Feeling satisfied tonight. It hit me, "It's all because you dodged the lust bullet on Friday night!" Highlights from my weekend came to mind:
- Great time joking with Sunday School class--they're 14, so uninhibited.
- Shoveling snow with Kylie (12), chatting as we did. Not a chore at all!
- Sucked that Gavin lost basketball game. Still fun to cheer them on--great team, together 3 years now, they're buddies.
- Everyone I met on the errands I ran Saturday afternoon seemed so nice. Even lady who wouldn't take my shoes--"over 30 days" (grrr).
- Friday night (working in reverse here): Good time at concert with Sandy. Usually not too big on jazz, but have to admit sax player (saxist? ;-)) really good.
I thought, "So that's what it's like to have a nice weekend, clear of the crap porn used to spill into my head and life."
When we talked during our therapy session yesterday I learned Jeff really had dodged a bullet Friday night. Sandy rode the train into the city to meet him so he had a couple of hours to kill before the concert. It had been a rough week with one deal falling through and trying to nurse a couple other precarious ones along. He was glad to have work wrapped up by twenty after five. Nonetheless, sitting there at his desk, instead of a rush of relaxation he felt blah and out of sorts.
In addition to porn, Jeff's also been a workaholic. It's been hard for him to accept that he can't trade his addiction for more productivity. He's had to start thinking differently about what to do with discretionary time. Initially it was quite a foreign idea that down time might not be wasted time. I encouraged him to read The Power of Full Engagement, about becoming more productive by spacing out our exertions. The idea is to rejuvenate regularly and release our muscles and mind in between periods of flexing them.
Jeff took all that to heart Friday night. Instead of staying at the office and making a token effort to get more done (and risk getting drawn into useless--or downright pornographic--content on the internet), he decided to leave and go for a drive. Nice sunset. Pleasant evening. Too bad it was too cold to take a walk. Then he realized it wouldn't be too cold if he strolled through downtown and ducked into a store to browse a bit every time he got chilly.
"I was having fun out in the brisk air, then checking out some shirts on a clearance rack. My mind was completely off of work, really starting to unwind. Then I looked up and saw a stunning, nine-foot-tall woman in racy underwear. And in the middle of winter! Maybe it because I was in a good place that night; maybe it that there were people were all around; maybe some of both." Whatever the reason, Jeff didn't stop and stare at that Victoria's Secret window poster like a patron at the Louvre admiring a Rembrandt. "I moved on, kept letting other stuff in. The Chinese dragon display in the bookstore window, the smell of coffee wafting out of the cafe. Pretty soon my jonesin' mind and pounding heart caught up with me."
The way Jeff had handled it prevented that lust jolt from becoming a lust fest and it had eventually shrunk down to a little blip on the radar of his weekend. He'd done it by developing better ways to unwind and sticking with them even when lust kept inviting him back to play.
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