Anger and resentment are our favorite excuses for going to extremes in sensual self-indulgence. The alcoholic will often go so far as to invent a war game with his wife as an excuse to get drunk and/or become embittered with rage.

Since resentment is a sin of pride, it also carries with it the pain of conflict, which sees alcohol as a joyful escape.

The alcoholic uses his initial upset for one ego-building experience, which, when it leads to conflict, enables him to enjoy a second ego-building experience, his drink, without reservation.

If he were only able not to get upset in the first place, drink would not be so attractive to him. No one can really “enjoy” taking an aspirin unless he has a bad headache. 

When you were young, you thought—actually, it was not you who did the thinking and dreaming—that you had to fulfill the fantasies of your imagination or else you would some-how be left out, excluded from the banquet of life.

Selfish wants seemed so natural that it would surely be a sin against nature to leave them unfulfilled.

So whenever you had to face self-denial, you reacted with resentment; and resentment made you want the forbidden object even more.

Your world of thought centered around being upset and dreaming lustfully of forbidden pleasures. When your yearning drew opportunities for gratification, you welcomed them with open arms.

And so sin made a home in you through that deception. Whoever overrides your conscience and permits you to sin is not a true friend.

He is tempting you with the forbidden fruit only to gain some advantage or to dominate you. Until you are able to see your lovers for what they really are, your perverted concept of freedom will cause you to equate freedom with attachment to them.

You cannot give up your ego supports without ceasing to exist as you are, for to deny yourself the sweet nectar of the forbidden would be ripping the covers off the reality you are still not ready to face.

You cannot sincerely give up your various poisons until you are ready to surrender your pride at any cost, even the cost of “life” itself. As long as you live pride-fully, reality is death (to the ego); and even though you may give up one vice, you will surely find another to take its place.

The grave still waits at the end of the road—you just change vehicles en route. 

"Face your problem honestly, realize where and how you failed, feel the shame of it—but don’t resent it."

Of course, there are the diehards, who have chosen their way of death with an unshakable will. Dying of lung cancer, for instance, they insist that life would not be worth living for them if they had to give up their cigarettes.

They love their cigarettes, like the gourmandizer loves his food and the womanizer loves his women. “Loving” your addiction or fighting it, you are just a loser until you are ready to throw in your hand and get out of the game. 

If you have been able to read this far, chances are you have a stomach for the truth. Chosen from birth, the elect of God, you will find it impossible to resign yourself to a lifelong involvement with the lies and delusions that are so irresistible to everyone else.

Of course, you may eat, drink, or have sex too much—and it bothers you. But the difference between you and the others is that you do not like what is happening to you as a result of your overindulgence.

You might have stopped a long time ago and given your life to God had you known the way. Now I ask you to become objective to your thoughts and feelings, for only by doing so can you stop being upset with yourself over the problems you have created through your self-indulgence.

It is of the utmost importance that you stop being upset with your problems. Remember, the sin came in two installments: first the willful indulgence, then the angry struggle with the results. 

Now you must deal with the second part first. It was your proud willfulness that created the problem. When you attack the results with the same proud willfulness, you are simply adding sin to sin.

You must go back the way you came, so your first job is to abandon struggle. Don’t listen to the part of you that challenges you to get upset in order to prevail.

Struggle is what makes egos evolve in conflict with truth. Realize the truth now, and the truth will extinguish struggle as a matter of course.

Gone will be the sick fixation to the problem that has kept you from seeing the real core of the matter. 

Abandon willful struggle, and the ego will diminish. Face your problem honestly, realize where and how you failed, feel the shame of it—but don’t resent it.

When you fully realize your powerlessness, when you realize that of yourself you can do nothing, you will see the futility of struggle, and you will find the faith to turn the problem over to a higher power.