Tag Archive for: shame

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Hitting the Restart Button on Your Brain

By Fr. Sean Kilcawley, STL

I have always loved technology.  When I was a cadet at West Point, we all had to pick an engineering track, and I chose computer science.  So I was one of the first of my peers to get a smartphone and among the first to learn to jailbreak it.  I bought a 2 in 1 Lenovo Yoga as soon as it was released.  My newest computer is a Microsoft Surface Book, which I love.  The detachable screen is more functional than my Yoga was in tablet mode, I like the functionality of being able to write on the screen with a pen, and with the base attached it is a powerful laptop.  The only thing is, the touch screen goes dead if I haven’t restarted for a while.

Although I love keeping up with new technology, I don’t know exactly why this happens.  My best educated guess is that there are too many processes running in the background and the system gets overloaded.  It becomes unresponsive and slow.  However, as soon as I restart it, everything is up and running again.  As I continue to work with porn addicts and learn more about counseling interventions, I am realizing that our brains are a lot like my Surface Book.  We consume so much information each day that we get overloaded.  We don’t stop to fully experience the range of emotions we have each day.  While we might not pay attention to them, they are still “running in the background.”  When our system gets overloaded, we stop responding properly.  Unprocessed anger, grief, rejection, fear, or anxiety can lead to a relapse before we realize that we were feeling those emotions in the first place.  But, is there a restart button for our brain?

Many of my therapist friends recommend mindful meditation to their clients.  You can find several videos on this technique on Youtube.  Sometimes, mindfulness comes across as hokey, weird, or uncomfortably close to New Age and Eastern religious traditions.  For good reason, we Catholics tend to stay away from anything like that.  However, I would frame this practice as “preparing your mind for prayer”, or “cultivating interior silence.”  The spiritual tradition of the Church has always promoted the necessity of silence, especially in Religious Life.  In the seminary, we observed “grand silence” each evening after night prayer.  Silence allows us to quiet our brain in order to make space for Christ.  It clears out the processes, conversations, and emotions running in the background so that we can be more focused on the present moment.  I recommend that you spend 5-10 minutes cultivating this interior silence each day.

What it looks like:

The goal is to spend 5-10 minutes per day thinking about nothing.  When you go to prayer, sit in a comfortable position, close your eyes, and focus your attention on your breathing.  You might notice your breath go in and out of your nose, you might pay attention to your diaphragm as it moves in and out, or the rise and fall of your chest.  When thoughts come to mind, or you start replaying conversations in your head, simply notice those thoughts, acknowledge them, and turn your attention back to your breathing.  Focus on the darkness as your eyes are closed and on your breathing.  After some time passes you should feel more calm, relaxed, and clear.

Now, you’re ready to invite Jesus into the silence.  Jesus, you are welcome into my thoughts right now.  Relate to Him the desires of your heart.  Talk to Him about what is going on in your life, and give Him the opportunity to respond to you.  Then you might begin whatever formal prayer disciplines you have taken on (rosary, divine office, etc.).  Most of the spiritual directees that I work with have found that their prayer is more efficacious if the spend the first 5-10 minutes cultivating interior silence.

Cultivating this interior silence is like hitting the restart button on your brain.  It only takes 5 to 10 minutes to refocus on the present moment.  It will help you to pay attention to the movements of your heart and to respond to the emotions you are feeling in a healthy way.  Interior silence will help prevent relapses because it will clear out all the negative emotions, worries, anxieties, and stresses that are running in the background.  For a quick reminder of how this process works, see the video.

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Why Confession Isn’t Helping Your Porn Problem – Part 2

In my previous post I wrote about distinctions in addiction patterns, specifically addressing biological, psychological, and trauma-based addiction.  One reason you or someone you are helping might be “stuck in the confessional” is that there is a psychological wound or trauma that needs to be addressed by a trained therapist.  Another reason people get “stuck in the confessional is that going to confession and receiving absolution has, in fact, become part of their acting out ritual.

