971 Commonwealth Ave #3
Sundays 8PM
Welcome to the Sunday 8PM closed mix meeting of Sex Addicts Anonymous. My name is ____ and I will be your facilitator this evening.
This meeting is open only to those who are seeking to stop addictive sexual behavior. There is no other requirement. For the sake of those attending, please feel free to leave at this time if this does not apply to you.
Now let's take a moment of silence to meditate and invite God to our meeting. We'll follow that with the Serenity Prayer.
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time. Enjoying one moment at a time. Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace. Taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world, as it is, not as I would have it. Trusting, that if I surrender to your will, you will make all things right. That I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with you forever in the next. Amen.
(pg. 1 of SAA Green Book)
Sex Addicts Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their experience, strength and hope with each other so they may overcome their sexual addiction and help others recover from sexual addiction and dependency. Membership is open to all who share a desire to stop addictive sexual behavior. There is no other requirement. Our common goals are to become sexually healthy and to help other sex addicts achieve freedom from compulsive sexual behavior. SAA is supported through voluntary contributions from members. We are not affiliated with any other twelve-step programs, nor are we a part of any other organization. We do not support, endorse, or oppose outside causes or issues. Sex Addicts Anonymous is a spiritual program based on the principles and traditions of Alcoholics Anonymous. We are grateful to A.A. for this gift which makes our recovery possible.
(adapted from SAA Green Book and pg. 58 of AA big book)
Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path. Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program. They cannot develop a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty. There are those, too, who suffer from serious emotional and mental disorders, but many of them do recover if they have the capacity to be honest.
Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now. If you have decided you want what we have and are willing to go to any length to get it, then you are ready to take certain steps.
At some of these we balked. We thought we could find an easier, softer way. But, we could not. With all the earnestness at our command, we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely.
Remember that we deal with sexual addiction – cunning, baffling, powerful! Without help it is too much for us. But there is one who has all power – that one is God. May you find God now!
Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked God’s protection and care with complete abandon.
Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery.
1. We admitted we were powerless over addictive sexual behavior – that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other sex addicts and to practice these principles in our lives.
Many of us exclaimed, “What an order! I can’t go through with it.” Do not be discouraged. No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles. We are not saints. The point is that we are willing to grow along spiritual lines. The principles we have set down are guides to progress. We claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection. Our personal adventures before and after make clear three pertinent ideas:
(1) That we were sexually addicted and could not manage our lives.
(2) That probably no human power could have relieved our addiction.
(3) That God could and would if God were sought.
(pg. 14-15 SAA Green Book)
Our goal when entering the SAA Program is abstinence from one or more specific sexual behaviors. But unlike programs for recovering alcoholics or drug addicts, Sex Addicts Anonymous does not have a universal definition of abstinence. Most of us have no desire to stop being sexual altogether. It is not sex in and of itself that causes us problems, but the addiction to certain sexual behaviors. In SAA we will be better able to determine what behavior is addictive and what is healthy. However, the fellowship does not dictate to its members what is and isn’t addictive sexual behavior. Instead we have found that it is necessary for each member to define his or her own abstinence.
Since different addicts suffer from different behaviors, and since our sexuality is experienced in so many different ways, it is necessary that SAA members define for themselves, with the help of their sponsors or others in recovery, which of their sexual behaviors they consider to be “acting out”.
This can be a difficult challenge. If we are too lenient with ourselves, we might not get sober. If we are too strict, we might restrict ourselves from healthy behaviors that we have no need to give up, and an inability to meet our high standards could set us up for relapse. We need the help of other recovering sex addicts, and the reliance on a Power greater than ourselves, to find the right balance between these two extremes.
Our program acknowledges each individual’s dignity and right to choose his or her own concept of healthy sexuality. We have learned that our ideas of what is healthy and what is addictive evolve with experience. In time, we are able to define our individual abstinence with honesty, fairness and gentleness. This process is a valuable exercise in our recovery. It requires us to carefully examine all of our sexual behaviors, decide which ones are healthy or addictive, and note those cases where we’re not sure. It is a way of taking stock of our sexuality that teaches us a lot about ourselves and our behavior.
Our Seventh Tradition holds that SAA ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions. If you would like to contribute to the finances of this meeting, please consider donating any amount to our PayPal account: paypal.me/symphonychurchsaa. The finances will be used for meeting materials such as printouts, books, and literature available for all attendees to borrow or use. We currently have $20 in the account. You may also volunteer to moderate a future meeting by talking to David or e-mailing symphonychurchsaa@gmail.com. The only requirement is that you have attended at least 6 meetings and consistently maintain sobriety of at least 1 month.
