My One Thing: Cory Schortzman

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Transcript

Stephen: I’ve got Cory Schortzman on the line. Cory is the executive director of Transformed Hearts Counseling Center and the author of multiple books on recovery. Cory, what’s the one piece of advice that you would give to somebody struggling with porn addiction?

Cory: Thanks. Good afternoon, Stephen. A couple of main things I’d like to talk about as maybe kind of a typical… There’s always accountability, honesty, lying, these sorts of things that help men come out of pornography, and getting in groups. But the one thing that I don’t find a lot of people talking about is this addiction to being offended. I believe that underneath any and every addiction is an addiction to being offended. And I find this in my own recovery, my own sobriety. And what does this really mean? So these are people that generally to go and act out, underneath that is deeper issues of feeling hurt, real or imagined offences get us to a place to want to go medicate those feelings and emotions. I have a website. I do a lot of blogging and an offended test. The Anatomy of Peace, Leadership, Self-deception by The Arbinger Institute. These books have taken me beyond my 12-step program over the years and really identifying that it is true and God’s word, when in the last days, many will be offended. Many will be lovers of themselves. It goes on to say love will grow cold. As we know, lust takes… I like to define lust as taking fantasy, takes… Imagination is about giving to others. Love is about giving.

So they’re just some quick little tidbits here on what this assessment looks like. If you find yourself thinking and believing your qualities are better than others, or you find yourself thinking and believing that the qualities of others are worse than yours, you find yourself as judge, jury, and executioner. You think about getting even with those that have hurt you.

Number three, you’re quick to accuse, blame, and criticize others for your own problems, thoughts, and actions. Another one here, you find yourself unable to sleep and awaken at night, unable to fall back to sleep, having your racing thoughts and feeling disrespect that you’ve been done wrong. You’re easily angered and become defensive when you ask to change or are confronted about your behaviors. You believe that only if others change, then your relationships with them would be better.

Here’s another one: you allow your emotions to dictate how you act. Generally, typical things that I see… and there are several more of these as I’ve assessed. So if you explore five or more of these, you might have an addiction to being offended. And part of this assessment too is we hear a lot [inaudible – 03:49] parts [inaudible] is the lesser known. Everybody is familiar with sex addiction, but what’s lesser known is intimacy anorexia. And this is an intentional withholding of our hearts, feelings, and emotions with our spouse. And in my research, about 64 percent of the guys that come to our office are not only sex addicts but intimacy anorexics. So to do that assessment, I have also on our website. And it can be very helpful for the guy we’re trying to help. So if you’re a guy not finding much success, you’ve been in recovery for a while from your acting out, there might be a 6 out of 10 chance that you’re only dealing with half the addiction, and that is intimacy anorexia.

So if there’s one thing today, I guess there are two things I want to bring to the table, and that’s an addiction to being offended, which I believe is also underneath the anorexia addiction. So a lot of things. I don’t want people to feel overwhelmed like oh, I’ve got more stuff to work on. But we do want tools and information out there, so check out our website and the blog. I’ve been blogging now for over a year. We have some YouTube clips out there that can help get them started. Thanks, Stephen.

Stephen: Yeah, awesome. I think those are a couple of great resources. I encourage all the guys watching this to check out those assessments, fill them out, and just see. It’s amazing what you can learn from just answering some of those introspective questions. I know in my own journey that intimacy anorexia was something that I worked through with my counselor. And it’s not something that’s on a lot of guys’ radars. But once their eyes are open to it, then they recognize it in their life. And you can see how it really does play a big part in pornography addiction. So I’m glad you shared that, Cory.

Can you tell people where they can find out more about you and your ministry?

Cory: Yeah, absolutely. We are based in Colorado Springs, and we also have a satellite office in Denver. But surprisingly, most of our practice is by phone. So don’t let that limit you. Give us a call. Our website is transformedhearts.com. The phone number is 719-590-1350. We do free assessments. We have lots of books and resources, YouTube stuff, the blogs. We do 3-day and 5-day intensives. We do phone counseling groups. So really, at any point of entrance, depending on your budget and availability, we want to help you out. So give us a call and see how we can serve you. Thanks.

Stephen: Yeah, awesome. As always, all that information will be in the show notes. So if you guys didn’t catch all that watching, just scroll down below and you’ll see all those links. Cory, thanks again for your time, I love what you’re doing, and keep up the great work.

Cory: Thanks Stephen, be blessed.

Stephen: See you.

Cory: Bye.