Recovery Nation

Thanks Boundless for your replies,

I have been doing rather well lately. It seems like a get more fulfillment out of the things that were so often overlooked in the past. I seem to be a more emotional person now. I have learned to appreciate things like I never did before. That has been the biggest help. Being more in touch with my surroundings, instead of just a spectator. I was often afraid to participate because someone might get a glimpse of the real me.

I just wish that the thoughts would go away. It seems like some of the thoughts still linger long after the original trigger. For the life of me I can’t figure out why I can go from perfectly happy and content to triggered and struggling, instantly. I have, after a recent acting out, begun to use my triggers as recovery triggers. Like when I am triggered, I use that opportunity to build on one of my values.

And the rubbernecking, is something that has just come like second nature for so long. As an example; it doesn’t matter how old or ugly the woman is, if she has large breasts, that is the first thing I look at. Like my first eye contact with any female begins at their chest. I used to use breast size to categorize the beauty of a woman. I treat women like objects only, worse than objects, just individual body parts. It has become so natural for me that I noticed one day, not long ago, a kid at the ball field bent over in front of me, this kid was probably 3-4 years old. Anyway, when she bent over her shirt popped open a little in front, I noticed this, not because I’m a pedophile, but because I have been looking down women’s shirts for so long now that it is where my eyes automatically go. Just a simple glance, but it bothers me. That’s the kind of rubbernecking I want to stop. Noticing a pretty girl is one thing, but only noticing her chest or butt is something else entirely. And one glance is ok, but the second and third glances are not appropriate.

What thoughts? (I'm building towards something here that I hope will help you understand what you're missing, but I want to see which thoughts you're struggling with)

B

_________________
"It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell."

"Be a lamp unto yourself."

- Buddha

To sum it all up. I can be triggered be anything and nearly everything. A few examples are; driving down the road I pass a golf course, my mind instantly reminds me a movie I saw where a girl flashes her chest on a golf course; while trying to get the house picked up before the kids get here for the weekend I see the need to vacuum, instantly my thoughts go to the girl stripping and dancing around naked while vacuuming.

Anyway, You get the idea. It just seems like even on the days when I am perfectly content and happy, even the smallest thing can be a trigger. Maybe I let the thoughts linger too long on the trigger? Maybe that should be something I need to work on? Those are the thoughts that I want to go away. Because once triggered I feel like it is a mechanical effort to change the thoughts to something more postive. Kinda funny, but here lately I have been singing the country song "Colder Weather" by the Zac Brown Band, seems to be about an addict.

All right, I see where your problem in understanding is. I was planning to make a post on the Community forum about the different types of triggers, but I'll start here.

What you aren't currently grasping practically is the effect of your emotional state in creating these triggers. In essence, there are two types of "triggers": emotional triggers and sensory triggers. Sensory triggers are the ones we are all aware of: scantily clad women, sexy advertising, links that promise "free porn" etc. These are what most people think of as triggers.

What they usually miss is that your emotional state has a huge effect on what you perceive as triggers. This isn't surprising, since most of us recovering from addiction are pretty bad at identifying emotions. When someone is feeling bored, lonely, anxious, fearful, stressed, etc, and if those emotions are managed in a healthy way, then your mind will manage them by kicking in your ingrained compulsive behaviours to stimulate you and balance those emotions.

This is probably why you can be "triggered by anything and everywhere"...because you're still seeing the triggers as outside yourself, when they aren't. With emotional triggers, they relate to your emotional state at the time; with sensory triggers, they relate to how you've learned to perceive that stimulus and the emotions involved.

For example:



Here, in the first example, you see the trigger as the golf course itself. But it isn't. The trigger here is most likely your emotional state (possibly boredom, since you were driving), so you start to fantasize about something that stimulates you. This seems like it happens automatically, but only because you aren't aware. Similarly, when you have to vacuum, this may be something that is boring or that you don't like to do...so your mind kicks in and fantasizes to stimulate you. Again, you say "the thoughts just happen"...they don't just happen, they're a response to your emotional state.

The point here is that most people see the object itself as the trigger...but they don't consider their emotions before they were triggered. And, as you said, even if you did happen to be content...our minds thrived on emotional extremes in addiction. So if you see something enticing (or that you perceive to be enticing), your brain will stimulate itself. However, what I found in my own recovery was that usually, emotional triggers are much stronger. This phenomenon is a great example of a question that gets asked a lot here: "why is it that sometimes I will see a 'trigger' like a sexy ad and not be triggered, then other times it causes a huge amount of struggle? What changed?" The answer: your emotional state at the time. This again points to the fact that the trigger itself is not outside yourself, but within your perception.