Now we will proceed with intros, checkins, and acknowledging sobriety birthdays. If you are a newcomer, feel free to identify yourself. This is to welcome you and to acknowledge the courage it took to get here. We generally recommend you come to at least 6 meetings before committing to the SAA program.
Sample Sharing Template:
Hi, my name is ______ and I am ________.
My inner circle behaviors are ___________.
Today, I feel physically _______________.
Today, I feel emotionally _______________.
Today, I feel spiritually _______________.
Some highlights of this past week were ______.
Some goals I have for this upcoming week are___.
Additionally, I would like to share about______.
And with that, I'll pass.
Before coming to Sex Addicts Anonymous, many of us never knew that our problem had a name. All we knew was that we couldn't control our sexual behavior. For us, sex was a consuming way of life. Although the details of our stories were different, our problem was the same. We were addicted to sexual behaviors that we returned to over and over, despite the consequences.
Sex addiction is a disease affecting the mind, body, and spirit. It is progressive, with the behavior and its consequences usually becoming more severe over time. We experience it as compulsion, which is an urge that is stronger than our will to resist, and as obsession, which is a mental preoccupation with sexual behavior and fantasies. In SAA, we have come to call our addictive sexual behavior acting out.
Acting out altered our feelings and consciousness, and we found this altered state very desirable. The obsession and rituals that led up to the sex act itself were part of the "high." We sought this addictive high repeatedly, preferring it to many other activities, and feeling our compulsions more strongly than our basic needs to eat, drink, sleep, or be safe. These compulsive desires were irresistible, persistent, and insatiable. They went off like alarms in our heads that made it difficult to focus on anything else. When we wanted to act out, the urge didn't go away. Nor did we feel satisfied when we got our "fix." Instead, the more we acted out sexually, the more we wanted to act out. We lost more and more of our lives to our addiction, which cost us time, money, relationships, our health, our jobs, and even our freedom. The consequences of our addiction did not make us stop or limit our acting out. The more we tried to control our behavior, the worse it got. We were unable to stop on our own, and the pleas or threats of the people in our lives didn't help us to stop, either.
We acted out in many different ways. Sometimes we had trouble with one unwanted behavior, sometimes with many. We struggled with promiscuity; anonymous sex; compulsive masturbation; destructive relationships; romantic obsession; infidelity; obsessive fantasizing; cybersex; compulsive use of pornography, including internet pornography; excessive fear or avoidance of sex; prostitution or use of prostitutes; compulsive cross-dressing; phone sex; voyeurism; exhibitionism; sex in public places; inappropriate touching; sexual assault or molestation; bestiality; or other behaviors that involve risk to ourselves-physical, legal, emotional, or spiritual-and harm to others. These are only examples of acting out; there are many more. The common thread among all these behaviors for us as sex addicts is that we engaged in them compulsively, our willpower was helpless against them, and they had negative, painful effects. It didn't matter if others appeared to do the same behaviors without ill effect. We could not engage in them without consequence.
Over time we have become aware of certain characteristics of our lives as sex addicts. While none of us fits the profile perfectly, we can all identify with some of the following traits. We chose sex and romantic obsession over those things we cherished the most-including friends, family, and career. Sexual thoughts, romantic fantasies, and seductive planning filled our minds and distorted our thinking. Sex became our way to escape our feelings and responsibilities. We repeated our sexual behaviors even though we knew they would bring harm to ourselves and others. We made attempts to stop the behavior, but they failed. Much of our time was spent either being sexual, or managing crises and problems that arose because of our sexual behavior. We violated our own values, and sex became the chief measure of what was important. Our sexual choices created fear and despair. Our lives became filled with deceit in order to hide our behaviors. We found ourselves isolated and alone. We felt spiritually empty.
In our addiction, we lost control over our behavior; the disease had a life and an agenda of its own. This is a hard fact to accept. We may think that we acted out only when we wanted to. But if we look closely at our experience, we see that we couldn't maintain control of our behaviors. For example, many of us thought that we could act out for a while, and then go back to our lives. We would engage in one of our favorite behaviors, such as cruising the internet, only to find that we didn't stop when we said we would. Sometimes we didn't stop until we absolutely had to.