When a behavior is compulsive, there is a pattern of out of control behavior that occurs over time.  A typical ritual involves the following:

Recognizing Rituals

Vulnerable time.  This is simply a time period or circumstances in which a person is more likely to give in to sexually acting out.  It could be the anniversary date of a traumatic event like the death of a parent, or some other kind of trauma.  It could also be when someone has not had enough sleep.  HALT and BLASTED are two acronyms used to identify vulnerable times (Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired, or Bored, Lonely, Agitated, Stressed, Tired).  The vulnerable time makes a person more likely to be affected by triggers.

Trigger.  A trigger is an event, situation, or interaction that has been habitually paired with sexually acting out.  Being alone with unmonitored internet access, a difficult interaction with a supervisor or a girl in an internet ad can all be triggers for different people.

Emotional response.  After the trigger there can be an emotional pull toward acting out, and physiological arousal may begin

Thought. Then the person might start thinking about acting out.  They also might start thinking about not acting out, “I hope I don’t act out!”

Chemical dump.  Next comes the flood of chemicals that get the brain ready and focused for sexual behaviors.  Dopamine is released in anticipation of acting out.  Dopamine actually helps the brain to focus on one thing.  At this point it is very hard to break the pattern

Second thought.  This would typically be something like “Well I guess I can start again tomorrow, this will be the last time, I kind of deserve this” etc.

Behavior

Remorse.  Now the person feels great guilt, shame, and remorse

For a deeper look into Recognizing Rituals, watch this video.

Typical Ritual

Typically this plays out according to the following narrative:

Bob gets home after a long day.  He didn’t schedule any activities for the evening because he wasn’t sure exactly who he would want to hang out with or what he would want to do.  Now he has the entire evening ahead of him but no one to spend it with so he feels a bit lonely.  In response to his loneliness, he checks Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and a couple of different email accounts.  Each time he discovers that no one has reached out to him or messaged him.  Some of his buddies have posted a picture of themselves at a bar, but they didn’t invite Bob.  Now he feels lonely and rejected.  So he rechecks his social media accounts just to be sure that he didn’t miss anything really amazing in the past 45 seconds (ironic sarcasm intended).  This time there is a trigger.  A girl from his high school posted pictures of herself at the beach.  She has friends too.  So he checks out the profile of her friend.  Then he sees that his friend’s friend also has a pretty friend.  Soon Bob is mindlessly scrolling through a friend of a friend of a friend’s bikini pictures on social media.  After a while this gets old so he checks out YouTube.

At this stage Bob knows that he doesn’t want to go to a pornography site.  So he sticks to YouTube and starts watching steamy scenes from movies that he remembers from the past.  Then he moves on to the 10 most inappropriate commercials of 2017.  He thinks to himself “At least I’m not looking at porn.”  Then the chemical dump comes.  Bob continues watching inappropriate videos on YouTube and after about 5 more minutes, he thinks “I might as well be looking at porn.  I think I crossed the threshold of sin a few minutes ago.”  Then he asks this question:

CAN I GET TO CONFESSION? 

Asking this question is part of the ritual.  If the answer is yes, then he will go on to the next step.  He acts out with porn/masturbation.  Then he thinks, “I fell once so I might as well keep going until I can go to confession since I’m already in a state of mortal sin.”  There is more behavior, accompanied by lots of negative and shameful self-talk.  Until he gets to confession.

Bob goes to confession which is actually the end of the ritual process for him.  He resolves to never act out again.  7-10 days later he’s feeling vulnerable…….

