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A lot of us don’t want to admit

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how childish we are. We don’t wanna admit

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how immature our behaviors are, how selfish, how

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entitled,

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and so I think that’s another barrier to

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being honest is not only are we afraid

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of

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admitting kind of the true motive behind some

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of our sexual acting out, but we also

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I don’t know if some of us can

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even handle accepting the truth to ourselves.

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It was hard for me to really to

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really accept the fact

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that I used women to make myself feel

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better.

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You are listening to the sex addiction podcast

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for high achievers, business professionals, executives, and entrepreneurs.

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This podcast is designed to apply sobriety and

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recovery principles specifically to the mindset of the

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high achiever. I’m your host, Roland Cochran, founder

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of The Successful Addict, a recovery group for

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high achieving men struggling with sex and porn

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addiction. For more information about joining our group

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or attending our next retreat, visit successfuladdict.com.

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And now, enjoy the rest of the episode.

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So it’s important to be honest in recovery,

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obviously, because if you’re not telling your therapist

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the truth, you’re not telling your wife the

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truth, and maybe even you’re lying to yourself,

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are you leaving in recovery? I mean, come

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on. The answer is no. We can’t lie

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ourselves into circles here. We’re not gonna ever

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get anywhere productive doing that.

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Here’s the problem. Can we be honest?

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Can we? Seriously, can we? And here’s what

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I mean by that is the driver behind

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a lot of these behaviors

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is really uncomfortable.

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It is not something you wanna say out

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loud. It’s not even something I wanna admit

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to myself that I did.

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But I have to. I have to if

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I wanna recover.

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Your wife’s gonna wanna hear about this. And

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for the betrayed partners listening to this, I

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would really encourage you to please try I

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know this is painful, but I would encourage

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you to please try to have an open

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mind to the best of your ability. Try

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not to react

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too much in that moment where this is

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disclosed. I get it. You’re gonna have the

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emotional response that you’re gonna have, and you

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have every right to have the emotional response

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you’re gonna have to to the things that

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have been done to you. The only reason

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I’m saying if we can try to kind

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of find some grace here and try not

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to make it honestly being intimidating,

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it’s to our benefit if we can do

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that. Here’s what I’m getting at.

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What if the truth hurts? What if the

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truth is not what you wanna hear? You

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know, what if you ask your husband, hey,

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have you ever figured out why you acted

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out the way that you did? What if

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he comes back and says, yeah, my whole

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life I’ve been chasing this. There’s this image

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of myself in my head, and my whole

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life I’ve been trying to live up to

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that potential, my potential. Right? And in my

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head, I was you know, I had all

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these nice cars, and I was I was

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the best in my industry, and everybody respected

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me, and I I was really great at

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business, and I was well respected at my

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church. And I have this image of this

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husband, this father, this this entrepreneur that I

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wanna be. And, unfortunately,

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usually because of movies we watched or masculine

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culture,

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Unfortunately, quite often,

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a plot of that image is impressing other

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men.

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Right? Showing other men how accomplished you are,

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how

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superior you are, how

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all the people you know, all the things

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you can. And, unfortunately, some of that is

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the ability to get women, to get attractive

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women.

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Attractive women have grown increasingly in the media,

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especially now with social media, have been displayed

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as these these trophies

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that only men of a certain caliber can

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get these trophies. It’s horrible. I know. It’s

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it’s like the epitome of gentrification.

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But it’s everywhere. It’s everywhere. This isn’t new.

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I mean, if you watch movies all the

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way back into the fifties and sixties, women

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have been these prize objects.

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Right? I was talking to my wife and

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she was citing a study. I guess, they

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they did, like, an analysis of film, and

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it was the number of women who fell

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for the guy, the guy who was in

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the position of power. And a lot of

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times, it was like she reluctantly fell for

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him. Right? But, basically, the media continues to

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reinforce this whole idea that if if you’re

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really this awesome guy, then all these women

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are going to want to be with you.

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And, typically, it’s the woman that all the

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other guys wanna be with, but only this

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certain superior guy is the one who’s able

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able to be with her. And, again, the

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problem with a lot of this is now

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that could become a measure of something that

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you were chasing. So my point of all

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this is what if when you disclose, well,

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you know, I think the reason I did

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it was

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not getting a frequent attention from attractive women,

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it made me really insecure. It made me

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start to second guess my value. Right? And

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this is usually from men who it’s usually

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men who fall into one of two categories.