When we were active in our addiction, it was difficult to stop our sexual preoccupations. They intruded into our thoughts, especially when we were under pressure. These included fantasizing about sex, thinking about past sexual acting out, and planning to act out again. Sexual obsession had consequences of its own. When we were preoccupied by sex we had a hard time concentrating on anything else. We would use sexual fantasy to deal with emotions and situations that we didn't want to face. The more we did this, the more our sexual obsession grew. Before long, many of us were thinking or fantasizing about sex around the clock. Our fantasies would become more compulsive and more extreme. If we acted on our fantasies, in the hope that fulfilling them would satisfy us, we found ourselves simply hungry for more. The longer we stayed in this fantasy world, the more we lost touch with reality. Our sexual obsession often led us to believe that other people were obsessed like we were. As a result of this belief, some of us would make sexually inappropriate suggestions, jokes, or remarks. It's not that sexual fantasy is necessarily unhealthy, in and of itself. Our problem was that we lost ourselves in these compulsive fantasies, becoming more and more isolated from others and from reality.
We would try to establish boundaries around our behavior, but eventually we'd violate these boundaries. Some of us decided that we would engage in certain behaviors, but that we wouldn't get involved in other things that were dangerous, caused harm to others, or were illegal. We would act out in so-called "safe" ways, and only fantasize about acting out in the forbidden ways. Then one day, we crossed those boundaries. We paid for sex when we thought we never would. We took risks meeting strangers for sex. Or we violated the sexual boundaries of others. We may have promised ourselves that we would not do these things a second time, and yet we did. Before long, we did them repeatedly, hoping we could stop, while praying that we wouldn't get caught.
We tried to stop our behaviors, co give up some or all of them. We would swear to never act out again, and then be right back in our addiction within days, hours, or even minutes. We would throw out all of our pornography or paraphernalia, only to dig it back out of the trash or buy more. We would promise ourselves, and sometimes our loved ones, that we wouldn't repeat our behavior. Sometimes we could keep our promises for weeks, months, or years. But eventually we would act out again.
The meeting is now open for discussion. You can share about the reading or just get current. To keep the meeting safe, we do not make direct comments about another person's share or give advice.
Please avoid mentioning the name of a Book, Movie, Treatment Center or the Like in your share because this can be viewed by some as "promotion”. It is ok, however, to talk about your experiences with these items. It is also safe to speak in “I” statements, as opposed to “you” statements. Feel free to share more specific information after the Serenity Prayer when Fellowship begins. It is appropriate to reference the reading.
We ask that any Newcomer that would like to share be given the opportunity. Our focus is making you feel welcome and acknowledge the courage it took getting here. We will reserve some time for Questions and Answers at the end of the meeting.
(optional) Please keep your shares to about ____________minutes.
I will help moderate. Who would like to begin?
As a gentle reminder for all of us, anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions. What you heard was spoken in confidence and should be treated as confidential. Please keep the things you heard here in the confines of your mind. Carry no gossip and always remember to place: principles before personalities.
This is how recovery has been for us. Each of us has taken steps of courage and leaps of faith. Each of us has contributed, not only to our own recovery, but to the recovery of other suffering sex addicts as well. We have contributed by showing up at meetings and by sharing our experience, strength, and hope. We have listened to our fellow addicts and supported them in their recovery journey. Like the first members of our fellowship, we continue to remain sexually sober by helping our fellow addict stay sober. Our prayer is that every sex addict who seeks recovery will have the opportunity to find it. And keep coming back.
(Ottawa, Canada Hope and Recovery Group)
Through a renewed Relationship with God, the healing force of recovery will take hold in our hearts. By giving ourselves over to God and working our program, our lives will become manageable and we will be restored to sanity. We will receive the inner strength and support needed to face our anxieties and fears, and to deal with the painful feelings that feed our addiction.
Relations with Others will improve as we learn to respect our boundaries and allow others freedom to be themselves. Reaching out in trust and connecting with others will come easier, dispelling our sense of isolation and loneliness. Degrading fantasies and obsessive sexual thinking will diminish.
Relating to Ourselves, self absorption will give way to self-discovery; secrecy to honesty; feelings of unworthiness to dignity; and shame to grace. A restored integrity will guide our behavior. We will feel more alive and regain a sense of happiness. We will hear ourselves laugh again and rediscover play. We will embrace change and will grow.
A Spiritual Awakening will free us from the tyranny of our addiction. An awareness of being guided by a Higher Power and supported by caring friends will sustain us. Regret for the past and worry for the future will give way to living for today. We will open ourselves to the amazing possibilities of a life worth living. Our life.
Are these extravagant promises?
WE THINK NOT!
We have seen them fulfilled.
They are ours, if we want them and work for them.
I put my hand in yours and together we can do what we could never do alone. No longer is there a sense of hopelessness. No longer must we each depend upon our own unsteady willpower. We are all together now, reaching out our hands for a power and strength greater than ours; and as we join hands, we find love and understanding beyond our wildest dreams.
Thank you for attending our meeting today! Now it is time for fellowship. Feel free to stick around to chat, ask questions, pass around phone numbers, or get a sponsor.