The main lesson here is that for Bob and many others, going to confession has become blended with the acting out ritual.  From the addict’s point of view, it isn’t the thing that pulls him out of the ritual but it is the final step in the ritual.  Some young people even report that they “never feel loved except when going to confession after sexually acting out.”  Another piece of anecdotal evidence for this link is that when addicts get sober, they don’t go to confession.  The only time they have ever gone to confession in the past is when there was a sexual sin to confess, and oftentimes the only reason they went to confession was to be sure that they would be able to receive communion on Sunday.  The primary reason that they wanted to receive communion on Sunday was so that a parent, wife, or girlfriend would not notice them absenting themselves from communion—which would draw suspicion about why they didn’t receive.

Breaking the Pattern

So another reason confession may not be helping is that it’s part of the ritual.  We need to get the Ritual out of the ritual.  We need to do something different.  If you or a person you are working with identify with this cycle here are a couple of things you can do:

Non-sacramental confession.  Find a priest, mentor, parent, 12 step fellowship sponsor, or good friend to talk to about your struggle with pornography and masturbation.  Eventually, you will tell your story in its entirety and this will help you to be more honest with yourself and others.

Get the Ritual out of your ritual.  Go to confession weekly for a while.  There are many graces obtained there.  You also need to learn to experience the sacrament of reconciliation outside of the context of confessing sexual sins.

Make phone calls during your vulnerable time.  When I was young and we were bored or wondering what our friends were doing, we made phone calls (it was the best we had).  But we always found someone to talk to which immediately answered our feelings of loneliness.  Checking social media when you are lonely oftentimes leads to further feelings of rejection when someone realized that “no one has messaged me, tagged me, or liked my posts.”   This perception of rejection will only reinforce the addiction ritual.  Phone calls will break it.

The big three:  Successful people do three things.  Find a good spiritual director, Find a good counselor, and find a good group.  People who do all three have the most success.  If you want to get “unstuck”, beef up your plan.

For more information on rituals consult Dr. Kevin Skinner’s book Treating Pornography Addiction.

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How to Overcome Shame and Seeking Help

If you’re struggling with an addiction to pornography, or think you may have an addiction, it’s important to reach out for help. However, this can be a difficult thing to do. Many people resist because they are afraid of what others might think of them.

For example, you might fear that if people find out about your struggle they will think you are some kind of sick pervert. Or, you might think that if people really knew about your struggle they would reject you. Many young people are afraid to tell their parents because they don’t want to disappoint them. While these are real fears, they are often fueled by shame.

To understand shame, you also need to understand guilt. Guilt focuses on the action while shame focuses on the person. So guilt is the emotion that says “you did something wrong and now you have to fix it.” Shame is the emotion that says “you did something wrong and because of it you’re a terrible, worthless person, and if people really knew about you, they would reject you.” Guilt is good. It can lead a person to make amends for the wrongs they’ve done. Shame is bad. It only makes a person want to hide. This increases loneliness and keeps a person trapped in their addiction.

So the first step in seeking help is to let go of shame. You need to realize how much God loves you and that nothing you could do could take that love away or decrease your value as a person. You’ll find that when you’re honest, people won’t reject you or think badly of you. On the contrary, they will admire you for your honesty, strength and courage to face a difficult issue!

Here’s an example: John is a College sophomore. For several years he struggled with pornography use. He knew he needed help, but was too afraid to ask for it. Finally he mustered up the courage to speak with a counselor at his college counseling center about it. She listened and understood his pain. John knew in order to get the help he needed he would have to tell his parents. His counselor suggested they call his parents together. He agreed. So she called his father and put him on the speakerphone. Together they explained to him John’s struggle. His father listened and said he understood the struggle. He said he loved John, and would help him get the help he needed. Later, John’s father talked to his mother and she was also very loving and understanding. John felt relieved after that phone call. He no longer feared and rejection from his parents. Knowing his parents still loved him helped him let go of his shame so he could address his addiction and overcome it.

Although you may feel alone in your struggle, there are many people who love you and are ready to help. First, there’s your parents. Don’t be afraid to talk to them. Then there are teachers, coaches, counselors, youth leaders, and clergy. If you’re having trouble talking with your parents about your struggle, people like John’s counselor can help you. Once they are aware of your problem, they will do whatever they can to help you.

