There was an exceptional meeting tonight in Boston. I walked into the meeting with a lot of restlessness and discontent. We read the portion of Alcoholics Anonymous on fear. My Higher Power helped me realize during the shares that I am afraid because I am using this program like just another tool to run my life. I’m being self reliant. I do prayer like doing reps at the gym and try to manage my relationship with God to the most optimum advantage. I try so hard to run my life, to be good, to be kind, running from one challenge to the next until I’m exhausted.

That’s when lust makes its approach, like a demon disguised as something gentle. Lust knows that I’m weary, fatigued, afraid, and confused. Lust offers to take that all away and reassures me that I can be alright and okay. So I leave my Higher Power’s side and go with Lust.

My long suffering Higher Power won’t take away all the pain. Still, He comes and comforts me.

Each time I imagine I’ll not make that trade ever again. Yet, when a month passes and I’m exhausted, I just make that trade again. The reality is I was never meant to bear the burden of being good, of being sober.

I see now that this program isn’t just one more exam for me to ace or a lust mathematics problem for me to solve. It’s not a form of martial arts to use against lust. They are tools not against lust, but to reorient me, to restore my relationship with my Higher Power. When I know that deep in my heart, I’m actually free. The lust demons can come. Their temptation has no strength against someone without a burden.

At the end of meeting tonight there was relief in the air. A funny member of our group shared in the last minutes “I want to bring to light that I have a fear of that tick, which if it bites you, you’re not able to ever eat meat again!” Boy, did we laugh. We forget ourselves for that moment, male and female sexaholics. All that was left was warmth, a taste of the reality that this motley circle of human beings was infinitely precious, and that we were going to be alright.