Tired of being broken

All Christians struggle with sin. It's a requirement to join, I think! ;-)

As a person of faith, I have found the small book More Than a Sunday Faith (Suitt) to be quite helpful. Maybe it would also be a help to you? Here is a brief outline of it: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zqVL11JjWICOHCRUDmqXr9TNC_gpb6yhRF1hKp-fxcc/edit

 

I'm similar to you in a number of ways. Longtime addiction to images, masturbation and chat. Several long stretches of sobriety interspersed with similarly long periods in which I'm off the rails. A real sense of using others to meet my own needs for connection and so on. A desire to stop this. And a fatigue that leads me to want to say 'F#$k this' and just indulge without restraint.

While I'm not sure I have anything to offer in terms of insight or assistance, whilst reading your post something came up around the sense of 'having to be on guard' all the time. Someone once told me that, while this 'on guardness' is an essential aspect of recovery, it's not 'on guardness' in the way we typically think of it. 'It's an on guard that exists within an attitude of surrender to you life,' he told me. Then he suggested that this surrender, this trust seemed missing for me.

I had completely forgotten about this exchange until now. It's landing with some weight.

 

Well said! We do not surrender ourselves fully to God if we do not fully trust him. And addicts often have problems with trust -- these itrust issues are often what lead to the addiction in the first place! But God is patient, and he will remain faithful. If we continue to show up and do not give up, he will eventually convince us of his utter trustworthiness. When that switch flips in our minds, we will finally lay it all down to him, and stop trying to do it all in our own power. That is when we can begin to make lasting forward progress, under his power instead of our own, which is not and never can be sufficient.

It is this continual yieldedness and resting in Christ that becomes our primary focus as we mature as his disciples. I think the words of Simpson's "Himself" say it well. https://www.biblebelievers.com/simpson-ab_himself.html

And, of course, someone made it into a rap.

 

Lol. That’s sounds like the drum track “errbody in da club getting tipsy”

Hahaha nice idea but I just ended up singin tipsy .”

 

And maybe that (often understandable) lack of trust and surrender is the real root of the sense of brokenness pointed to in the title of this thread. It's not that I act out per say, but that deep down I have tried / I am trying to separate myself from God. And now that I type this, I wonder if this trying is the true root of my fatigue and fed up-ness as well...

 

Have you ever thought about medication? I take fluoxetine and it helps with feeling satisfied and it curbs my sex drive. Sometimes people can take medication for compulsive actions. I'm not an expert but a psychiatrist has prescribed this medication for me specifically for hypersexuality and it does help.