. The person has repeatedly and unsuccessfully tried to stop the behavior in a number of ways. Many take a binge/purge approach where they binge for a day, week, or even a month, and then they purge and that is also cyclical.
2. Their behavior is destructive to them in some form. The first consequence is numbness, emotional numbness. SA is medicating against some sort of pain or emotional reality in his life.
3. There is increased intensity of the activity over a period of time. The sexual high of the past isn’t enough so the “dosage” has to increase thus altering the brain chemistry.

The Addictive Mindset consists of a variety of destructive core concepts or also known as Core Beliefs (Patrick Carnes) including thoughts or worthlessness, unlovability, loneliness, and pleasure centric thoughts.

1. “I am basically a bad, unworthy person.” Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here.
2. “No one would love me as I am.” (Similar to “If they knew me, then they wouldn’t like me.”) Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here
3. “My needs are never going to be met if I have to depend on others.” Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here
4. “Sex is my most important need.” Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here

The Addictive Lifestyle consists of a cycle that begins with Fantasy which leads to ritual, which leads to secrecy, which leads to further shame and guilt.

The Addictive Cloak is in denial, delusion and blame.

The Addictive Root has three basic drivers: (1) Family Dysfunction; (2) Personal Trauma; and (3) Addictive Society. And this root is a complex root system, and for people with multiple issues or even addictions this root system is overlapped with another complex root system that must carefully be revealed, studied, and eventually dug-up, repaired or even replaced.

Admiral Jim Stockdale who was the highest ranking US military officer in the “Hanoi Hilton” prison-of-war camp during the height of the Vietnam War. Tortured over twenty times during his eight-year imprisonment from 1965-1973, Stockdale lived out the war without any prisoner’s rights, no set release date, certainty as to whether he would even survive to see his family again. He shouldered the burden of command, doing everything he could to create the conditions that would increase the number of prisoners who would survive unbroken, while fighting an internal war against his captors and their attempts to use the prisoners for propaganda…[In Collins' preparation of meeting with Stockdale, he read In Love and War]

As I moved through the book, I found myself getting depressed. It just seemed so bleak–the uncertainty of his fate, the brutality of his captors and so forth. And then it dawned on me: “Here I am sitting in my warm and comfortable office, looking out over the beautiful Stanford campus on a beautiful Saturday afternoon. I’m getting depressed reading this, and I know the end of the story! I know that he gets out, reunites with his family, becomes a national hero, and gets to spend the later years of his life studying philosophy on the same beautiful campus. If it feels depressing for me, how on earth did he deal with it when he was actually there and did not know the end of the story?”

“I never lost faith in the end of the story,” he said when I asked him, “I never doubted not only that I would get out, but also that I would prevail in the end and turn the experience into the defining event of my life, which, in retrospect, I would not trade.”

I didn’t say anything for many minutes, and we continued the slow walk toward the faculty club, Stockdale limping and arc-swinging his stiff lef that enever fully recovered from repeated torture. Finally after about a hundred meters of silence, I asked, “Who didn’t make it out?”

“Oh, that’s easy,” he said, “The optimists.”

“The optimists? I don’t understand,” I said, now completely confused, given what he’d said a hundred meters earlier.

“The optimists. Oh, they were the ones who said ‘we’re going to be out by Christmas’. And, Christmas would come and Christmas would go. Then they’d say, ‘We’re going to be out by Easter.’ And Easter would come, and Easter would go. And then Thanksgiving, and then it would be Christmas again. Then they died of a broken heart.”

Another long pause, and more walking. Then he turned to me and said, “This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end – which you can never afford to lose – with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.”

That conversation with Admiral Stockdale stayed with me, and in fact had a profound influence on my own development. Life is unfair–sometimes to our advantage, sometimes to our disadvantage. We will all experience disappointments and crushing events somewhere along the way, setbacks…What separates people, Stockdale taught me, is not the presence or absence of difficulty, but how they deal with the inevitable difficulties of life.

The Stockdale Paradox simply is maintaining unwavering faith that you can and will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties, AND at the same time have the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they may be.

And so it is with recovery. We must do two things:

1. Maintain hope and unwavering faith that I can and I will prevail in the end, and
2. Confront the brutal facts and effects of my current reality.

Hope. Reality. In my own recovery, it is extremely difficult for me to do both. Typically in the past, I either have one or the other, but primarily one and that being a naive, faint hope. I have only been an Optimist, as Stockdale put it, and I have died again and again and again. I am not surviving whatsoever. I tend to shy away from confronting the “brutal facts” of my current reality. And that’s what they are: brutal. My reality is often exposed by my wife at times I don’t find convenient…then again, no time is convenient! Basically, I don’t want to face my reality. I don’t really want to face them for when I do, I am not sure if I can handle it. Living in the world of ignorance, denial, and un-reality is bliss, but only bliss for me in a very limited sense. It is anything but bliss and serenity for my family. Instead my selfish bliss becomes a raging storm for those around me. And I sit in the midst of the storm believing that I am not getting wet and that it will not have any affect on me whatsoever.

As the Calvin (little boy) and Hobbes (tiger) comic goes, Calvin says something like, “If I see/hear something I don’t like, I think I’m going to ignore it.” And Hobbes says, “Don’t you think that’s kind of irresponsible.” And Calvin says, “Wow, isn’t it a nice day?”

