Serenity Prayer

Honestly? Yes!

/ Tim / Leave a comment

I’m not sure how many times the word ‘honesty’ appears in recovery literature but I am sure that it’s a substantial number. Honesty is an essential part of the program. The essence of the twelve steps is to dig through the layers of ego driven lies and bravado in order to arrive at the truth of who I am and then maintain that truth, and even dig a little bit deeper as I go along.

“To thine own self be true.”  Shakespeare

The coins we receive to mark time in sobriety have this struck onto them. It comes from the play Hamlet where a father is giving advice to his son who is going off on his own for the first time. Be honest with yourself, says dad. He’s also advising his son to stay the course, not to stray, to be true in the sense of an arrow heading for the bullseye. The first nine steps in the program allow us to find our path of truth. The last three help us to stay on that path.

We’ve all told some whoppers in our day. When looking back at these big lies, we can see that we told them to protect our vision of ourselves or deflect suspicion onto others: lies are always Ego based. The biggest lies are the ones we tell ourselves. The biggest lie I told myself is that I was ‘different’. I suffered from ‘Terminal Uniqueness’: my belief that I was unlike anyone else was killing me slowly. My ego told me that it was okay to try to escape from my surroundings and who I was because no one understood me, no one was going through what I was going through and everyone was against me or I against them. Drugging and drinking were symptoms of deep dishonesty.

Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” Oscar Wilde

It’s a challenging path to the truth of who I am. It’s peeling off the layers of the onion to get to the center. There’s often a fear that we’ll go so far we’ll find there’s nothing at the center. Fortunately, onions grow from the inside out and there’s always another layer to discover: new truth and understanding. But yes, being honest with myself means ripping off the layers that Ego has built with half-truths and lies and getting to my essence and accepting the ‘me’ that I discover. It’s not easy and it’s not something that happens overnight. Like many other parts of our program, it’s a process. But once there, I have a base, a foundation I can build upon.

“Pretty words are not always true, true words are not always pretty; and yet, they are still true.” Aiki Flinthart, The Yu Dragon

Being honest isn’t easy. It’s hard to face who I am and to know that it’s not the world, circumstances or others who brought me to my knees. I did that. I was the one who made those decisions that created the addict/alcoholic that I am. It wasn’t my parents, my partner, my job, where I live or my tragedies: I created the mess that landed with a thump at the door of a recovery program. That’s probably the most difficult truth anyone has to face. It’s the one that I must face if I am to recover.

I build my new life based upon truth, based on honesty. I can begin small by just not telling lies to myself and others. This goes beyond being ‘cash register honest’. Honesty and truth become deeply imbedded in this new character we are constructing. Self-inspection is essential to building this new life.  Even the best bricklayer uses a level to make sure that his work is plumb and follows a string line to make sure that it is straight as well.

“The longest journey is the journey inwards.” Dag Hammarskjöld

Once more I see how the program is simple, but not necessarily easy. It takes courage and willingness to dig deeply into my self and come up with an honest appraisal of who I am. Here again, the Serenity Prayer comes in: serenity, courage and wisdom. I ask for these in my quest for honesty and the discovery of self.

 

Faith Over Fear

/ Tim / Leave a comment

Fear. It paralyzes us. It oppresses us. It looms over our whole being. Fear of our future. Fear of illness and death. Fear of rejection. Fear of failure. I could go on and on. Fear is something that keeps us cowering, immobile in the corner, unable to come out. It is pervasive in our disease of addiction. We fear we won’t have enough, we fear we will have too much. We fear the opinion of other and we fear our own thoughts about ourselves.  Addicts and alcoholics don’t have the monopoly on fear, but we do have an unhealthy dose of it in our lives.

F.E.A.R. There are two acronyms that we use for fear in the groups I belong to.  One is F*** Everything And Run, which is what I usually did. I couldn’t deal with the muddle of my life. I couldn’t handle confrontation. I didn’t even want to open the mail and I screened most of my calls. Running to my addiction gave me the illusion of safety; at least I didn’t have to deal with the stuff that was going on around me for now. I didn’t know how to face things. I didn’t know how others would react to what I was doing so I thought it better to do nothing.

The other acronym is Face Everything And Recover. This took me quite a while to understand and put into practice. To be honest, I’m still working on it. I am certainly a whole lot better at facing those fears I have about life. In facing them, I have discovered something for myself: discussed fears dwindle in size and intensity. If I talk to my sponsor or another member about what I fear, the very act of talking brings it down in size from the paralyzing monster that my brain had made it, to a manageable point of discussion that doesn’t seem so big any more.  My brain makes mountains out of mole hills and tempests in teapots. Talking makes it right sized.  I try to remember that it’s not the end of the world until it’s really the end of the world.

