If I were the creator of a brand-new football that was so aerodynamically superior to a traditional football that it would fly farther and straighter than any other, who would I sign to endorse and demonstrate it: Peyton Manning or some yahoo off the street who's never in his life thrown a football? Before you say Peyton Manning, consider this.
I recently had a client ask me an honest question: "After I've had a SLIP in my recovery, why does it matter whether I acted out multiple times in the next few days then get back on the recovery road versus immediately getting back on the recovery road after the SLIP? Does it really matter, since I've messed up either way, anyway?" Good question... and one spoken like a true addict.
Here are three reasons that come to mind from my professional coaching with men in pursuit sexual integrity recovery.
I really do try to stay prayerfully open to God's plan for my life. But more often than I care to admit, I find myself taking my creative ideas to God with my heart already attached to one or more of them. Our Heavenly Father invites us to bring our requests to Him (Philippians 4:6). But He would rather we come to Him with an unattached heart.
I have to admit that I've never seen any statistics like this before. And it does resonate with me, based on my own work with Christian men who contend with same-sex attractions. Yet, there's something about seeing the numbers that still jolts me a bit, even though I've suspected it for some time. If the following research can be replicated, it would be difficult to argue that it's only a matter of gay rights.
Anyone who's been a part of a traditional twelve-step community knows the phrase. Even those outside of recovery know it. It's supposed to encourage us to keep keepin' on, even when there's little emotional drive to endure. But some get stuck on the very first phrase: "fake it". We need to stop thinking of this phrase as forcing ourselves to do something we really don't want to do. That's not the whole picture.