That is me in a comic strip. I ignore things I don’t like instead of confronting them and facing them head on. I am the big pink elephant in the room, and I am perfectly happy so as long as no one talks about me, talks to me about me, or brings a mirror in the room.

Scot Peck, in the Road Less Traveled, says:

We must always hold truth, as best we can determine it, to be more important, more vital to our self-interest, than our comfort. Conversely, we must always consider our personal discomfort relatively unimportant and, indeed, even welcome it in the service of the search for truth. Mental health is the on-going process of dedication to reality at all costs.

This is extremely difficult. As an addict, I have lied again and again, over and over, to myself, to my wife, to all my friends, and on and on. I have lived a lie masquerading as something that I am not really putting my family in situations where they must also masquerade in order to “protect” me. So to face this truth will be extremely difficult; however, it is one that I must do.

John 8:32 says, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” For so long I wanted to be free without knowing the truth, without anyone else knowing the truth, and if I could help it, without God knowing the truth. And part of knowing the truth is obeying Jesus Christ, for John 8:31 says, “If you continue to follow my teaching, you are really my disciples.” This is consistent with much of 1 John which speaks about abiding in Christ and obeying Jesus’ commands. However, for me, the truth is that I haven’t been following Jesus’ teachings in regards to sexual immorality. The truth is that I haven’t been obeying Jesus Christ with my tongue, lying constantly and rather consistently. The truth, my reality is that I have created a wake that is ugly, devastating and brutal for all parties involved.

The truth and my true reality is not gray regardless how gray I would like things to be. Instead, the truth is black and white for that is the nature of truth. My reality is not gray. It is black and white. My pornography addiction has created a gray environment where something that should be seen as sin (as black) is seen as gray or not so bad because of my rationalizations and failed moral compass (if I can even say that I have one).

In the introduction, Michaelson remarks:

The fundamental principles of strategy are the same for all managers, all times, and all situations. Only the tactics change—and tactics are modified to the times.

Strategy is best defined as “doing the right thing,” while tactics is “doing things right.” Where does strategy end and tactics begin? Admiral Mahan…said, “Contact is a word which perhaps better than any other indicates the dividing line between tactics and strategy.”

For us porn addicts, we need both a strategy and some tactics to maneuver through and out of our addiction into freedom. However, having only strategy without tactics will fail, and having only tactics without strategy will lead us back into defeat. It is similar to the sayings, “Failure to plan is planning to fail.” Similarly, “Execution without planning is foolhardy. But, planning without execution is failure” (Sandler), or, “Planning without Execution is futile, Execution without Planning is fatal.” Simply, where does achieving our tactics or “doing things right” in addiction leads us? Without a plan or a strategy, we can be led into another addiction; we can be led into simple morality. Simply, without a plan or strategy, it is more likely that we will land somewhere that we do not want to be. So we need both a good strategy (a plan) and good tactics (execution).

Strategy is a mental exercise and process that comes from the right mindset. Tactics have to do with behavior that is aligned with the mental strategy. Good tactics cannot be divorced from a strategy. As soon as a tactic is separated from strategy its potential weakens, even if it is a useful tactic. For example, placing a filter on the computer to keep the addict from looking at porn is a tactic, and it is like any other tactic if there is no strategy involved. The filter becomes powerful when coupled with a strategy of overcoming that also comes with other tactics. So, a filter placed on the computer with a strategy of learning how to use the computer and internet for good purposes along with accountability reporting, PC shutdown practices (for example, bsecure shuts down your internet if you trip the filter too many times within a certain time period. Covenant Eyes has an alarm feature or panic button.), calling accountability partners, sponsors and even coaches or counselors.

Personally, I have been the victim of both ineffective tactics, no tactics, and poor, or competing, or even no strategy. I would give lip service to saying that I wanted to quit and in my inner most being I wanted to quit. However, I also didn’t want to quit. I was torn. I had two competing strategies actively engaged in my mind. And as with any kingdom, a person that is divided cannot stand (Mark 3:24-25). And for a while, I had bad or evil tactics. I was an expert liar or deceiver (as are most addicts). It was how I kept my secret a secret. Other tactics included using programs to cover my tracks, initiating a process to delete the history or cookies or whatever. I would hid porn so well that I even lost it. Ever do that? Then when I was clean or trying to stay clean I would come across them and fall right on my face! Thus continuing and widening the gap between my 2 competing strategies.

Then I gradually would learn new good tactics, but I never used them (so I guess I didn’t learn them or if tactics are “doing things right” I simply didn’t have any tactics). Even when I did do things right, the tactics I used were ineffective because, as I’ve said, often times I would couple them with competing bad tactics like lying. So, all the while I was never aligned with any sort of strategy. However, now, and it has taken me a while to get here, I have only one committed goal of being clean. Thus, I am learning or rather re-learning a good strategy to “get clean and stay clean.” While I have been behaviorally clean for over a month now, I know that the mental process of developing a good strategy is necessary. So, I have finally gotten an appointment with a local counselor to begin developing this strategy, articulating it along with its tactics, and laying a foundation that will serve my family and I well as we want to serve the Lord in whatever capacity (which is extremely difficult for me to say because I really want the Lord to still use me in ministry teaching the Word of God).

What is your strategy? What tactics do you have in your tool belt?