June 5, 2025 • 10 mins
Most guys want this to end at some point. The time spent in groups, therapy, couples therapy, couples groups… It's a lot. And, I see why guys feel like their life is being consumed by recovery work.
The good news is that you will be able to tone down the number of hours spent each week. However, you will likely always have a few hours each week dedicated to continued growth and maintenance.
The guys I know who stayed in good recovery… stayed in good recovery. Meaning that they still see their therapist once a month, and they still attend their recovery groups once a week.
Why? Because it’s not worth the risk of divorce.
No guy means to relapse. It just happens.
But, every guy who relapsed will tell you the same thing… “I stopped going to my groups and stopped seeing my therapist… and eventually I made a bad decision in a weak moment.”
And, just like that… they find themselves splitting their assets and seeing their kids 50% of the time.
Recovery is a lifestyle, and this podcast episode will explain how you can practice it.
If you are ready for a recovery group that focuses on self-mastery rather than sobriety, head to our website: successfuladdict.com
We provide high-achievers, business professionals, and entrepreneurs with a recovery mastermind full of like-minded men. Together, you can accelerate your recovery by having the other men see what you cannot see on your own.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
So this is news that none of the
guys wanted to hear but it needs to
be said.
And that's the idea that there is no
such thing as being recovered
with an e d ending, having it be
something of the
past. You are listening to the sex addiction
podcast for high achievers, business professionals, executives, and
entrepreneurs.
This podcast is designed to apply sobriety and
(00:22):
recovery principles specifically to the mindset of the
high achiever.
I'm your host, Roland Cochran, founder of the
Successful Addict, a recovery group for high achieving
men struggling with sex and porn addiction. For
more information about joining our group or attending
our next retreat, visit successfuladdict.com.
And now, enjoy the rest of the episode.
(00:42):
And, you know, know, for most of you,
this this isn't a surprise because you've seen,
you know, you've been in the groups, you've
seen that, you know, sobriety is a tough
thing in the when it comes to sex
and porn addiction. Right? It's,
it's not easy and and it's not uncommon
for guys to relapse,
five years in, ten years in. Right? And
the consequences of relapse when it comes to
(01:02):
this addiction are typically pretty big. Right? Asking
your wife for a second chance is is
a big ask. Asking for a third chance,
you know, a lot of guys don't get
that third chance. Right? So, you know,
there there is no recovered. Right? You know,
this is a process addiction. Right? So there's
brain processes that you might not even be
aware of yet that you might discover five
years from now. You know? I'll speak for
(01:24):
myself as somebody in recovery.
You know, it's not uncommon for me every
six months to still
discover a thought process that I am, you
know, compulsive around or addicted to or something
that has the potential to be unhealthy.
Right? And so that's why I say there
is no such thing as,
recovered.
And you're and you're gonna hear this. Right?
Most of the CSATs, the the, people who've
(01:45):
been personally affected by being compulsive or addicted,
you know, the CSATs will tell you too.
Right? I am in recovery
myself. They go to their own meetings. Right?
A lot of therapists have meetings exclusive to
CSET therapists. Right? So,
the point is, you know, having this be
a thing of the past to the point
where you take your foot completely off the
gas pedal,
I'd be careful with that. Especially if you
(02:06):
love your wife and love your family,
you know, I I would be very, very
careful taking your foot off the gas. So
I wanted to just kind of introduce this
this concept, right, of of recovery being a
lifestyle. You know, many of you have heard
before, I don't like the word recovery,
because, again, it comes with this, like, addiction
connotation to it, right, where, it's something that
we're gonna go do. It's short term. It's
(02:28):
like this this nuisance or inconvenience.
And we do the work, and then we
become recovered, right, is is kind of the
the understanding.
And, you know, in substance addiction, you know,
that that kinda actually makes sense. Right? In
substance addiction, because it's very different than process
addiction, you can go to rehab and and
and detox and
become recovered, right, or or or close to
(02:49):
it. Right? Well, with process addiction, it's not
quite like that. Right? These processes, some of
them are really sticky.
Some of them, you know, might take two,
three, four, five years
to even get out of your life. Now
it doesn't mean that you're gonna be relapsing
every week. It just means, you know, you're
gonna be battling some of these compulsive temptations,
you know, throughout throughout the day.
So I I I would like to introduce
(03:10):
the concept of calling this self mastery rather
than recovery.
Self mastery meaning the concept of of of
mastering oneself.