In the beginning, you must take conscious action against this, to both understand your emotions and change your perceptions. As you progress, it will get easier and this will happen less often, until you no longer fear triggers at all.

To go back to your previous post:





I'm still unsure what thoughts exactly that you mean...do you mean thoughts about the trigger itself, or other thoughts that cause you anxiety?

Anyways, the point here is that you're not seeing how these things link together. If you read my posts to others, I talk about the various number of unhealthy beliefs about ourselves we have. The drivers of your compulsive behaviours have little to do with the behaviours themselves. Over the years, these thought have built up more and more, to the point where even when we aren't stressed in the present moment, all of these thoughts are kind of running in the background at all times, influencing our perception and causing a sort of low-lying, constant anxiety (at least this is how I've experienced it) that you've previously just accepted as "normal" for you. So, we developed compulsive rituals in response to these, such as fantasy or scanning, to deal with this anxiety. So once again, why do you rubberneck? To balance your emotional state. And, if you want to stop it, you should create an action plan specifically for rubber-necking, then work on implementing it (by visualizing, urge control, decision-making, etc.) But rest assured, the reasons that you're compulsively rubber-necking aren't related to the rubbernecking itself at all (this is different than just choosing to gawk at attractive women, since that can be done solely for the pleasurable emotions involved, not to manage emotions...hopefully you get what I'm saying here).

Hope that helps!

Boundless

_________________
"It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell."

"Be a lamp unto yourself."

- Buddha

Thanks again Coach Boundless for your wonderful insight and help!!!

Lesson 22 and 23

I have already begun to measure and track my behavior on a daily basis. I don’t just keep up with my addictive behavior, I would have to skip days on the calendar for that. What I have been measuring is my stress levels, and more importantly, what I did that day to build on my values. I assign a number to my overall health for that day, 1 being happy and content, 10 means I acted out. Luckily there have been very few days in the past few months where I have acted out. Like I said, I think things are going a lot better for me.

I think what I am going to start doing now is go from a sort of check list when the stress get too much and thoughts of acting out begin. I guess what I may be suggesting is something to not only remind me of my values, but more importantly, something to remind me of all the negative consequences for the act of acting out. I guess something I read in lesson 23 reminded me of the one of the sayings in the SA groups. “If you are thinking of acting out, take out your 24hr Desire chip and put it under your tongue, if it melts, go for it”

Anyway, back to the lessons! Breaking down the behavior and mapping out my struggles is a great suggestion and I for one do too little of this. I think on my last few acting out sessions, I failed to think about where I was at and what I was doing, or the consequences for each. Role playing is also something I need to start doing more of as well. I have begun to do this a little bit, but it sometimes feels more like pre-planning than role playing. I sort of preplan when a foreseen stressor is coming up. Maybe they are more like quick, thrown together, action plans?

More thought and more concentration on my emotions after triggers is also a priority. If I am triggered, don’t just white knuckle it, figure out why I was triggered, not the actual trigger, but why my emotional state was such that allowed me to be triggered. Then begin the previously mentioned check list to remind me of values and consequences for my actions, both good and bad consequences. Also, if I was in such an emotional state that allowed me to be triggered, I need to figure out what I can do to remedy the situation.

6/5/2012

Today has gone quite well for me. I worked today on my normal day shift schedule. Although I normally don’t like to work on dayshift unless it is on the weekend, today went by rather quickly. Normally all the big dogs are at the plant spewing their thoughts and opinions on how exactly things should work, which they don’t, and otherwise showing their stupidity. Anyway today was a day I did exactly has I was told and things went to hell, I had to take things into my own hands to keep the unit online and keep those Megawatts going out on the grid. To anyone reading this, in case you can’t tell, I am a Control Room Operator at a coal fired power plant, and a damn good one if a do say so myself.

Back to my recovery!!

With today being a success, I look forward to my two upcoming days off. I am making plans to spend time with my two girls. Spending quality time with them is really starting to have more meaning in my life. I have really started talking to them and being a part of their life and not just a spectator. These are the things I need reminding of when t he thoughts of acting out come to mind. Sort of count my blessings.

After reading my first paragraph, I have noticed something that I need to be aware of, something that I always despised in other people. Arrogance! I need to remember my Golden Rule value, to treat everyone the way I would like to be treated.

I’ve had a pretty good day so far today. I’ve been waiting for a friend to call so I can go over to his house and help him put up a pool. While waiting I guess boredom is setting in and I have begun to get a little bit anxious. Maybe something triggered me, maybe it was just my mind playing tricks on me, to get me to look at the computer, to alleviate my boredom. There are a thousand what-if’s. I have tried to identify the emotions I am currently feeling with little to no success, other than boredom. So what I have decided to do is to take advantage of the free time I have, head to the park for some hiking, and role playing. I did some research on the community forum about how to role play, and I have already read the lessons on role playing. So if I am ever going to learn to master this recovery tool, I need to start somewhere.

