The Uncluttered Mind

September 28, 2017 / Tim / 1 Comment

Stuff
I read a blog from a friend who is moving to a much smaller home and is going through the process of de-cluttering. She’s sorting through all sorts of things she’s been dragging around for many years and filling up the recycle bins at a stunning pace. My sister and her wife just moved into a highrise condo. After garage sales, generous donations to the local resale store and recycle bins, they are unwilling to being the cycle of accumulation again. Good for all of them. I know there’s nothing like moving to a new country with only a few suitcases to prioritize what is important. Of course, I have accumulated more ‘stuff’ but I tend to do so a bit more mindfully, acquiring what I need, and not necessarily what I want.

Deal with it

I try to do the same thing with my mind. How much crap do I have stuffed into this brain that clutters and confuses? How many old feelings and beliefs do I carry along with me. I remember Jim Carrey’s movie: Eternal Sunsrhine of the Spotless Mind, where a couple have their memories of each other removed after they break up. That technology, of course, doesn’t exist; I can’t simply erase the clutter from my mind. I have to, somehow, deal with it.

I wasn’t the best at dealing with emotions, feeling. I wasn’t taught how to deal with them. I don’t think my family was much different than any other at the time. Expressions of mild happiness or contentment, and anger could be expressed. Anything else was viewed with suspision. Someone who appeared too happy? Hmmm, something’s up with them. Expressions of love? Well other than your mother, you didn’t say the ‘L’ word outside of an intimate relationship. Fear? Not me! Jealousy? I’m above that. Sadness? Boys don’t cry. Lonely? Confused? Just muddle through but don’t let anyone know. Men don’t talk about feelings. Period!

I didn’t know how

The problem is, I still had all of these feelings. The way I learned to deal with them was with supression aided by a generous dose of alcohol or whatever. That was the only coping mechanism I learned. I had to do something because the feeling were churning around inside me. Alcohol was an acceptable release. Smoking up one could leave it all behind. And once in my reduced world of the altered mind, I felt free of those feelings or I could express them and, the next day, have the excuse, “Boy was I ever drunk last night!” And everyone understood.

I will never forget the first few meetings I attended. Men were talking about how they were feeling! They were using phrases like, ‘I was afraid’, ‘I was wrong’ and ‘I needed help’! I hadn’t heard those words before. Not said in public. And especially not by straight men in Perth County! We don’t talk like that!

After I got over my disbelief, I learned. Expressing my feelings is healthy and important. It was absolutely necessary for me to learn how to deal with them if I was going to stay sober and find the serenity, courage and wisdom I prayed for.

Express Yourself

I learned that feelings do not go away. I can only repress them. Perhaps that’s why I was an addict; I had been stashing up so many feelings that it took more and more of whatever to keep them down and stop me from exploding. I learned that I could talk about what I was feeling in meetings, in prayer and with my sponsor. In working the steps and making them part of my life I learned to deal with things as they came along and not stuff them under the proverbial rug hoping they’d disappear. I’ve learned that a tenth step can not only be used for promptly admitting my faults but also promptly admitting my feelings and talking about them. It helps me to grow and thrive. As Madonna’s sings, “Express yourself, respect yourself.”

I can’t say that I always am successful in uncluttering my mind, but I know I’m much better at it now. I’m learning to deal with it and move on. I can’t change the past but it has become useful in that I can learn from it, hopefully not repeating it. My feelings are my feelings and there’s nothing right or wrong about them but I do have to work with them if I want to be happy, joyous and free.

♥ ♥ ♥

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Peace

The Wreckage

September 25, 2017September 24, 2017 / Tim / 2 Comments

I’ve learned in my program that I need to clear away the wreckage of my past. Part of that wreckage is the damage that I did to other people, especially family. In the movie When Love is Not Enough, the Lois Wilson Story, Lois’ character says that on average four people are pulled into the vortex of an alcoholic. The word vortex, the spinning fury of mayhem that pulls what is around it into its empty centre, is quite appropriate. We lie, we cheat, we manipulate and we steal from these people while we are in the vortex, often discarding them along the way. I am reminded of the Tasmanian Devil of old cartoons. That is pretty much what we did.

Lois Wilson was the founder of Al-Anon Family Groups program for the family and friends of alcoholics. She, being the wife of Bill Wilson, one of the co-founders of Alcoholics Anonymous, knew what she was talking about having lived through the destruction that her husband’s alcoholism caused in both of their lives. She also knew of the struggle to find her own sanity in the midst of chaos and conflict. If her statement is true about how alcoholics and addicts affect the lives of others, then the rooms of Al-Anon should be overflowing; they aren’t.

I suppose it must be extra difficult to admit that the insanity of an addict’s life rubs off and that they are as powerless over alcohol and drugs and their loved one. It’s the alcoholic who is sick, not the spouse or partner. It’s hard to admit that one’s attempts to help a loved one have never been successful. It’s also hard to see that AA or NA is doing what love and devotion couldn’t accomplish alone. The wife of a friend of mine in the program openly states that she was as sick as her husband because of alcohol, but she was unable to see it until she went to Al-Anon, ostensibly to try to get help for him. Once there, she discovered that she needed help as well. Today they both travel their path of recovery.