Right? And that includes all aspects of oneself,
The your your identity, your belief system, right,
the things that you become attached to,
your emotions, you know, and then and your
(03:30):
needs. Right? A plethora of other things. Right?
What it's like to be alive and be
a healthy individual
operating,
you know, you know, in a in a
healthy fashion, fulfilling your full potential. Right? Self
mastery versus recovery. Now are the two words
interchangeable? Probably, honestly. When you look at the
the when you transition out of sobriety and
into recovery,
(03:50):
you know, recovery is basically self mastery. Right?
It's it's getting over the things that got
you to these behaviors in the first place.
Right? Your distrust of others, your,
overreliance
on oneself,
this perception of, you know, the lone wolf,
and, it's better if I take care of
my problems myself, the the shame around asking
for help,
(04:11):
or the,
you know, or showing and expressing your emotions
and the vulnerability attached to that, or or
feeling your emotions and and feeling them as
an inconvenience,
which a lot of high achieving men,
perceive emotions as is something that slows them
down or distracts them. Right? You know, that,
sorting all of that out, that's recovery. And
and it's and it's the same thing as
self mastery. Right? You know, I call self
(04:33):
mastery
the the road to intentional
living. Right? How do I create the reality
that I want?
The reality that elicits the emotions that I
wanna feel. Right? If I wanna feel respected,
admired, accomplished,
successful, if I wanna feel like a, like
I'm gonna be remembered when I die. Right?
All of these emotions. If I wanna feel
these awesome emotions, I need to create a
(04:55):
reality that are going to give me, that
are gonna it's gonna yield those feelings. Right?
That's really what we're talking about self mastery.
So, you know,
instead of looking at recovery as a phase
or a thing that you're doing so that
you can save the marriage,
achieve long term sobriety, whatever,
kind of kind of flip that. You know,
I I would say recovery is a lifestyle.
(05:15):
That's why I like to call it self
mastery is it really never ends. Right? The
the process of mastering oneself
and seeking truth is a process that you'll
do for the rest of your life, and
it should be fun. I mean, you've heard
me say that before. If it's not fun,
you're you're doing it wrong. If it's not
fun, you're you're gonna relapse. I mean, that
that's just the truth. I mean, you're gonna
it's gonna get old. You're gonna take your
foot off the gas, and you're gonna relapse.
(05:36):
So it's important to develop a self mastery
process that's fun. You know, it's not uncommon
for guys to two x, three x, four
x their income after joining my recovery groups,
even though, you know, these aren't business groups.
We're not talking about,
making money.
But the truth is, you know, in business,
it's an interaction between humans.
(05:57):
Right? When somebody hires you, signs you on
for a contract, buys something from you, switches
from another company over to your company, whatever,
it's a human choosing you, another human. And
so what happens oftentimes is as these guys
are,
diving into
their self mastery and really sorting out their
brain processes. Right? How many of these are
serving me, and how many of these did
(06:18):
you know, got implanted into my brain through
childhood, through
movies, television, you know, outside influence? Right? How
many of the things that I believe
was I programmed to believe versus how many
of my beliefs are actually my own? Right?
Do I wanna believe these things? And it's
that self mastery process of really teasing out,
how do I know what I know, and
(06:38):
do I actually like what I know? Do
I even believe what I know? Have I
stopped long enough to challenge my own belief
system? And I think that's the beauty of,
self mastery and recovery
is it's that process. Right? Am I truly
living my best self? Am I believing beliefs
that I wanna believe? Do the beliefs that
I have, did I put them there, and
do I want them there? Were they implanted
in me? Was I brainwashed by my parents,
(07:00):
organized religion,
mentors?
I get advertising,
social media influencers. Right? Have I have I
been convinced that this is the right way
I wanna live my life, that these things
are important to me? Are they actually important
to the real me? Right? And that's the
mastery of self is this is teasing this
out. Now this is really, really hard to
do on your own. That's why you're gonna
see so many,
just kind of self mastery,
(07:21):
mastermind groups or these kind of these, like,
retreats that people go on
and, surround themselves with other people on the
same self mastery journey. Now why is this
important? Well, it's really hard to test your
own belief system because so many of our
beliefs we consider true.
Right? We consider it the truth because if
it's something you believed since you were 10
(07:42):
years old, you've never tested it. So it
it feels like a fact of life.
Right? I need attention from women. I don't
I don't you know, it's it's a it's
valuable
to me when women,
are attracted to me,
and I can see them staring at me.
Right? That would be a belief that I
adopted when I was, like, 12 or 13
years old. But when I really think about
(08:03):
it, like, do I really want what what
if these women at the gym are married?
