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iQuestions Faculty, Dr. Gary Smalley 
 
 
Question: 
 
How do I stop lusting? 
 
Answer:  
 
So, you want to change some part of your life? Well, I want you to 
know that for the last four years—and I was sixty-two when I first 
found this—but I discovered tons of research on this. I missed it, I 
don’t know how, all of my life. But do you know that you and I do and 
say and think the things that we believe in our heart? 
 
Now, some people call this the subconscious, but what happens to us 
throughout life is that we pick up certain beliefs as little kids. You 
know, we pick up beliefs from traditional things our folks have; we pick 
them up from reasoning, our own thinking; we pick them up from 
emotional experiences, and especially experiences.  
 
You know, what happens to us is that we just have them, and we don’t 
even know we have these beliefs in our heart. I’m going to use this as 
an example of our heart, but watch how powerful this is. What I 
discovered is, I realized that everything I say, do, and think is coming 
from some belief that I have in my heart. 
 
And so, I thought, “I’m really going to test this out. I’m going to see if 
this really true, is this really reliable.” There are a lot of books written 
on this, and I have one, but it’s just amazing how powerful it is.  
 
I actually wanted to get rid of lusting for women. Sixty-two years of 
age and there’s still lust, and I kept thinking, “Am I really going to do 
this, until I’m like seventy-five, eighty-five, ninety?” 
 
 
 
I’ve heard that 99% lust, and 1% say they don’t—but 1% is lying, so 
it’s really 100% of men who actually lust.  
 
And I used to think it’s just testosterone that caused us to lust, 
because of its flowing through our body—and that does contribute to 
it, but here’s what I discovered: since the time I was five—with a little 
girl in our neighborhood who had a charismatic personality and was 
inviting little kids into her garage—I was having orgies. And I still 
remember that, even at my age. And so, I didn’t have any idea how 
this was affecting me.  
 
But what happened to me, starting there, and then the rest of my life, 
for sixty years, was that I actually believed—I had a deep belief in my 
heart, you could say—that life is pleasure, life is thrilling, life is fun, 
exciting, all those things. That was a major belief in my heart. I 
actually, in just two weeks, saw this behavior in my life change, 
because listen to how powerful this—and you can do this today—it’s 
what you think about day and night.  
 
All your thoughts eventually seep into your heart. In fact, every 
thought is like this pen here. Every thought makes a mark in your 
heart. It’s a small mark, but the more thoughts you have that are 
similar, the same, whatever you’re thinking, it makes like a groove in 
your heart. And the more you say it, the more you think it. The more 
you say it, the more you think it. Eventually, I have found it actually 
covers up old beliefs that I have. 
 
And so, the exciting thing is, here’s what I started saying every day, “I 
know I’m a free person inside—given freedom from God, actually—and 
I know that I don’t want to use this freedom to satisfy my own sexual 
desires and central desires. I really want to use my freedom to care for 
people. Love is the greatest thing in life, so I want to love people and 
serve people.” 
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I actually said those few words, day and night, thought them for two 
weeks. And I remember I was in a Jacuzzi with my granddaughter, 
and in walks these two real Barbie dolls, and walked toward the 
Jacuzzi, and my first thought that came into my mind was, “I wonder 
how much God loves them. I wonder if they are loved by their dad or 
loved by their husband today.” And I thought, “Whoa. I don’t know 
where that thought came from.”  
 
But the amazing thing is, that’s been a year, and I still have not had 
any more lustful thoughts, because I get to manage my thoughts, my 
words, my behavior, by changing the beliefs that I have in my own 
heart. 
 
 
 
 
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