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Either they have used women

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to make themselves feel better all through really

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high school, college, and their their young adulthood.

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Right? They’ve used women frequently for that. Or

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it can be number two, which was kinda

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my case. It was really hard for me

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to get girls. I was shy. I wasn’t

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very good looking. I was not confident. And

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so I had this scarcity

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of, like, oh my gosh. Am I ever

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gonna be able to get attractive women? Am

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I ever gonna be able to get women

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to like me? Am I gonna ever be

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able to get married? And so that scarcity

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became an issue. Right? So again, there’s this

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mismatch of this man that I’m trying to

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become.

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And part of that recipe for a lot

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of men is their ability to get attention

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from women. So what if I have to

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go be honest about this? Because I can

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tell you right now, your wife’s not gonna

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be thrilled to hear that. No wife is,

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neither would a husband if his wife was

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coming home and telling him the same thing.

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But it’s important to be honest because if

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that was the main driver that you liked

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checking that box

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made you a man of this caliber,

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if that’s a massive reason why you did

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it,

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then you gotta be honest about that. And

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and here’s the trick I think too is

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a lot of us don’t want to admit

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how childish we are. We don’t wanna admit

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how immature our behaviors are, how selfish, how

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entitled.

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And so I think that’s another barrier

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to being honest is not only are we

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afraid of

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admitting

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kind of the true motive behind some of

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our sexual acting out, but we also I

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don’t know if some of us can even

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handle accepting the truth to ourselves.

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It was hard for me to really to

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really accept the fact

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that I used women to make myself feel

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better.

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Completely used them as if they were objects.

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Right? And it’s even more shameful to say

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that I did that when I was married

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to my wife.

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It’s a hard pill to swallow. It’s embarrassing,

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but I publicly announced it to outside of

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the sex addiction field, just out in the

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different kind of business circles that I run-in.

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And, yeah, I was judged for it. No

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doubt. And I knew I was gonna be

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judged for it. That’s why I hid it.

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But my point of all this is we

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can’t be wrestling with the truth behind why

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we did what we did. You’ve got to

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figure out what it is. You’ve got to

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own it. You’ve got to tell people about

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it. You cannot just keep it to yourself.

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You cannot run from it. The truth is,

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there’s a reason why you did everything that

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you did. There is a reason. And you

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need to figure out what that reason is.

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And when you figure it out, you need

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to be honest about it. You need to.

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You need to tell. And if your wife

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doesn’t wanna hear about it, that’s okay. You

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don’t have to tell her unless she wants

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to hear. But, you know, if she does

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ask,

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eventually, you are gonna have to come clean

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about the ins and outs of your process

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addiction. And if it’s inconvenient

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for her to hear, again, that’s really not

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up to you to decide. If your wife

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wants the truth, she deserves the truth. And

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if the truth is that you felt more

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masculine, more macho, more accomplished by sleeping with

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women when you were on work trips, then

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you need to tell her that. And if

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you like kinda preying on younger women or

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women of who are less

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off financially and and you like to flex

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your imposture, your superiority

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to feel godlike to these women, you need

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to say that. You need to tell that

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that’s discussions that needs to happen in your

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recovery groups and in in your therapist. That’s

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your recovery.

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Your recovery isn’t stopping. That’s sobriety.

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The recovery is what was the thought processes

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I was engaging in to make the decisions

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that I made? And you need to be

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honest. If it was about image and then

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it was about image, it was about masculinity,

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it was about masculinity. If it was because

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you love to feel wanted and seen in

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a very unique way and sex was the

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way to do that, then do that. If

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you had a really hard time with women

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for the first twenty years of your life

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or thirty years of your life and then

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now you kinda found your confidence and you

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found money and all of a sudden things

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kinda had changed for you, and now you

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have all these regrets of lost time and

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you’re trying to now sleep with women because

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everybody else got to sleep with women in

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their twenties, but you didn’t and now you’re

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making up for it, but you’re married, you

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gotta say that. I know that sounds stupid

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and it sounds childish, but if that what

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was going on was the fear of missing

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out and you wanted to live this exciting

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life, then you gotta just admit the fact

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that that’s what you did. But I do.