What if they have boyfriends? What if they
have families and kids? Right? So I'm asking
for them to violate their own morals and
values of honoring their marriage and keeping their
eyes to themselves and not objectifying me, right,
out of respect for her husband and her
family. Right? So, again, see, that's what I'm
(08:23):
saying is, like,
I could think, oh, of course, I want
her attention. Who doesn't like to, be admired
and wanted and feel attractive? Right? You know,
that that's one set of beliefs. But, again,
now
we test the beliefs with, well, do you
really want married women, women in in relationships
to be doing that? Would you want your
wife to be doing that? Right? Because, again,
(08:44):
if if those women are in relationships, you
know, what about your wife? Do you want
her at the gym,
objectifying all these other men and checking them
out, right, you know, flirting with their eyes
or even worse or physical physically flirting? Right?
You know, it's easy to say on one
side that flirting is relatively harmless. But again,
do you want your wife doing all of
that? Do you want your daughter doing some
of that stuff? Right? So,
(09:04):
you know, that's what I mean by self
mastery. It's this it's this testing of your
belief system. Is this sustainable?
Right? Because just because it feels fun for
you and it's convenient for you doesn't mean
that it's not harming the world, doesn't mean
that it's an unsustainable practice that actually makes
this place worse.
Right? That, you know, it violates morals and
values that actually make make the world a
worse place to live and a less safe
(09:25):
place for for women to be in. Right?
So, again, think about recovery as a lifestyle.
Right? Hunt your beliefs constantly. Are these the
best beliefs to have? And, again, don't don't
keep self mastery confined to sexual sobriety.
Right? To me, that's a mistake, and I
think most men make that mistake. And I
think that's why most men who relapse relapses,
(09:46):
they're so zoomed in on the sexual behaviors.
It's like, no. Let's zoom out and look
at the belief system that created
the environment that allowed these sexual behaviors to
occur because it's that environment
that causes all sorts of problems. Right? It's
that environment that why we,
cheat on our diet, and,
it's that environment that makes us lazy or
(10:06):
procrastinate.
It's the, you know, it's there's a lot
more than just sexual behaviors happening
in a world full of that belief system.
It's your job to understand
how did I start believing these things and
are these the best things for me.
Thanks for listening to this episode. If you
are a high achiever with a sex addiction
and you're looking for a recovery group full
of like minded men, visit successfuladdict.com.
(10:29):
We provide men with a recovery mastermind group
using four day retreats, weekly group calls, and
daily accountability check ins. If you wanna achieve
long term sobriety and save your marriage, go
to our website and fill out our application.
If you enjoyed this episode, please pass it
along to a friend in recovery who would
benefit from listening. It is my mission to
get this information out to as many high
(10:49):
achievers as possible, and I can't do it
without your help.
So this is news that none of the
guys wanted to hear but it needs to
be said.
And that's the idea that there is no
such thing as being recovered
with an e d ending, having it be
something of the
past. You are listening to the sex addiction
podcast for high achievers, business professionals, executives, and
entrepreneurs.
This podcast is designed to apply sobriety and
(00:22):
recovery principles specifically to the mindset of the
high achiever.
I'm your host, Roland Cochran, founder of the
Successful Addict, a recovery group for high achieving
men struggling with sex and porn addiction. For
more information about joining our group or attending
our next retreat, visit successfuladdict.com.
And now, enjoy the rest of the episode.
(00:42):
And, you know, know, for most of you,
this this isn't a surprise because you've seen,
you know, you've been in the groups, you've
seen that, you know, sobriety is a tough
thing in the when it comes to sex
and porn addiction. Right? It's,
it's not easy and and it's not uncommon
for guys to relapse,
five years in, ten years in. Right? And
the consequences of relapse when it comes to
(01:02):
this addiction are typically pretty big. Right? Asking
your wife for a second chance is is
a big ask. Asking for a third chance,
you know, a lot of guys don't get
that third chance. Right? So, you know,
there there is no recovered. Right? You know,
this is a process addiction. Right? So there's
brain processes that you might not even be
aware of yet that you might discover five
years from now. You know? I'll speak for
(01:24):
myself as somebody in recovery.
You know, it's not uncommon for me every
six months to still
discover a thought process that I am, you
know, compulsive around or addicted to or something
that has the potential to be unhealthy.
Right? And so that's why I say there
is no such thing as,
recovered.
And you're and you're gonna hear this. Right?
