Core Beliefs of Sex Addicts

Sex addiction is not a moral failure. Compulsive sexual behavior often involves behavior that much of society would consider immoral, but if you are suffering from sex addiction, you are caught in a cycle of addiction over which you may believe you are powerless.

Sex Addiction’s Four Core Beliefs

Dr. Patrick Carnes states in his classic work on sex addiction, Out of the Shadows, that there are four core beliefs that sex addicts share.Sex Addiction’s Four Core Beliefs

This belief keeps a person locked into a cycle of shame and acting out, often because of stresses in life, not the least of which is low self-esteem. But the euphoria of acting out is soon replaced with shame, further reinforcing this core belief.

In other words, “If people really knew me, they would not love me.” This core belief reinforces the need to keep all "acting out" behaviors secret, creating a double life that is marked by deceit and duplicity.

People who have the very highest morals and ethics in every other area of life will engage in behaviors that may be abhorrent to their personal beliefs.

They have a public self that is honest, trustworthy, and exhibits the highest standards. But their private self is the antithesis of these values. Secrets are deadly to a sex addict.

As long as secrets exist, little progress can be made in eradicating these behaviors from their lives once and for all.

This is a core value that often finds its roots in childhood. A person learns they cannot depend on others and must be self-sufficient. While self-sufficiency and independence can be very positive qualities, people with sex addiction often isolate themselves and find it difficult to depend on others.

It is not uncommon for a person struggling with sex addiction to have such an insatiable appetite for sex that they continue engaging in sex hour after hour. Sometimes this may be solo acting out where they masturbate to the point of injury. For others this may mean acting out with multiple sex partners with little or no discrimination criteria for selecting their partners.

Individuals struggling with compulsive sexual behavior need to stop believing these lies about themselves and find help. There is hope, and there can be freedom.

Hope & Freedom Counseling Services offers many resources to help individuals recover and find freedom from sex addiction. Our 3-Day Intensives are designed to accelerate your healing and map out a recovery plan that will get you on the right track to recover from sex addiction and live a life of sexual sobriety.

If you are unsure whether you meet the criteria for sex addiction, take the quiz, “Are My Sexual Behaviors Problematic?”