It's funny, I had almost this exact same discussion with another member recently. He was having trouble with boredom.

I wrote this post a little while back entitled "Enjoying Boredom" after I had a realization around the subject. You can read it here (I am going to bump it up): viewtopic.php?f=2&t=19686

Anyways, think about this: what's wrong with being bored? What's wrong with having nothing to do? If you're anything like me, you were (or still are) constantly running from times when you have nothing to do, to keep distracting yourself. But why?

I remember I constantly felt like I never had any time to relax...when in actuality, those times were all around me. They were the times when I was bored and had nothing to do...which, once I had this realization, were everywhere, every day, yet I never recognized them as such. I had always thought my life was one stressful event to the next, when I was actually the one perceiving it this way.

This should also lead to a further thought: the real problem here isn't boredom. It's the thoughts that arise when you aren't distracted and the emotions those thoughts cause. The problem is the anxiety created by boredom, rather than the boredom itself...which begs the question: what causes that anxiety? This leads us back to those underlying patterns I was previously discussing. When you're bored and have nothing to distract yourself with, your mind starts to churn out these patterns habitually. Here, you're not triggered so much by anything in particular, but because these patterns start to arise when your mind no longer has anything to focus on. This makes you uncomfortable and so you once again seek to distract yourself.

So, the next time you're sitting around bored, and suddenly you start feeling anxious, instead of distracting yourself, stay with that anxiety. Think about it: why were you anxious? You were about to go to a friend's and help him put up a pool...sounds fun to me. So the anxiety must come from somewhere else. It comes from those patterns that arise when your mind no longer has anything to focus on.

Roleplaying can help. So too can specifically fishing for these patterns, knowing that at worst, they can only make you feel uncomfortable. Because once you remove these causes of underlying anxiety (and I would consider each one to be an obstacle to health)...then you will find you can sit, bored, and truly feel peaceful.



Boundless

_________________
"It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell."

"Be a lamp unto yourself."

- Buddha

This is it exactly!! It all comes from previous bad habits I guess. When bored my mind, in a way, seeks to trigger itself. Like I am trying to talk myself into doing something I don't want to do. Oh the tricks my mind can play on me to get me back to my old complusive ways.

I noticed it this morning as a matter of fact. I got home from work around 8:30am, I quickly ate a bowl of ceral, put a load of clothes in the washer, and while I was waiting to put it in the dryer, I started watching a movie "Gladiator". It's a good movie with no triggers, no nudity, and I would only be watching for a little while, just long enough to throw the clothes in the dryer and head to bed. Anyway, while sitting there watching the movie, I could feel myself "trying" to be triggered. Like Since my mind didn't see anything on the screen, I could feel myself mentaly searching my vast card collection of movies trying to find something to fit the movie that was on the screen. Once I realized what I was going, I just sat there, gave a little chuckle, and thought "oh what a tangled web we weave".

Anyway the reason I got on Rn this morning was just to write down a update of last nights events. Yesterday, before I went to work I sat down and wrote out some "homework" for me to do while I was at work last night. It was more or less just 5 questions that I felt I would focus on during the lull moments in my night shift. It seemed like a good idea since I have previously had a harder time while I was working midnights (tired, frustrated, away from family). Anyway it seemed like a good idea to have this sort of improvised action plan in place. And it worked wonderfully!! No struggles, kept me focused on my recovery, just a good all around tool, and definetly one I will utilize in the future.

Thanks CoachBoundless!!

I feel I have made some real progress these last few days about my emotional awareness. These might not be the euphoric moments that send me over the top when it comes to recovery, but they just might add to the steam I am building. With a question posted on the forum about emotions and values, where I have received some great advice, I have made a few connections.

1. My emotional state prior to a trigger may or may not have a dramatic effect on how the trigger affects me. The key is that the trigger is just my brain trying to stimulate me using compulsive thoughts and behavior.

2. I need to start seeing triggers, not for the positive stimulation they used to provide, but for all the negative consequences of acting on them. I realize too, that even though the stimulation provided felt good initially, the long term consequences are what matters.

3. If I continue to make values based decisions, eventually, with time, I will no longer receive any emotional stimulation from acting out. Instead my emotional stimulation will come from knowing that I make decisions based solely on values.

4. I also need to be aware that once triggered, it may have actually changed my emotional state to that of stress, because I shouldn’t want to look. I will need to do something to counteract this possible change, something positive and productive.

