When you leave the Affair/Swinging/Promiscuous Lifestyle, you’ll need a ‘clean up’. It’s not by accident that the old expression, “clean up your act” comes to mind.
When a behavior turns into a lifestyle, it’s due largely to it having become a habit. Cleaning up means that you change your habits, along with your thinking.
Changing one without the other often leads to relapses. Both your thinking and behavior need changing. The amount of change depends on how deep you were into the ‘Lifestyle’.
When sexual acting out has reached the point of a lifestyle, your life revolved around it. Does this mean that you need something new to be the center of your life? Yes, it does.
Self-gratification and sexual adventures will have to become secondary rather than primary. There will still be a part of you that wants to take risks and live ‘on the edge’.
That risk-taking part needs redirection. Those desires need re-channeling in a different direction.
Another area needing change is what you see as the purpose of your life. Instead of acquiring notches in your bedposts, another goal is needed.
If you’re serious about leaving the lifestyle behind, acquiring sexual conquests is no longer the major drive in your life.
How you socialize and your concept of fun need do-overs. This is part of changing your thinking.
You need goals, and the ones you choose for your life often alter your choices and direction. With changing your way of life, changes are needed in your goals and direction as well.
Who your friends and associates are also need changing. When you’re in the lifestyle, those around you often keep you in that way of living, typically for selfish reasons.
When you leave the lifestyle,it’s important for your success to surround yourself with people who desire seeing you succeed. You want people who are encouraging and optimistic in a ‘good’ way.
They are very important, especially on the days that you wonder ‘is it worth all the effort ?’ It’s worth the effort. Nothing worthwhile comes easy, especially when it concerns changes in lifestyle.
If you’re struggling with the effects from swinging you may be experiencing relationship trauma. You don’t have to get drunk, take pills or medications to numb yourself out, and keep symptoms under control.
When you have been traumatized, there are reasons for you not being able to get over it’ and bounce back.
Discover the tools, exercises and techniques you need in understanding and moving past what has happened to you.
If that’s your situation, I invite you to get your copy of the video on “Overcoming Relationship Trauma for Swingers“. Making change is challenging when you are unsure what comes next. Knowing what to expect helps make those transitions smoother.
Best Regards,
Jeff
