One of my first clients was what I called "a flight risk." Those are the ones who have to be monitored constantly because they are always looking for a slight opening to use. Almost like an indoor cat watching for the door to be left open juuuuust a little longer than normal. Yeah, two different analogies.
Anyway, this guy would get a craving late at night and, knowing his phone was locked down so he couldn't access Grindr or any of the other drug-dealing apps, would journey to Walmart to buy a track phone or tablet.
The situation really tested me early. It felt like he literally needed to be handcuffed and kept in a padded room every night. And this is very common in early chemsex recovery.
It is all tied to the midbrain and euphoric recall. The prefrontal cortex shuts down, like when we are tired, hungry, or horny... and the midbrain takes over. We are then sleepwalking our way to the chem parTy.
I remember back then thinking, and I've said it more recently, "If you are going through all of that, you don't want it bad enough."
Which is horribly shaming. And counterintuitive. And not becoming of a coach.
And in some cases, that was actually true. And still nothing that would help a client. I get that now.
What I've come to realize and how I approach this with clients now is less about how bad they want to be meth-free and more about how willing they are to do what it takes to be meth-free. Those are way different approaches.
Because there is one thing I do know, and that is that given the world we live in today and the ease of access to meth, meph, and GHB, one must be willing to do hard work, difficult work, uncomfortable work. How bad you want rid of the substance is actually irrelevant.
How willing are you to do what it takes? And that's what we are going over today.
The question I was asking wrong
More often than not in my program, my clients are high-functioning and often affluent gay men.
And often they have tried many routes to becoming meth-free. And often they have heard what I'm going to tell them first, hoping I will say something different than treatment centers and counselors.
Whether my program is shame-free and empowering or not, the fact remains that the phone must be dealt with. Full stop.
He tells me he can't delete the apps. He can't change his phone number. He tells me he can't stop talking to that one guy. He tells me the group time doesn't work for him, the accountability call feels like a lot, the group chat is overwhelming, and he'll start the morning practice next week.
The instant urge in me is to say, "Look, buddy, how bad do you want this? And I used to say that.
I was not trying to shame him. I want to be clear about that. I was trying to reconnect him to his own reason. I wanted him to remember the version of himself who called me the first time, the one who was done, the one who meant it.
It worked, temporarily.
He would nod. He would get quiet. Sometimes he would tear up. He would leave the conversation with a new resolve.
And then two weeks later, we would be having the same conversation.
I have had that same conversation hundreds of times. Hell, I have had it with myself.
I was asking the wrong question. And you might be too.
Everybody wants it
Look, nobody comes to me because they want to keep using.
Not one man. Not ever.
The man who relapsed on Saturday wanted out just as badly as the man who didn't. He was not less motivated. He was not less sincere. He did not want it less.
Think about your own 4am.
The promise you made to yourself while you were still coming down. The apology text you sent at 6am and meant with your whole chest. The prayer nobody heard. The vow you made with your jaw still clenched and your tongue still raw, that this was the last one, that you were done, that tomorrow was different.
All of that is wanting.
It was real. It was sincere. You were not lying.
And it changed virtually nothing.
Every man I work with has an unlimited supply of want. The desire is not in question. It really is just the beginning.
What was actually missing
Wanting and willingness are two different systems, and we use the words like they're interchangeable.
Wanting lives in the future, in a vaguge place where emotions live. It comes and goes. Willingness lives in the next ten minutes.
Wanting costs you nothing. Willingness costs you something every single time.
Wanting is a feeling that arrives on its own. Willingness is a behavior you produce on purpose.
Here is the clinical version, and then I'll drop it.
There is a whole body of research in motivational interviewing that separates what a person says into two buckets. The first bucket is desire, ability, reasons, and need. I want to. I could. I should. I have to.
Researchers call this preparatory talk.
The second bucket is commitment, activation, and taking steps. I will. I am. I did.
A man can live in the first bucket for a decade.
Across hundreds of studies, how badly a person intends to do something explains about 28% of whether they actually do it. There's a name for the rest. They call it the intention-behavior gap.
Twenty-eight percent.
Which means almost three-quarters of your recovery is happening somewhere other than in your wanting.
This gap is where many men live. That's where I live in some aspects of my life.
Willingness is not wanting. You can be completely willing to do something you have no desire to do. Most of the important things are like this.
Willingness is not conditional. "I'll do it when it gets easier" is not willingness. That's the negotiation stage of the grieving process.
Willingness is not trying. Trying is the word a man reaches for when he has already decided the outcome is not his responsibility. "I'm trying to quit."
Willingness is not a feeling. It is action.
What unwillingness actually sounds like
One of my guys, about six weeks in, doing well.
He tells me he's ready. He's serious this time. He wants his life back.
So I ask him about the apps.
