change

A Firm Foundation

/ Tim / Leave a comment

Meetings.  They’re part of the foundation of my recovery. When I came into the rooms I was invited back the next day. Not used to receiving many invitations at that time, I accepted. And I kept going back. I never counted the meetings I went to at the beginning, but I know I did a lot more than 90 meetings in 90 days. Now that I wasn’t consuming anything, I suddenly found that I had more time on my hands. I really didn’t trust myself going out socially. So I went to a lot of meetings. They ended at 9 PM. I’d get home a bit before 10 and go to bed. Safe and sound.

What I didn’t realize then was that I didn’t know how to act with nothing in my system. I didn’t know how to relate to others. My whole world had revolved around my disease. How to get it, how to hide it, how to get some more. I’d be nice to others because I thought you might share with me. Or I’d be trying to control things so I could make it through the next part of the day until I’d be free to let loose again. My life revolved in so many ways around my disease, so that now that I was trying to live in the solution, I had to find out what the solution was.  I had to relearn, or in many cases, learn for the first time how to relate to other people and life. I did this through meetings.

Going to meetings isn’t the whole program of recovery. But meetings kept me in contact with others who had, or were going through the same things I was going through. At meetings I learned how to apply the steps to my own life. I heard simple ideas about how to stay in recovery and not stray. I may not have been the cream of the crop of addicts but I did figure out something fairly quickly: people who were having the most difficult time in recovery were the same people who figured they didn’t need to go to meetings. Those who have long term recovery are those who still go to meetings regularly as part of their recovery. They’ve built their recovery on a strong and solid foundation upon which to base their lives. When the difficulties and challenges come along, that firm base supports them.

When I came into the program I was told five things: don’t consume, go to meetings, get a home group, get a sponsor, work the steps. There’s a reason why meetings have been part of Twelve Step programs since their inception: they work. Who am I to think I know better? After all, some of my best thinking got me to the point where I had to turn to recovery.

I go to meetings regularly because I’ve learned, when I start missing meetings, I start missing whatever I used. I listen at meetings because there’s still so much I need to know. I share at meetings because I’m grateful for what been given by the other members.

Peace.

Live Life!

/ Tim / 2 Comments

“What if you don’t like your path?”

“Then it’s not your path.”

Jed McKenna,  Dreamstate: A Conspiracy Theory

I remember when I was a kid there was a great emphasis on finishing what you had started. Even if you didn’t like it, you stuck with it because that is what you were ‘supposed’ to do. Quitting part way through was the lazy way out, a defect of character. This went for college course choices, job choices and relationship choices. Once you committed to something, you couldn’t change course.  Stiff upper lip and all that!

I couldn’t disagree more today!

How many people are working at jobs they detest? Are going through the motions in a relationship that no longer fulfills? Living in conditions that are sapping them of their life blood? What good does it do you to keep climbing the corporate ladder when you find that the ladder is propped up onto the wrong wall?

Life is too short. It’s too short to be working at a job you detest, living where you aren’t comfortable and being with the wrong person. To everything there is a season. And when the season ends it’s time to move on. And there’s a lid for every pot; if the lid isn’t fitting, then change lids.

When I look at my life before recovery and now, I see a colossal difference. When I came into the meeting rooms I was at my bottom. I was living in the metaphoric dungeon of life and my addiction kept me in chains. The miracle of recovery showed me that the chains were of my own making and they weren’t locked. The trap door from the dungeon was unbolted and there was a ladder out. According to the old philosophy, I made my bed, now I must lie in it. The goal, I discovered isn’t to “make the best of it” it’s to leave the dungeon all together!

Any change can be very stressful. Because of this some prefer to stay in the dungeon because they ‘know’ it. Some fear what might happen if they do leave. What if they fail? What if they don’t like it? So they sell their health and peace of mind for the sense of security of a job or a relationship or an addiction that is robbing them of really living life.

Again I say, life is short and you’ll be dead for a lot more years than you ever lived. No one on their deathbed wishes they could have spent more time at the office. Get out there!  Try different things! Take some risks! Change the path you’re on if it’s not your path. You don’t get out of here alive, so make sure that you’ve lived while you were here.

 

 

Opening to New Thinking

/ Tim / 2 Comments

When I came into recovery I was told to keep an open mind. I was told that my best thinking had led me to the meeting rooms so maybe my thinking wasn’t the best at that moment. Perhaps I had better start listening instead of thinking.

At first I thought, I’m educated. Twelve steps? I can whip through those in a few weeks and be on my way. Higher Power? I’ll choose universal energy, it’s much better than the traditional ideas I grew up with. Make amends? No problem. I just won’t include a few people on the list.  I wasn’t living in my car. I didn’t drink Listerine. I wasn’t pushing a shopping cart through town. I wasn’t like ‘you people’ who really needed the program. I just needed a bit of help to get me stopped then I would be fine.

I had the idea that I was somehow ‘better’ than the other people around me. I had so many reasons why I was different from the others in the room. My situation was ‘special’. I had a set of challenges that no one else had. I heard my sponsor tell me that I was suffering from something very common in the rooms: Terminal Uniqueness. I was so special, living in conditions so different and in a world so ‘unique’ that it was slowly killing me, just like any other ‘terminal’ illness does. But I didn’t get it right away.

Slowly I learned to identify with everyone in the room and stop comparing myself to them. I learned that I had plenty in common with the woman who had lost custody of her children and the guy living at the mission. I began to see that their struggles were my struggles, and their triumphs were my triumphs. Once I pulled my head out of my, um, the sand, and I let go of the idea that I was different, things began to change. I started to feel I was a ‘part of’ and not ‘separate from’.

Throughout our literature I’ve read about how my Ego is at the root of my problem. My ego tells me I’m different, unique, separate and alone. Ego says I am far above or far below anyone else. It Ego that tells me that I ‘deserve’ this and that if you have something, I should have it too. What I didn’t realize when I arrived was that Ego was robbing me of the most important thing in life: connection.

Slowly I have reconnected with others in recovery, my family, friends, a Higher Power and myself. I am no longer alone as I walk this path of life. I thought that I was alone, but I never was. I thought I was different but I discovered many more similarities. I thought I wanted your possessions but I found that I already had abundance. Ego needed to be tamed, humbled, brought down to its right size. Slowly my thinking is turning around and it all started because I started to open my mind and listen.

I am grateful.