Lie No. 1 – Lust Loves You Unconditionally
We all want to be loved unconditionally. Lust wants to hijack this desire. Even before you enter into romantic relationships as an adolescent, lust has already offered you unconditional love and acceptance. You can tell lust all your dirty secrets, be vile, comforted, excited or have power and use it in any way, and it will still love you.
The truth is that there is a condition to this love. You have to agree to host lust in your being and are not allowed to ask it to leave. When you become unwilling to host lust in your mind, will, emotions, body and soul, it becomes indignant, crying, “After all I have done for you!”
When lust does this, and you command it to leave, it will become vile and violent, questioning what right you have to tell it to leave. Lust’s hate only comes out when you tell it to leave.
Never believe lust loves you, especially unconditionally. Only God—and maybe a few great humans—really love you unconditionally. I encourage you to celebrate their love of you in your lust-free life today.
Lie No. 2 – You Don’t Have Enough
Lust will lie to you and tell you that you don’t have enough. This is a tricky little lie lust likes to use. Lust makes you believe the image, fantasy or other woman really “gets you.” Men who struggle with this behavior believe the lie that lust understands, accepts and cares about them.
This lie has a pattern in the men lust affects. When a man opens himself up to lust, he uses it as a temporary solution to avoid hurt feelings, feelings of insignificance, weakness or hopelessness. No matter to what or whom you open up in this low state of mind, you will feel they “get” you.
It’s not that lust gets you; it’s that you are vulnerable and receive something from lust. If you did this with your wife, girlfriend, accountability person or pastor, you would feel they get you as well! It’s your discipline of opening up that gives you the feeling you are understood. In your lust-free lifestyle, you want safe, mature men who “get” you, so you won’t allow lust to pretend to play that role any longer.
Lie #3 – You Can Handle It
Lust loves to say, “You can handle it.” Lust plants the idea that you are uniquely gifted to be able to plant the seed of lust, water it with ongoing communication and believe there are no side effects.
Like a drunk who believes he can handle his liquor, lust makes your life spiral out of control. If you think you can handle a little sometimes, some occasionally—just not the bad stuff—you are believing lust. The truth is, you can’t handle any, ever, under any circumstance.
If you believe this lie, you will try to create a formula of the types of lust you can handle and the frequency with which you can handle it. You’ll end up dabbling in more than you thought you ever would.
If you believe you can’t have any lust any time, regardless of how you think or feel, you will notice a dramatic decrease in lust. You will feel like you have won and feel better about accepting the truth that you can’t handle it at all.
You must decide to become lust-free. You must have the tools you are willing to master on a daily basis. The battle may be minute by minute in the beginning, so you have to commit to brutal honesty with yourself, God and a man (don’t keep trying by yourself). You have to commit to start every day fresh. You may lose a fight here and there, but today is a new day, and you are totally forgiven of your past. {eoa}
Doug Weiss, Ph.D., is a nationally known author, speaker and licensed psychologist. He is the executive director of Heart to Heart Counseling Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and the author of several books, including Lust Free Living. You may contact Dr. Weiss via his website, drdougweiss.com or on his Facebook, by phone at 719-278-3708 or through email at [email protected].
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