When I entered the program, I acted out almost daily. As I progressed, I would act out weekly, every two weeks, every month, etc. It seems to me as though I have some sort of capacity to hold lust within me – I’ll call it a lust balloon. Once I have filled this balloon with lust, I feel compelled to resort to my addiction by acting out my addictions physically.
There seem to be three things I can do with a lustful thought: 1. Let it go completely (surrender) and voluntarily, 2. “White knuckle” or fight it down into my subconscious, or 3. Dwell on it and feed it until it overpowers me. When I let go of all lust completely, the lust balloon never fills up, and I am never compelled to resort to my addiction. If I let go of 95 percent and stuff the other 5 percent into my subconscious, then the lust balloon may take two weeks to fill up, and then I am at the point of being compelled to resort to my addiction. If I dwell on it in my conscious mind, the balloon fills up quickly, and I act out later that day.
Letting go of lust for me takes a prayer telling God that I am willingly giving Him this temptation (not “take it from me” as I grip it tightly) and praying for the person I’m lusting after. I can pray for them to have a good day, to get married in the temple, to overcome the challenges they face, etc. This changes the selfish lust into giving blessings and turns the “object” I’m lusting after back into a child of God who has thoughts, feelings, and dreams and who cries and is joyful just like I am. It’s also an attempt to turn selfish lust into an act of love. I have found that separating lust from love is an essential part of recovery.
If it doesn’t go away after doing that, I call another group member to explain to them (without graphic detail) how I’m struggling, and then I surrender it to God while on the phone. As time has progressed, I try to make the call instead of first trying to surrender it on my own. Isolation never did work for me. I don’t know why calling people works better than surrendering in isolation, but it does. At first, when I gave my struggles (and this works with any temptation: lust, resentment, anger, fear, depression, stress, etc.) to God, I only imagined the thought or temptation going out of me, but one day I decided to visualize it going to God and Him struggling with it on my behalf. Boy, did that change my experience! It deepened my appreciation of what He has done for me and helped me realize that I don’t know Him well enough! The God I was giving my temptations to was a stranger to me, and it gave me a deep desire to know Him more fully.
The other cool yet counterintuitive thing is that I don’t have to be perfect at catching every image and trigger to reach that 100%. Anything I miss during the day can be caught before bedtime. I take some time in prayer to review the day, asking God to remind me of anything I missed, and inevitably, something will come up, and I surrender it until it’s gone and until no more triggers come up. Then, I ask God to keep me clean and safe during the night. I did all I can, and He takes care of the rest.
Of course, my ability to completely let go of lust depends largely upon my attending meetings and, thereby, increasing my faith in God and my humility (self-awareness). I won’t let go of lust or any other sin or drug if I don’t have more faith in God than I have in that drug. And I can’t let go of something I don’t know I’m holding onto.
More Freedom Blog 
One thought on “The “Lust Balloon””