Degeneacy as gospel, no brag just fact and past

I try not to advertise my degeneracy, for I am sure it would shock most any who found it. While it might speak to some one struggliing in the throws of the same or a related degeneracy, if what I say to them is, 'My past is who I am and never better can I be,' then where is the hope? But if I can say 'That was how I was but now I am free from the chains of that _______________________(fiyob), then at least I am not offering the prospect of nothing really happening or changing because I am so bad, with inferrence that all are so bad, that nothing ever really changes other than now I can rely on Jesus to stand up for me...I firmly believe that God could and would under the right conditions forgive Attila the Hun, but only if those prescribed conditions included a change of heart detectable by God as a change in behaviour, if not even so much as a sigh of repenteance and tenderness of look, but its beginning, on a death bed. When God breathed life into Adam did He not say to himself something on the order of 'It is Good!' And he celebrated. Why should I argue with the edict of God? How do I love another as myself if I do not love myself? And this is not to say that I did not need, nor do I now not need, Jesus the atonemnt and His forgiveness. It is to say that if I mean it in my heart of hearts then I will begin to step out of the way and and Christ will begin to live through me. Edification anyone?