I remember hearing a speaker at a meeting talk about having an argument with his wife because he was late coming home from work one night. She had been worried about him and he was angry because he had been in recovery for almost a year at the time. His sponsor chastised him, telling him that he had made so many promises to her that he had broken, that he had lied so many times about where he was and when he was coming home, and had manipulated her for so many years, that she had a right to think that he may have slipped. Even after a year, two years, or ten years, members have relapsed, so a partner’s worry is not without cause.

One of my sponsees came to me a while back. He’s fairly new in the program and was complaining about his wife. He felt that she was not understanding enough about his disease, always asking him where he was going and who he was with. He felt like she was treating him like a child and not the sober adult that he felt he was. His wife’s concern was genuine and is quite common. How many times had he broken promises to her? How often had he lied to her about where and with whom he was with? How often had he told her that he wasn’t going to drink or use only to find him dropped off on the front porch unable to stand let alone find the front door? No, he was the one who needed some understanding of where she was coming from and that while he may be sure he’s on the path of sobriety, she has every right to her uncertainty.

It is so much easier to see how our addiction has affected our own lives. It is not as easy to see how it has affected those who made the decision to love us. And it does affect them just as deeply and profoundly. I do not presume to speak for members of Al-Anon. I only know what I have heard from them. One told me that it was one of the most difficult thing he ever had to do was admit that he had allowed the alcoholism in his family to affect him as deeply as it had and that it took so long for him to realize that he too needed help to live.

We cause great swaths of destruction and leave a path of wreckage behind us. All of this can be cleared and the vortex toned down to a tolerable swirl. It takes time. Addicts and alcoholics know it takes time to go through their program and find happiness, joy and freedom. Those whom we have deeply affected also need time to heal. There is hope for all of us affected.

♥ ♥ ♥

Peace

Photo credit: Jennifer Rice

“ONE” at a Time

September 14, 2017September 12, 2017 / Tim / 2 Comments

One of our recovery group’s slogans is, “Live one day at a time.” It’s a good slogan to live by for anyone in recovery or not. The idea is not to get too far ahead of ourselves; stay in the moment and leave the future to one’s Higher Power. Along with this slogan I would like to add a bit of an addendum: “Do one thing at a time.”

Those of us in recovery suffer from the disease of “More”.

We wanted more of whatever our addiction consisted of when we were in our disease, and we still want more of everything now. If a little is good, then more should be even better is our logic. It comes as no surprise then, that when we try things, we try them in a huge way. I think it is a recipe for failure.

The floor of gyms and fitness centres are strewn with the remains of lost resolutions and self-promises. How many times have we said to ourselves on January 1st that we are going to join a gym, workout, go on a diet, loose those extra pounds, eat healthier, quit smoking. You know those resolutions we make to become better physically. Or we resolve to meditate daily along with taking walks in nature, reading inspirational literature and eating a vegan diet. There is nothing wrong with all of these things in and of themselves, but those of us with the disease of “More” it spells disaster. Why?

I think it’s because we put all of our eggs in one basket; mentally, all of these resolutions are tied together as one. Should I fail at one of these, say slip up on my diet, then in my mind I have failed at all of them. Or if I miss going to the gym one day then it’s easier to miss another day. My mind says: “Well, you missed going to the gym, you screwed up on that and everything. You may as well eat that eclair now because you’re going to screw up your diet too!” So, downhearted by one small failure, we let all of the other eggs fall out of the hole in our basket instead of stopping and repairing the hole. I am not saying that making several major life changes like this is impossible to do all at once, but I am suggesting that we are putting ourselves at a greater risk failure if we do.

Do one thing, do it well and only then move on.

This is what I have been learning. It takes time for the old habits to die and new ones to replace them. I’ve read in several places that we need to practice a behaviour for at least a month before it becomes a habit. I need to give myself time. I focus on one thing at a time and I have a better chance at success. I believe that is important for those of us with the disease of “More” because we think we can handle it when we’re probably not ready to do so.

It brings to mind a person who was in her second month of recovery. She decided it would be good for her to give up smoking cigarettes too. She asked me to be her ‘quit smoking’ sponsor; if giving up booze and drugs is good then so is smoking. That’s true. However, I recommended that she get through her first six months at least in the program to get herself grounded in recovery before attempting another major change in her life. Unfortunately she was back smoking within 10 days and drinking about a week after that. I can’t say that she would have succeeded in sobriety had she not quit smoking. I don’t know. However, I have seen it happen more than once where people in recovery take on too much at the beginning and make it very difficult for themselves.

One of anything at a time; that’s about all I can handle.

Sobriety has to be my number one priority. As we say in our group, whatever I put ahead of my sobriety will be the second thing I loose. I take my sobriety one day at a time. I’ll share one more metaphor. I like a nice frosted chocolate cake. Hmmm. However, if I shove the whole thing in my mouth at once I will choke. If I eat it one forkful at a time, I can enjoy and savour it.

Take it easy folks. ONE of anything at a time is about all any of us can handle.