You can overcome any addiction.

How long you've been acting addictively doesn't matter. I've helped people in their 70's overcome addiction.

Your occupation won't get in the way. Mark was a truck driver and sexually addicted; Renaldo, considered a genius by the people in his medical practice, was hooked on cocaine; Dorothy, an overeater, was a stay-at-home mom. They all overcame their addictions with the approach in this ebook.

Wealth, popularity, or a powerful position is not required. Most of my clients are not wealthy and have no connection to the power structure.

Where you were born, your ethnic background, gender, or sexual orientation is not the issue. Gay, straight, Asian, Black, Hispanic - it just doesn't matter.

 When it comes to overcoming addiction, you need to identify the key to mental health.

The key to mental health can be summed up in one word: honesty.

I define honesty as:

In other words, it's:

• the *intention* to figure out what's going on and

• *sincerely trying* to tell other people what you are aware of.

Honesty is the heartbeat of mental health because:

• Honesty opens the door to change. Dishonesty keeps it locked.

  The mind longs to know and experience itself.

  Look at your own life and you will see that every time you were honest with yourself - even if you didn't like what you found - you felt relief. That relief was the mind rewarding you for being honest.

  One of the major reasons many people do not succeed in overcoming addiction - or other hindrances in life - is that they don't accurately identify the problem. For instance:

  • A sexually addicted person might fool himself by saying, "I don't have a problem with addictive masturbation and pornography. Everyone does it."

  • An alcoholic might delude himself with, "I take a drink every now and then to relax. What's wrong with that?"

  • A person hooked on prescription medication might claim, "My doctor recommended it. I'm not a drug addict; I'm a patient."

• In a romantic relationship, honesty is far more important than:

  • Financial net worth

  • Looks

  • Popularity, or

  • Sexual prowess.

  But if:

  • Your goal is to appear as others expect you to

  • You believe the more money you have the better person you are

  • You think sex is the essence of a relationship

  • You manipulate people

  • You try to get power over people

  • You will say anything to avoid a conflict

You're in for a life of unhappy romantic relationships because a loving, committed relationship demands honesty.

Sex addiction is a symptom of an unhealthy approach toward relationships.

The first step toward a healthy relationship is honesty.

When you are honest with someone you show him or her you care about them. In effect you say,

True love is not built on candlelight dinners, expensive gifts, or winning the sexual Olympics.

Ask any happy couple and they will tell you, "I trust my partner." Talk to any unhappy couple and you will eventually hear one or both people say, "I don't trust my partner."

Honesty is where good relationships begin and bad ones end.

All healthy personal change begins with knowledge.

Honesty is the key to mental health because it enables you to gain knowledge of yourself and it allows the people you value to know you.

To overcome sex addiction, I needed to become a better person first.

At the core of every improvement I made was rigorous honesty with myself and the people I valued.

Look closely at yourself and you'll discover that honesty opens the door to overcoming addiction.

Copyright Joe Zychik 1999-2008. Attn. Webmasters, students and researchers and everyone else: Please obey fair use laws. Thank you.