The anticipation of pleasure drives addiction. Pleasure is the “carrot on a stick” that keeps an addict trudging forward.
Sometimes it seems like absolutely anything, be it a substance or a behavior, can be addictive. That is not in fact the case. For a substance or a behavior to be addictive, it needs to trigger the neurobiological experience of pleasure, which over time leads to anticipatory fantasies of similar pleasure (what sex addicts call the bubble or the trance). Without this, a behavior may be compulsive, but it does not qualify as an addiction. For instance, compulsive hand-washing causes neither pleasure nor anticipatory fantasy. As such, it is not an addiction. It is instead classified as an Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD).
Just for Today
Watch all of your behaviors, not just your sexual behaviors, to see if anything else seems addictive and/or compulsive.