To start at the lowest point, I was completely without hope… I had a plan in mind of how to end my life. It would have been easy, accidental looking, with even a feeling that, “He died doing something he loved!” There would have been plenty of insurance money for the kids and wife, I would finally be able to rest from the affliction of pornography and its accompanying ills that hounded me and held me captive for 25 years of my 32 year existence here. While it wasn’t the only reason, pornography was among the biggest contributors to the other two huge problems staring me in the face that I couldn’t resolve; I was in a marriage that was a disaster despite my best efforts, and a business that was crumbling after years of giving it the best I knew how. I felt like my inability to keep pornography in check was the reason my business and marriage were in such desperate straits; I felt like a complete failure!

Except for the day described above I always knew deep within me I was not meant to live like this; I had a higher purpose. I just never knew when I would get through it and I never would have believed how. I am a father of 4 young children, who had tried desperately for decades to make my actions conform to my beliefs.

I hated what I did. I could never figure out why part of me wanted something so intensely that the rest of me hated and punished myself for constantly. I sought help in 12 step groups for years. I counseled with every ecclesiastical leader who had stewardship over me from the time I was about 13. I was more prayerful and studious than 99 percent of people my age. I attended seminary in my teenage years with enough consistency and extra study to letter in seminary. I attended Institute of Religion courses for four years of college, waking up early or staying up late to excel in religion courses as well as in my career studies to graduate summa cum laude from college and with honors from the Institute of Religion.

Outside of religious education I served as a leader in church programs, boy scouting, and FFA club during high school and after high school. I was always asked to lead others when I served a religious mission for 24 months on the other side of the world (as the 12 steppers would say, “I white knuckled it for that entire duration), and when I came home I was unable to maintain abstinence from this dreadful habit. It seemed that the minority of my desires was ruling over the majority. I abstained for nearly a year while I courted and started a marriage, but returned to the dreadful practice after being injured and laid up for several months early in our time together. I again counseled with ecclesiastical leaders and found strength to abstain for 18 months even when my wife refused to be intimate with me for months and even for over a year at a time.

At year 4 or 5 we sought professional help with one therapist who was supposed to be the best at treating pornography “addiction.” I experienced little or no progress in the three or four times I met with him. At year 6 we were referred to a therapist who, we found on good authority, was the very best in our area. He focused intensely on true principles of life and helped me truly believe that pornography is not an addiction but a reinforced habit. I learned later that what reinforced my habit was not at all what I believed it was. Through his counsel I was able to understand all the whys and why not’s and I had nearly a year without incident, but there were close calls and a lot of white knuckling. Part of me still wanted the porn so badly. I spent thousands with this great counselor who helped us make great strides forward as a couple and individually. After my lowest point I tried to go on anti-depressants to get me in a better place and relieve me from the temptations to view pornography. I tried three different medications, all of which made me worse to the point I felt like my brain was burning and all I could do was lay in bed twitching from medication side effects. I still couldn’t be free from this constant temptation.

I blamed my seemingly unconquerable desire for pornography on an early exposure at age 7. I used to believe that the exposure lead to heightened curiosity and lead me to view a lot of pornography over the subsequent years.

I always had the feeling there was something that needed to be unlocked, or unwound back to my childhood that contained the root of this desire. Until I experienced that first hypnotherapy session I didn’t think it was possible to even remember what this was, indeed many told me to just move on, that I would never be able to recall what it was that started this in me. I believed them and tried to move forward without fixing the past.

I was so scared to try hypnotherapy. I thought of the stage performers I had seen, I wondered if I would be looked down upon by my ecclesiastical leaders, I was scared of what I would say if I wasn’t in control of my mind, and perhaps the greatest fear was that it all sounded too good to be true another failed attempt waiting to happen.

I had nothing to lose, my wife had decided to divorce me by this time. I was truly seeking to solve my own problems and fix me so I could move on and be rid of the prison cell of pornography that I kept choosing.

In my first hypnotherapy session (I really didn’t believe that I was even hypnotized at the beginning because it felt so natural) one of the first instances that came out of the session were a couple of memories I had of stealing toys when I was 7 years old. I learned that I had decided to never trust myself because of those actions. I believed the lie that I simply could not be trusted. I found through hypnotherapy that this lie was what was reinforcing my habit of pornography indulgence. As Dennis guided me through the process of learning the lessons I was supposed to learn from those experiences, and making proper restitution for my actions, my desire to view pornography immediately diminished. I became more and more single minded.

In visit after visit more and more layers were removed to clear up lies and misunderstandings I had kept deep inside my mind from my earliest years and even very recent times. Perhaps the most important insight came when during a session Dennis pointed out that the enemy of our happiness speaks to us in the first person to make us believe it is us who wants to do what is contrary to what we know is right and good. That principle has been as a shield to my mind against negative thinking.

The Spiritual Mind Management principles I have learned through this process have allowed me to address a myriad of experiences on my own. I have used the triangular conversation gestalt technique, which really helps me to clear up lies, negative thinking, and interactions with others that have troubled me. I have also used the empty chair gestalt to banish negative personality parts I had allowed enter and influence my personality. I am learning to control my intelligence for clearer thinking and decision-making, and even to enhance my creativity in problem solving at work.

I highly recommend you give this process a chance. It will change your life. You have nothing to fear inside your own mind; you have everything to gain from becoming a unified whole person. I worried at times that this would impact my faith negatively, I have found that I have never been more faithful, optimistic, and hopeful. When I think back on that dark day when I lost all hope and nearly sought to end my life, I see those dark hours served to get me to a place that I could overcome my fears of trying something very different and for me that was hypnotherapy.

– Middle Aged Father