I also try to remember that fear is a product of my Ego.  I want things to go my way, but they might not go that way.  What then might I do? Then this will happen, then that and oh my, that surely won’t go my way either! You get the picture. I let my expectations of what I think should happen take over and fear tells me those expectations will miserably fail. Ego takes me for an unstoppable ride. Talking slows down the ride and helps me look at things realistically, not fantastically.

I also trust. I know that my Higher Power has always been there for me. I know that because I am here today. If that’s the case why would I think that my Higher Power will leave me hanging in the wind tomorrow? I will live through everything that comes my way until I don’t. I have faith that H.P. will be by my side even at that moment too. Besides, like worries, 95% of my fears have never materialized. I am finding that by living the program of recovery things have a way of working themselves out in ways that I could have never dreamed. Fears are fantasy. They don’t exist. Like the smoke and mirrors of a carnival, they have no substance. Permit me one final acronym? False Evidence Appearing Real. There is no reality in fear. It’s all in my head. It’s a future that I can neither know or predict.

We ask for courage in the Serenity Prayer. Courage is what we need when we still have fear. We go forward even though we don’t know what the next step might take us. We take the next step knowing that we have faith in whatever comes our way we will be able to handle. And we take another step in the knowledge fear is not conquering us, rather we are vanquishing it. Courage and faith conquer fear.

♥  ♥  ♥

Please like and share this blog. Perhaps it will give others the needed courage, strength and hope to start and continue their journey down Recovery River. I would appreciate it if you would sign up and follow as well.  Please comment and offer suggestions.  I’d love to hear from you.

Peace

 

When We Were Wrong

/ Tim / Leave a comment

There’s no shame or harm in changing your direction. In fact, it’s often absolutely necessary if we are to survive and remain sane! Isn’t that what we are praying for in the Serenity Prayer: courage to change the things I can? Whether it is a minor course correction or a major shift in my life direction, I need to step out of my comfort zone and make those changes. If I am to be happy, joyous and free, then I must be willing to change and do what I must as I trudge the road of happy destiny.

I read a few days ago again that an airplane is off course 90% of the time. Wind is constantly blowing that metal tube about, shifting it’s position. There are often cloud banks and storms the the pilot can avoid by navigating around them. The pilot or autopilot is constantly making subtle changes in order to keep the airplane safe and to bring it back on course to its destination. And though it may seem a miracle, it lands on time and where it was supposed to land.

It’s not a miracle, not really. It’s a result of the constant attention of the flight crew. Those constant course corrections nudge the plane back on course. A constant check to see where it is headed. That’s what Step 10 is all about: course correction. “Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.” This is our regular measure of where we are and where we are headed.

Especially early on in the program, it is so easy to stray in our thinking. Everything is new: sobriety, sharing, slogans, steps and sponsors are part of a whole new vocabulary in our lives. It seems there is so much to learn and at the same time so much to forget.  The good news for newcomers, as I was told early on, is that you can start to practice any step that has a “1” in it right from the beginning, so steps 10, 11 and 12 can be worked while you’re still on the first step.

It need not be complicated, and you probably already do it to some degree.  At some point in the evening we can go over the day and pick out what went well, and what didn’t.  If we need to, we can talk to our sponsor about it. It may well be that we had acted like a jerk to a friend or coworker and tomorrow we can apologize.  No need to take on the sins of the world here, just a simple, “I’m sorry, I acted like a jerk yesterday.” is all that is needed.  It doesn’t even matter whether the apology is accepted, because forgiveness is not the goal, clearing our conscience is! Keeping our own side of the street clean early in sobriety is a good way to practice the program principles. It helps to keep us true to this new direction we are headed.

And to be honest, even after years of sobriety, a slight variation in thinking can gradually lead to bad decisions that lead back to the bottle, the pipe and the syringe. Meeting rooms are full of people who were absolutely certain they “had” the program before and suddenly they found themselves back where they started, even after more than ten or twenty years sometimes. A spot check inventory helps to keep us in touch with ourselves, our program and our Higher Power. Like any other terminal condition, I must take my medicine which is the practice and the living of all of the 12 steps of our program, every day. I can’t let up; there is no “free” day here.  It’s one day at a time, one day, everyday.

♥  ♥  ♥

Please like and share this blog, not to stroke my ego, but for those who need the courage, strength and hope to start and continue their journey down Recovery River. I would appreciate it if you would sign up and follow as well.  My intention is to post Mondays and Thursdays.   Please comment and offer suggestions.  I’d love to hear from you.

Peace