I’m stunned by how a few sex addiction meetings have affected me.
I don’t walk around with the predatory fantasies that normally afflict me.
Please know that these are fantasies only! I don’t act them out. I’m a good Orthodox Jew, a light on the Hollywood Hills, a shining example for the world of ethical monotheism.
My fantasy life is almost 100% eroticized rage. I don’t dream about intimacy within a committed relationship (though I rationally desire this). I dream about being a big swinging dick.
I don’t judge myself as a bad man for my fantasies. Like Judaism, I distinguish between thought and behavior, but I think my dreams are a mirror to my psyche, and that this psyche needs repair.
So I’ve done some meetings and shared my creepy thoughts and I’m different. Just as watching porn made me different in the opposite direction. It influenced me to treat sex like sport.
Twelve-step meetings sober me. I’m not walking around this week imagining myself a superstar with unlimited access to hot women. I’m not dreaming about being on the front page of the New York Times. I’m not wondering why nobody is making a documentary about my life.
In short, I’m not walking around in my normal narcissistic daydream. I’ve talked to too many people now whose lives have been rendered miserable by pursuing these delusions.
So, I feel more rooted in reality. When I’m with people I care about, I’m softer. I think my writing has changed.
It’s hard to go from davening or Torah study to the heedless pursuit of lust. And it’s hard to go from a 12-step meeting to treating people like objects.
I don’t expect this to last. I need to catch another meeting soon. Perhaps I might even make myself accountable to a sponsor and start working the 12-steps?
