Step One Of Twelve Steps of Recovery
By Kevin Leapley, MA, LPC, CSAT on Friday, July 24th, 2015 in Sexual Addiction. No Comments
STEP ONE – “We admitted that we were powerless over lust — that our lives had become unmanageable.”
The following questions are suggested as a guide in working this step. Most of the work is in thinking about the answers, dredging up the pertinent recollections, and making notes, so that I can write it out. This step should contain enough details to convince me. Sometimes it is healing to reveal these secret instances to someone who has achieved a period of sobriety and who can support and guide in my sharing with the group.
Sexual Inventory
Write down all the things you have done sexually that caused pain, wounding, shame, embarrassment, abandonment, arrest, etc. Write out all the details and explore how you feel about each of them now. Some questions for reflection are:
- What is my earliest recollection of sex? Was there anything unusual about it?
- Did I have any unusual pre-puberty experiences with sexual curiosity?
- At the outset of puberty, did I discover masturbation? Did it become compulsive and frequent? If so, has that practice continued?
- What about pornography? At what age, if any, did I start reading or viewing such materials? Has the practice continued?
- What about visualization and fantasy? Have I spent much time in this practice?
- What about relations with women (men)? Have I used them for self-gratification? If so, how exactly have I used them? How compulsively?
- Am I aware of feelings I might have been trying to cover up by masking them with a sexual high? What were my payoffs for these actions?
- My life is unmanageable — I am powerless over lust.
- In this section I recognize my powerlessness and how my life has become unmanageable from my sexaholism, how have I tried to control lust but have been unsuccessful, and how my life is out of control. Some questions to guide my reflection are:
- What has it cost me to obsess sexually? A spouse(s)? Family? Girlfriend/ Boyfriend? Job? Promotion? Money? Reputation?
- What have I done that I didn’t want to do? Whom have I associated with that I wouldn’t have associated with? Where have I gone that I never would have gone? Is something other than me running my life?
- How has my illness affected my home life? My spouse? My children?
- How has my illness affected my work? My employment? My career?
- How has my illness affected my finances? Have I lost income over it? Incurred significant costs?
- How has my illness affected me legally? Have I been arrested? Could I have been arrested for what I have done? Could I have been sued?
- How many times have I tried unsuccessfully to quit? What promises did I make myself? Did I keep them? What happened when I failed?
- What financially brought me to SA? What were the financial incidents?
(Note: Try not to focus on blame or who was at fault but rather that you own the behaviors or the stinkin thinkin.)
The only real essential of Step One is stated on the first page of Alcoholics Anonymous: “We learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics.” The goal is for the addict to fully take responsibility and to admit that he/she is powerless over lust and that his/her life is unmanageable.
This material was adapted from San Diego SA’s use of the study guides from the Top of the Hill Group, an AA group.
Kevin Leapley, MA, LPC, CSAT
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