Six years ago my life was a sewage pit of porn, masturbation, promiscuity, homosexuality, bestiality, incest, and dozens of other things I thought I absolutely needed to get through the day. I would get sick of what I was doing. My wife and my boss threatened me. I would swear that I’d never do it again. And yet, despite my best intentions, my best efforts, within days (or at most weeks), I was back doing the same things again and again.

Despite all my searching for truth, wisdom, and God, what was blocking me from freedom was a lack of action. I was under the impression that I could think my way out of this problem. If only I could understand more. In hindsight, this was just another form of egotism.

Yet here I am today, sober since 2002. The miracle is not that I’m no longer engaging in the above-listed behaviors. The miracle is that I am content, at peace with myself, and that as the result of the Steps, have been allowed to develop a relationship with someone who meets all my needs, even the ones I don’t know about.

I was shown a particular exercise to identify how my sex addiction would kill me, and this is how mine looked:

• I’ll start acting out again.
• My wife will eventually find out and leave me.
• I’ll eventually get caught acting out at work, and I’ll lose my job.
• I’ll go back to drugs and use them along with sex.
• I’ll lose my house.
• I’ll prostitute myself and contract HIV.
• I won’t care that I have HIV. I will only live for today.
• I will be homeless and constantly sick.
• A drug overdose is a possibility, but more likely, I’ll be in the wrong place at the wrong time, say the wrong thing, and be killed.

Having done this exercise, it is important that I realize that knowing this will not keep me sober. Because when I begin the journey that leads to acting out, I will not think of any of these things. At that moment, I am insane. I needed to see the necessity of recovery in my life. If it wasn’t life and death for me, I will not be willing to submit to following directions which I might think are stupid or irrelevant.

Something that I experienced in early recovery was emotions. I had been acting out a long time. I acted out to celebrate victories, and I acted out to comfort myself in defeats. I acted out in so many ways, reacting to so many events, that I literally entered and went through adulthood numb to most of my feelings. When I first got sober, I was no longer numbing myself, so I started to feel things. Some of these feelings were good and some not so good, but they were all foreign. I didn’t know how to deal with them and they made me uncomfortable.

Sadly, in the beginning, I did not really accept Step One. I operated under the illusion that if I did the right things, and learned the right things, then I could gain some control over my sickness. Without a real acceptance of Step One, I could not find the Higher Power I needed to recover. Although I prayed and read spiritual material, it was more along the lines of asking God to help me overcome this disease. I was the key, and He was simply my helper.

Because of this, Step Three was an illusion. I was convinced that I knew what God’s will was, and that I was doing it. I was physically sober, but still filled with fear, anxiety, panic, and sadness. Why didn’t I feel better? I hurt in a hundred different ways. Without my drug to sedate me, my skin would crawl with discomfort. I knew my Higher Power in only superficial ways, and could not find any comfort by His presence.

I slipped after eighteen months and Step One hit me in the face like a two-by-four. I finally ran out of power and admitted it. My best wasn’t enough, and no matter what I did, I couldn’t stay sober.

The Twelve Steps, with the direction of a sponsor, were my path to freedom. I admitted, first to myself and then to another person in the SA program, that I was powerless over lust. I had made a mess of my life, and there was absolutely nothing I could do to fix it.

I began following directions from my sponsor whether I agreed with him or not, even whether I understood or not. I just did it. It felt really bad and it went against everything I believed. Working the Steps was exactly what I needed to shrink my monster ego.

When I tried the intellectual approach, I remained miserable. I wanted to be judged by my intentions, but my sponsor saw right through that and actually required me to follow through on every Step. I gave up and accepted direction. I worked each Step of the program. I didn’t just think about working them, read about them, or study them.

Today, I see no difference between the word “want” and the word “lust.” My focus is on the actions I am taking. When I want something different than what is currently in front of me, I am in a state of lust—maybe not sexual, but still lust. I invite my Higher Power into this lust, and ask that I be shown what actions I can take to bring me to a place of peace. The answer is always the same: “Find something to do for someone else, without any expectation of reward or reciprocation.” As soon as I move from thought into action, I am returned to a place of peace and contentment.