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I think one thing I see quite often

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is and I don’t think it’s intentional,

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but I do. I think a lot of

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guys

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assume that they’re an addict. They subscribe to

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the whole, oh, I was just doing this

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because I was stressed, or, oh, I was

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just doing this, yeah, to regulate my emotions

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and my childhood trauma, and I’ve I’ve never

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really realized how to bond. And so I

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I use this as a escape to I

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think they just kinda like fall into that

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because they heard it on a podcast or

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they read it in a book. And I

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think we need to be careful with that

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because if you just, like, grab convenient stuff

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and just say, oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

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I’m I’m an addict and I cope through

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sex and I’m powerless over lust and blah

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blah blah, and you just, like, adopt and

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inherit

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this process addiction.

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Is that actually gonna lead to recovery though?

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If you’ve completely missed the mark, which I

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did, the whole first year of my recovery,

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I bought into the whole, oh, I’m an

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addict. I can’t emotionally regulate, so I’m using

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this to manage my intimacy

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anorexic and I, this is an intimate disorder.

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I bought into that because that’s what everybody

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told me I had. The problem was that’s

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never why I did any of this stuff.

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I’m not your typical sex addict and porn

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addict in the sense that I can stop.

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I was doing it all to fulfill an

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image of myself, of being macho, of being

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this guy, you know, being James Bond. And

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I know it sounds pathetic, but that’s the

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truth. That’s what I was doing.

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It was all just this massive performance just

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like everything else in my life, just like

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the cars I buy, the wristwatches I buy,

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the designer crap that I buy, all the

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positions in my different careers. It was all

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to have this macho show of proving to

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everybody how superior and special I was. In

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the end, it was all BS. It was

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all done out of insecurity.

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And my recovery work was figuring that out.

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So be honest, please. And for the betrayed

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partners listening to this, remember, again, you’re entitled

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to having every reaction you wanna have. But

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I would say it’s definitely

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more helpful to a guy’s recovery when he

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can feel safe and not judged to really

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just say the truth of what was going

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on in his brain. And sometimes, is it

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gonna make him look like more of an

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asshole than an addict? Yeah. A lot of

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times, it is. But in the end, what’s

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really the difference?

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So I’m insecure

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and then I use women

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to be James Bond like and be Tony

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Soprano or whatever,

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Christian Grey, blah blah blah,

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Batman, whatever the stereotype I’m trying to live

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up to. What’s really the difference though? If

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I feel insecure

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and I’m compensating through a means

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of compensation,

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is it really that different than the guy

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who is an addict and is just escaping

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and using porn or sex or whatever to

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escape his life, why do we have more

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grace for somebody who’s doing this dopaminergic escape

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to regulate his emotions? Why is there more

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grace there than for the insecure guy who

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is using women to enhance his self esteem,

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his self worth, feel feelings that he wants

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to feel. Is it really that different?

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Is it really that different? Why is one

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an addiction and the other one’s not an

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addiction? To me, both people have screwed up

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ways of thinking, both people are acting outside

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of their integrity, and both people are are

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lying and ashamed of their actions. Is it

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really that different?

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So again, let’s be honest. Don’t if you’re

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not an addict, don’t force yourself to be

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an addict. And if you’re not an addict,

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that’s okay. Then go do the addict thing.

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But the point is, we gotta get honest

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about why we made these decisions.

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We have to get honest. And if we’re

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not, I don’t know if you’re in good

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recovery. And frankly, relapse is probably gonna happen

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because in the end, you’re just white knuckling

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this whole thing. You haven’t really prevented this

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thought process from occurring again.

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Thanks for listening to this episode. If you

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are a high achiever with a sex addiction

353
00:12:01,710 –> 00:12:03,470
and you’re looking for a recovery group full

354
00:12:03,470 –> 00:12:06,590
of like minded men, visit successfuladdict.com.

355
00:12:06,590 –> 00:12:09,389
We provide men with a recovery mastermind group

356
00:12:09,389 –> 00:12:10,690
using four day retreats,

357
00:12:11,134 –> 00:12:13,875
weekly group calls, and daily accountability check ins.

358
00:12:13,934 –> 00:12:16,095
If you wanna achieve long term sobriety and

359
00:12:16,095 –> 00:12:18,014
save your marriage, go to our website and

360
00:12:18,014 –> 00:12:20,254
fill out our application. If you enjoyed this

361
00:12:20,254 –> 00:12:22,495
episode, please pass it along to a friend

362
00:12:22,495 –> 00:12:24,495
in recovery who would benefit from listening. It

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00:12:24,495 –> 00:12:26,297
is my mission to get this information out

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00:12:26,297 –> 00:12:28,697
to as many high achievers as possible, and

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00:12:28,697 –> 00:12:30,237
I can’t do it without your help.