Initially when I read the theme to submit an article for the Essay, I wondered about the paradox and challenge of finding such growth. I was intrigued by the focus. However, the more I reflected on my experience, the more I could honestly say that I had grown in joy and freedom during these Covid times.
To seek spiritual progress, I must continue to work the Steps with my sponsor. I must continue reading questions, reflecting and writing answers no matter how many times I’ve done this before. This time around, I found a few Twelfth-step questions online— about reaching out to other sexaholics and how the 12-step program has worked for me.
It works if you work it! It’s a simple quote. We repeat it at every meeting. Just as simple is the requirement for membership: a desire to stop lusting and become sexually sober. But while these are simple truisms, living them is not easy. To stay sober in the face of day to day challenges and to deepen my recovery means I have to work the Steps, practice the tools of recovery, do service for others and take regular guidance from my sponsor.
Let’s start with some statistics. The word happy appears in the book Sexaholics Anonymous seven times, and in the book Alcoholics Anonymous 16 times. The word joyous is in the SA book eight times, and in the AA book 12 times. Freedom is used only four times in the AA book and 37 times in the SA book.
Football (or Soccer as they call it in the US) - what would we do without it? It is so exciting, so passionate, such a good topic of conversation, and so much more. As a teenager I was obsessed travelling around the UK following (worshipping?) my beloved Tottenham Hotspur F.C. As life moved on and I got busy with studies, marriage, kids I realized that (maybe?) there are more important things in life and I gradually lost interest.
“How do you practice your program during this pandemic?” Haha! Thanks for asking. I was on a Zoom meeting the other day when a young man said with some alarm, “I feel like I’m living like a monk!” That just fits for me, I’m thinking. :))
A favorite author of mine (not in a 12-step program) says that love is “a flow of energy willingly allowed and exchanged, without requiring payment in return.” The 12-step recovery process has been an integral part of my experience with this flow of love. As I walk the road of restoration, the channels are open for me to receive the love that my higher power has for me.