Most of the CSATs, the the, people who've
(01:45):
been personally affected by being compulsive or addicted,
you know, the CSATs will tell you too.
Right? I am in recovery
myself. They go to their own meetings. Right?
A lot of therapists have meetings exclusive to
CSET therapists. Right? So,
the point is, you know, having this be
a thing of the past to the point
where you take your foot completely off the
gas pedal,
I'd be careful with that. Especially if you
(02:06):
love your wife and love your family,
you know, I I would be very, very
careful taking your foot off the gas. So
I wanted to just kind of introduce this
this concept, right, of of recovery being a
lifestyle. You know, many of you have heard
before, I don't like the word recovery,
because, again, it comes with this, like, addiction
connotation to it, right, where, it's something that
we're gonna go do. It's short term. It's
(02:28):
like this this nuisance or inconvenience.
And we do the work, and then we
become recovered, right, is is kind of the
the understanding.
And, you know, in substance addiction, you know,
that that kinda actually makes sense. Right? In
substance addiction, because it's very different than process
addiction, you can go to rehab and and
and detox and
become recovered, right, or or or close to
(02:49):
it. Right? Well, with process addiction, it's not
quite like that. Right? These processes, some of
them are really sticky.
Some of them, you know, might take two,
three, four, five years
to even get out of your life. Now
it doesn't mean that you're gonna be relapsing
every week. It just means, you know, you're
gonna be battling some of these compulsive temptations,
you know, throughout throughout the day.
So I I I would like to introduce
(03:10):
the concept of calling this self mastery rather
than recovery.
Self mastery meaning the concept of of of
mastering oneself.
Right? And that includes all aspects of oneself,
The your your identity, your belief system, right,
the things that you become attached to,
your emotions, you know, and then and your
(03:30):
needs. Right? A plethora of other things. Right?
What it's like to be alive and be
a healthy individual
operating,
you know, you know, in a in a
healthy fashion, fulfilling your full potential. Right? Self
mastery versus recovery. Now are the two words
interchangeable? Probably, honestly. When you look at the
the when you transition out of sobriety and
into recovery,
(03:50):
you know, recovery is basically self mastery. Right?
It's it's getting over the things that got
you to these behaviors in the first place.
Right? Your distrust of others, your,
overreliance
on oneself,
this perception of, you know, the lone wolf,
and, it's better if I take care of
my problems myself, the the shame around asking
for help,
(04:11):
or the,
you know, or showing and expressing your emotions
and the vulnerability attached to that, or or
feeling your emotions and and feeling them as
an inconvenience,
which a lot of high achieving men,
perceive emotions as is something that slows them
down or distracts them. Right? You know, that,
sorting all of that out, that's recovery. And
and it's and it's the same thing as
self mastery. Right? You know, I call self
(04:33):
mastery
the the road to intentional
living. Right? How do I create the reality
that I want?
The reality that elicits the emotions that I
wanna feel. Right? If I wanna feel respected,
admired, accomplished,
successful, if I wanna feel like a, like
I'm gonna be remembered when I die. Right?
All of these emotions. If I wanna feel
these awesome emotions, I need to create a
(04:55):
reality that are going to give me, that
are gonna it's gonna yield those feelings. Right?
That's really what we're talking about self mastery.
So, you know,
instead of looking at recovery as a phase
or a thing that you're doing so that
you can save the marriage,
achieve long term sobriety, whatever,
kind of kind of flip that. You know,
I I would say recovery is a lifestyle.
(05:15):
That's why I like to call it self
mastery is it really never ends. Right? The
the process of mastering oneself
and seeking truth is a process that you'll
do for the rest of your life, and
it should be fun. I mean, you've heard
me say that before. If it's not fun,
you're you're doing it wrong. If it's not
fun, you're you're gonna relapse. I mean, that
that's just the truth. I mean, you're gonna
it's gonna get old. You're gonna take your
foot off the gas, and you're gonna relapse.
(05:36):
So it's important to develop a self mastery
process that's fun. You know, it's not uncommon
for guys to two x, three x, four
x their income after joining my recovery groups,
even though, you know, these aren't business groups.
We're not talking about,
making money.
But the truth is, you know, in business,
it's an interaction between humans.
(05:57):
Right? When somebody hires you, signs you on
for a contract, buys something from you, switches
from another company over to your company, whatever,
it's a human choosing you, another human. And
so what happens oftentimes is as these guys
are,
diving into
their self mastery and really sorting out their
brain processes. Right? How many of these are
serving me, and how many of these did
(06:18):
you know, got implanted into my brain through
childhood, through
movies, television, you know, outside influence? Right? How
many of the things that I believe
was I programmed to believe versus how many
of my beliefs are actually my own? Right?