5. Writing things down helps me work through my problems. I have to sort through my thoughts and emotions so that I can put them on paper in a way that makes sense. I think this is why some of my posts that have questions written at the top also have answers written at the bottom, written by me.

Just an update,

I have been doing well these last few days. Maybe some of these lessons are starting to sink in. Maybe I can see change happening and my motivation has picked up some more? Using CoachBoundless' analogy of being on an island and wanting off of it so bad you set out to sea in your little row boat, not knowing where you'll end up. Just knowing that you hate the island sooo much you are willing to chance it. Maybe I am starting to see land on the horizon. I still have a long way to go, and with the map RN gave me, I will get there.

I am begining midnight shift tonight and already have a game plan in place should I need it. I am also leaving on vaction with my GF in a few days for my motivation.

I got back from a planned vacation with my GF a couple of days ago. We went to her Uncle's Farm where we just tried to relax and enjoy each others company without kids, SA, or any other stressors. This plan didn't work out to well for her. The house we stayed in had a few pictures of scantily clad women in them, along with one picture of a naked woman that was very art inspired. NO, I did not dwell on the pictures or really have any thoughts at all about them. They were more or less, just another picture to me. My main focus was the stress these pictures were causing my GF. She ended up taking a few pictures down to try and help calm her nerves. This seemed to help her out some but not enough to consider this a relaxing vacation.

Most of my GF and I's main problems now are on her not seeking help. She doesn't do any work on RN. She has read all the lessons on her side but feels that they are all wrong in their concepts. She feels like she is supposed to just stand back and let me heal without it really effecting her. The problem is that she wants me to be open and honest about any struggles I am having, including signifigant triggers and how I dealt with them. But my disclosures only hurt her feelings because she see's it as me lusting over another woman, and she is always in competition with every other woman. She feels like she isn't good enough for me, if she was I wouldn't be looking. She also feels like when I am better and don't have any urges any more, then she will get better as well, because then she will know that the only woman I want is her.

Anyway, this is a real stressor for me. One that I feel I have been handling pretty well lately. I let her talk, which hurts my feelings, then I have to concentrate on something positive in my life to reduce this stress. I often look at pictures of my kids, at some of the things I have built, just thinking postive thoughts all around. Reassuring myself that I am a good person.

Enough for today, as always writing this stuff down helps as well.

Hello, first off, let me start by saying that I have been doing pretty well lately. I have had a few significant struggles here and there but nothing I couldn’t handle. I have also done a lot of soul searching and basically studying the inner workings of how my mind works or thinks. I have come to a few revelations that might not go along with everything that RN has to teach me. I don’t think that RN has been wrong per se, after all, it is what taught me how to delve into my own mind and study it. Here is the first thing that doesn’t fit with RN teachings. Sometimes I act compulsively no matter what my emotions are doing at the time. This is one of those things that I have struggled with learning, that just never came. Everything is just basic decision making based on your values, and more importantly for me, my vision of who I want to be and the steps I need to take to get there. If I see a pretty girl, or anything that reminds me of my “card catalog” of porn movies stored in my brain, it is just a decision I have to make on whether or not I let the compulsive thoughts continue, or I quickly filter them through my vision. My emotions at that particular moment CAN have an effect on my decision to continue, or they might not have any bearing at all on my decision. Where the emotions, for me anyway, really come into play is when the choice to not act compulsively has been made. Then the stress comes. And in the back of my mind, I know that it is just the addict in me trying to take hold and make me act compulsively. I heard somewhere about how Howie Mandel had to have the fringes on the rugs in his house perfectly combed. If they weren’t it would drive him absolutely insane until he fixed them. It is the same thing with me. I see something that reminds me of a porn scene (fringes out of place), I stress and stew over it until the viewing and masturbation (combing the fringes) ritual is complete. This addiction is more or less just a different form of OCD. Unfortunately, this form wrecks havoc on everything else in life. It ruins marriages, makes people lose their jobs, subject people to dangerous situations, all to satisfy their compulsive needs.

Anyway that is enough for now, just writing makes me feel better.

I have decided that I am just not in a place I am comfortable with yet. I still feel like my life mangement skills need work. There are days when I feel like I am white knuckling recovery, sort of living one day at a time. Anyway, I intend to go back through the lessons and see what has changed in my life and also what I need to work on. I'm also making it a point to not "redo" a lesson. I don't want any influence from the past to skew my current thoughts. Basically I am trying to better myself. I feel like the "side effects" from having an addiction are still there. I still struggle with honesty and openness even when I haven't done anything wrong. I also still find myself objectifying women, seeing them as body parts instead of human beings with feelings and thoughts. I guess those are my primamry reasons for coming back here. I don't know how I will be in the future, I just know that I am not happy with who I am today.