I had three prayers before I got sober in AA in 2003. They were: 1. “God, give me what I want.” 2. “God, please make this person do what I want.” 3. “God, if you get me out of this one I promise I’ll never do it again.”
A recent issue of the AA magazine Grapevine drew my attention when I read something close to “Coincidence is God’s way of staying amazing.” After seeing that I remembered, “Half measures availed us nothing.... We asked His protection and care with complete abandon.”
I am approaching a milestone in my recovery. It’s not an anniversary “birth date” so much as an oddity of my sobriety date and the Gregorian calendar. I am about to achieve 7 years, 7 months, and 7 days of sobriety, if I choose to follow God’s will again for the next few days. Oddly enough, again due to a calendar oddity, it will also be 2,777 days of continuous sobriety.
At the Madrid convention I was prompted to share one of my early surrender experiences relating to Roy K.’s 18 suggested ways of surrendering lust hits and gaining daily progressive victory over lust.
I have met newcomers at SA meetings who have bristled at the description of sexual addiction as a disease. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) does not list it. The CDC doesn’t recognize it. It’s missing from disease lists everywhere. One newcomer said to me defiantly, “It’s not a disease. You’re just a terrible person.”
Over three sober decades in SA there have been quite a few pieces of “bad news” for we sexaholics. They all arise, like our entire program, from our experience, strength and hope. Each issue of Essay under Practical Tools we’ll share some pieces of “bad news”: • If you’ve ever been sober for 24 hours, you have all the tools you need to be sober the rest of your life – One Day At A Time.
Although I’ve been sexually sober since August 4, 2018, lust dreams have been part of my life since I discovered masturbation at age 12.
If I want a better relationship with someone or something (father, mother, wife, son, daughter, sponsor, golf clubs or friends) – in other words anyone or anything, what would I do? I would spend MORE time with them!! The key to being present to have more time with them is to “improve my conscience contact with God......” To improve my relationship with God I gotta spend time with him.
The SA Correctional Facilities Committee has seen a dramatic increase in the number of prisoners needing to be sponsored by mail. This is due to SACFC outreach, etc. We currently have a backlog of some 40 sponsees. We have an urgent need for sponsors.
In I’ll Stand By The Door he talks about the men who “stood at the door” to welcome and guide him into sobriety and recovery and eventually to found Sexaholics Anonymous.