"Yeah, I deleted Grindr."
Okay. What else is on your phone?
Pause.
"I mean, Sniffies is still on there. But that's not the same thing."
Tell me how it's different.
Longer pause.
"It's just, like, browsing."
Hmmm.
Here's the thing. He was not lying to me. He was not being defiant. He was not in denial. He wanted out with his whole body, and I could see it.
He was doing something much more human than that.
He was negotiating the price.
That is what unwillingness actually sounds like. It almost never sounds like refusal. It sounds like a man agreeing to the goal and then quietly amending the terms.
Are you chemsex-free or chemsex-free with caveats?
I'll stop using, but I'm keeping the apps.
I'll delete the apps, but I'm keeping his number.
I'll go to group, but not that group.
I'll do the work, but not the part that embarrasses me.
What are you willing to lose to gain a new life?
You don't have to guess
Here's what I love about this reframe, and why I'm never asking "how bad do you want it" again.
You cannot feel your way to an answer on willingness.
If you sit down and ask yourself "am I willing?", you're going to get a yes. Every time. Because the part of you that answers that question is the part that wants it, and that part is enormous and loud and completely sincere.
Willingness is only ever visible in the rearview.
So don't ask.
Look.
The apps are on your phone or they are not. His number is in your contacts or it is not. You made the call or you didn't. You told one person the truth this week or you kept it.
None of that is a character verdict. It's just information. It's the most useful information you have.
The part nobody warns you about
The hardest part of willingness typically lives in life in recovery.
Being willing to be the one who leaves early.
Being willing to stop getting invited.
Being willing to sit in a room where everybody else can do the thing you can't do anymore and to not make it mean something about you.
Being willing to have a sexual life that looks nothing like the one you had, for a while, without knowing what it's going to look like on the other side.
Being willing to lock the phone up in a lock box at night or surrender to your partner.
Being willing to surrender your keys at night.
Being willing to be monitored and have friends stay over to ensure you don't go out.
I want to name what that actually is.
That's grief.
That is not weakness and it is not you being dramatic. You are being asked to bury a version of yourself, a social world, and a whole sexual template, and to do it before the replacement has shown up. Anyone would flinch at that.
And for a lot of us, that scene was the first place we ever felt wanted. The first room where we walked in and nobody looked away. Losing it is a genuine loss. Most recovery advice bounces off men like us because it refuses to say that out loud.
So I'll say it.
You are not being asked to be willing to live with less.
You are being asked to be willing to live without it long enough for something else to arrive.
I know that's a lot to ask on faith. I asked it of myself and I did not believe it either.
It arrived anyway.
Don't try to summon it at 3am
Willingness moves. It's a state, not a trait. You do not have a fixed amount of it.
Nobody is willing at 3am with a text on the screen and the whole system activated. Your midbrain is running the show, your prefrontal cortex has gone offline, and you are on autopilot. Expecting to generate willingness in that moment is like expecting to learn to swim during a flood.
Which means it has to be decided in advance.
The form is simple. If, then.
If he texts, then I do this specific thing.
If I open the app, then I call this specific person.
Pre-decided, written down, put somewhere you'll actually see it, so it doesn't have to be manufactured in the worst ten minutes of your week.
That's a 1% interruption to the pattern. It is not the whole recovery. It's the part that survives contact with a craving, and honestly that's the only part that has ever mattered.
So here's where I've landed.
You don't need to want it more.
You need to take the damn action.
Hope this helps.
Love, Dallas
The Willingness Inventory
Answer these in behavior. Not in intention.
Name one thing you have wanted for six months and have not done.
What is the price of it?
What have you been negotiating down?
What is still on your phone?
Who have you not told?
What would this week look like if you were willing?
What is the smallest piece of that you could do today?
Then write this one out:
If ________________ happens, then I will ________________.
Put it where you will see it.
Journal Prompts
Where in my life am I confusing wanting with willingness?
What am I afraid will be true about me if I do the hard thing and it still doesn't work?
What do I believe I will lose that I have not let myself grieve?
If wanting it was never the problem, then what is?
Sources
Miller, W. R., and Rollnick, S. Motivational Interviewing: Helping People Change. Guilford Press.
Sheeran, P., and Webb, T. L. (2016). The Intention-Behavior Gap. Social and Personality Psychology Compass.
Sheeran, P. (2002). Intention-behavior relations: a conceptual and empirical review. European Review of Social Psychology.
Gollwitzer, P. M., and Sheeran, P. (2006). Implementation intentions and goal achievement: a meta-analysis of effects and processes.
Hayes, S. C., Strosahl, K., and Wilson, K. G. Get Out of Your Mind and Into Your Life. New Harbinger.
Stuart, D. Chemsex and the cultural conditions of gay men's sexual and substance use behaviors.
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