Do I wanna believe these things? And it's
that self mastery process of really teasing out,
how do I know what I know, and
(06:38):
do I actually like what I know? Do
I even believe what I know? Have I
stopped long enough to challenge my own belief
system? And I think that's the beauty of,
self mastery and recovery
is it's that process. Right? Am I truly
living my best self? Am I believing beliefs
that I wanna believe? Do the beliefs that
I have, did I put them there, and
do I want them there? Were they implanted
in me? Was I brainwashed by my parents,
(07:00):
organized religion,
mentors?
I get advertising,
social media influencers. Right? Have I have I
been convinced that this is the right way
I wanna live my life, that these things
are important to me? Are they actually important
to the real me? Right? And that's the
mastery of self is this is teasing this
out. Now this is really, really hard to
do on your own. That's why you're gonna
see so many,
just kind of self mastery,
(07:21):
mastermind groups or these kind of these, like,
retreats that people go on
and, surround themselves with other people on the
same self mastery journey. Now why is this
important? Well, it's really hard to test your
own belief system because so many of our
beliefs we consider true.
Right? We consider it the truth because if
it's something you believed since you were 10
(07:42):
years old, you've never tested it. So it
it feels like a fact of life.
Right? I need attention from women. I don't
I don't you know, it's it's a it's
valuable
to me when women,
are attracted to me,
and I can see them staring at me.
Right? That would be a belief that I
adopted when I was, like, 12 or 13
years old. But when I really think about
(08:03):
it, like, do I really want what what
if these women at the gym are married?
What if they have boyfriends? What if they
have families and kids? Right? So I'm asking
for them to violate their own morals and
values of honoring their marriage and keeping their
eyes to themselves and not objectifying me, right,
out of respect for her husband and her
family. Right? So, again, see, that's what I'm
(08:23):
saying is, like,
I could think, oh, of course, I want
her attention. Who doesn't like to, be admired
and wanted and feel attractive? Right? You know,
that that's one set of beliefs. But, again,
now
we test the beliefs with, well, do you
really want married women, women in in relationships
to be doing that? Would you want your
wife to be doing that? Right? Because, again,
(08:44):
if if those women are in relationships, you
know, what about your wife? Do you want
her at the gym,
objectifying all these other men and checking them
out, right, you know, flirting with their eyes
or even worse or physical physically flirting? Right?
You know, it's easy to say on one
side that flirting is relatively harmless. But again,
do you want your wife doing all of
that? Do you want your daughter doing some
of that stuff? Right? So,
(09:04):
you know, that's what I mean by self
mastery. It's this it's this testing of your
belief system. Is this sustainable?
Right? Because just because it feels fun for
you and it's convenient for you doesn't mean
that it's not harming the world, doesn't mean
that it's an unsustainable practice that actually makes
this place worse.
Right? That, you know, it violates morals and
values that actually make make the world a
worse place to live and a less safe
(09:25):
place for for women to be in. Right?
So, again, think about recovery as a lifestyle.
Right? Hunt your beliefs constantly. Are these the
best beliefs to have? And, again, don't don't
keep self mastery confined to sexual sobriety.
Right? To me, that's a mistake, and I
think most men make that mistake. And I
think that's why most men who relapse relapses,
(09:46):
they're so zoomed in on the sexual behaviors.
It's like, no. Let's zoom out and look
at the belief system that created
the environment that allowed these sexual behaviors to
occur because it's that environment
that causes all sorts of problems. Right? It's
that environment that why we,
cheat on our diet, and,
it's that environment that makes us lazy or
(10:06):
procrastinate.
It's the, you know, it's there's a lot
more than just sexual behaviors happening
in a world full of that belief system.
It's your job to understand
how did I start believing these things and
are these the best things for me.
Thanks for listening to this episode. If you
are a high achiever with a sex addiction
and you're looking for a recovery group full
of like minded men, visit successfuladdict.com.
(10:29):
We provide men with a recovery mastermind group
using four day retreats, weekly group calls, and
daily accountability check ins. If you wanna achieve
long term sobriety and save your marriage, go
to our website and fill out our application.
If you enjoyed this episode, please pass it
along to a friend in recovery who would
benefit from listening. It is my mission to
get this information out to as many high
(10:49):
achievers as possible, and I can't do it
without your help.
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