Regardless of what you are struggling with, the fact is you don’t have to struggle alone. There are many people out there who care about you and want to help. The most successful people in recovery are those who have a whole team of people on their side loving and supporting them, and keeping them accountable in the healing process.

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Overcoming Guilt and Shame in Recovery

Two primary factors that often keep people from seeking help for pornography addiction is guilt and shame. While they often act together, they are two very different emotions.

Guilt focuses on the behavior while shame focuses on the person. Both need to be resolved for a healthy recovery.

Guilt

Guilt is an emotion that focuses on actions. It is the emotion that says, “Okay, you’ve done something wrong and now you have to correct it, fix it or clean it up.”As uncomfortable as this emotion may be, it is actually very healthy. It requires a person to take responsibility for their actions and atone for them. To do this, one must embrace the virtues of honesty, humility, responsibility, courage, faith, hope and love.

Taking responsibility for one’s addiction and recovery can be very healing for individuals and for relationships. It shows that you understand how wrong your actions were and that you are taking positive steps to end your pornography use.

This resolves your guilt and can reunite you to loved ones. The same effect happens in our relationship with God. When we sin, it damages our relationship with God. Here is where God uses guilt to bring us back to him. To be reconciled with God, we must admit our sins, take responsibility for them, and confess them. In many cases our penance can be to make amends for our sins. By confessing your sexual sins and doing penance, you resolve your guilt and are reunited with God.

Addressing guilt is also an important part of the 12 steps of recovery. Steps 4 through 10 state we:

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.

While it can be difficult to take responsibility for an addiction, doing so actually strengthens a person. It takes the addiction out of the darkness and brings it into the light. This can diminish much of its power over you. While some people may be hurt and angry with you for a while; most will forgive. In the end they will respect you for admitting your guilt and resolving it.

Guilt can help you address your addiction while still affirming your value as a person and as a child of God.

Shame

Shame is the emotion that focuses on the person. It is the emotion that says, “You did something wrong and because of it you are a bad person. You need to hide so that no one will ever know how bad you really are.” This is not of God.

Ultimately, this is a tool of Satan to keep a person trapped in his addiction. It fuels the five faulty core beliefs by which many addicted people live:

1. I’m unworthy of being loved

2. If people really knew me, they would reject me

3. I can’t count on anyone, including God, to meet my needs

4. I must find something that I can control that will meet my needs

5. Pornography/sex is my greatest need and source of comfort.

Shame can result from sinful acts you’ve committed, such as viewing pornography. It can also develop out of sinful acts committed against you. For example, a person who was abused as a child might feel responsible for it and develop a deep sense of shame as a result. Both sources of shame can lead a person into addiction.

Regardless of where your shame came from, it’s important to know that your worth as a person is not determined by your actions or the actions of others.

When God created you he instilled in you an infinite worth that no one can diminish. It doesn’t matter what kinds of sexual sins you’ve committed or how often you’ve committed them, you are still a good person. There is no need to hide. God still loves you. He is always ready to take you back and cleanse you from your sin.

As you take responsibility for your addiction, you will find many other people who still love you regardless of what you’ve done. Letting go of shame can be very difficult or many addicted people. If shame is a major stumbling block for you, I recommend you consult with a therapist and/or a priest. They can help you let go of your shame and bring your addiction out into the light so you can overcome it!

Embracing Your True Identity

It’s important for all people who are addicted to pornography to understand that you are not defined by your addiction. Guilt and shame are proof of that! Guilt focuses on the action, not the person.

By addressing your guilt and making amends you actually strengthen your ability to recover from your addiction. Others will also respect you for your work in recovery. Shame is not of God and thus does not define who you are.

Thus, not matter what your addiction has lead you to do, God still sees you as his beloved child. This is how you also need to view your self!

Image via Flickr, CC 2.0, Logo added

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