As recovering addicts, we are still going to be faced with triggers, temptations, and moments of frustration – both from negative emotional triggers and from lust triggers.
Here’s an email I shared with a sponsee that explains some of my thoughts about dealing with triggers in the moment:
Hey,
There are days that are harder than others for me too, but I can’t dwell on them, just try to recognize my part and what I can do to turn my life and will over to Him. I know that I can’t do this on my own.
If I feel I’ve been in a tough, triggering situation, I try to build up fortifications and recognize weapons of war that I am willing to bury. There can be nothing worth the price of losing everything that is most important to me: my relationship with God, my wife, and my family.
One thing that really stuck out to me last night in group was what a brother said about what “recovery” is: he said it is when we are focused on recovering what we have lost due to our choices. Yes, sobriety is essential, but living in recovery is when I’m willing to give up anything and everything in order to stay far away from the edge of those deadly cliffs, to recover what has been lost (i.e. Trust, connection with God and my wife, the Spirit, and my agency to choose).
I remember when I came to the conclusion that social media was something I had to completely bury. Part of me thought that would kill my business and that I’d struggle to make ends meet because of it. But it’s been the opposite. This year has been, by far, my best year in business, and I know it’s because I’ve been trying to do what I feel God wants me to do. I’ve had to put my trust in Him like I never thought I could. I’ve had to surrender and take steps in the dark in order to find the true light again.
In addition to leaving social media, I shut down a branch of my business that I’d been running for 10 years, my baby in the Internet world. In that business, I sold products online to primarily women. I had access to hundreds of women’s social media accounts. I was “forced” to reach out to these women as a way to generate new business. And I justified over and over again to myself, to my wife, and even to God that what I was doing “wasn’t that big of a deal.” It was “just business.” But that wasn’t true at all. These relationships and connections are what ultimately always led me back down the paths of hell and frustration and addiction.
I feared shutting this business down and what it would do to my bottom line, but I knew if I continued to put myself in those dangerous situations, ultimately history would continue to repeat itself and I would never be living in true recovery. Instead I would lose the most precious things I’d been blessed with.
I look forward to catching up with you in Sunday sometime and am glad we were able to keep in touch while you were away.
Talk soon.
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