Pruning and Rejuvenation

February 23, 2019February 23, 2019 / Tim / 1 Comment

When I was in school, yes many moons ago, young Grasshopper, I learned that the cells of our body could regenerate. That was why when I got a cut it would heal over. I learned that all cells could do this, except neurons. We were born with a certain number and there wouldn’t be any more coming to us. We even joked about it; when we had a night where we had gotten particularly blitzed, we´d say we had burned out a few more brain cells. However, it’s not true. Neurologists tell us now that we do generate new brain cells and continue to do so for all of lives. So, you can teach an old dog a new trick after all.

Neuroplasticity, the ability of the brain to reorganize and regenerate itself allows me to make changes to my life. It means that I am not condemned to the same thinking pathways, the same personality or the same Tim as I was when I was born. Change my neurons and I can change my thinking. I don’t have to be the same person I used to be. However, when the new comes in, the old has to move out to make room for it. There’s the rub!

If I have a Higher Power and I have put my will and my life into its care, then I have to allow it to make those changes to me. I have to give up the old Tim and welcome in the new Tim. Of course, letting go of the old me is easier said than done.

I can see how I have changed since I came into recovery. I am not the same guy that first walked into my first meeting. By working and living the Twelve Steps, I have made major changes in my life and done my best to clean up the damage of my past. I feel I am a better person than before. However, I also feel that my Higher Power isn’t done with me yet. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life just maintaining the status quo. I want to continue to grow. So I have to let go.

I do that, or more honestly, I am trying to do that regularly. In the third step I ask that my Ego be lessened and that I be open to the plethora of possibilities before me. I ask for guidance which I receive via my sponsor and sponsees, through meditation, and by being aware of those serendipitous things which happen around me. I believe that it is important for me to continue to change and grow.

I am reminded of a particularly pretty flowering shrub I had on a property once. Over the years it had grown fairly wild. It wasn’t very thick, there was a lot of dead wood and it produced few flowers. After a bit of research on it, I follow the advice for a radical pruning and fertilizing schedule. It took a few years but the scrub grew new branches, thickened up and gave an incredible spring show of flowers. Still the same plant, but a completely different result.

So, I ask my Higher Power, in its care of my will and life to do the necessary pruning and fertilization in order to allow me to grow and change. I want new neurons and pathways to grow and create a new and evolving Tim. And it will happen as long as I have open-mindedness and willingness.

Terminally Unique

February 19, 2019February 19, 2019 / Tim / 1 Comment

I, like many others who arrive at the doors of recovery rooms, was suffering from a belief that went far beyond my addiction and was at the root of what was killing me. It was a belief that went deep and in many ways was the source of all of the problems that I was encountering in life. I arrived with the disease of ‘Terminal Uniqueness’.

I thought that I was unique. I believed that I was different. I knew that no one else had the challenges that I faced. I was convinced that if anyone else had been bombarded by the set of circumstances that I found myself in, they too would have found a way to escape this prison by over indulging in some sort of ‘medication’ to treat this disease.

Of course I ended up in recovery. I was sure I was the only white, gay, ex-catholic, male, farm boy from Southern Ontario that had ever been born. I had some lower back pain issues. I had a partner who didn’t understand me. I was depressed. I felt I was powerless over my situation and so, of course, I deserved some compensation for all of these difficulties. Getting loaded was my way of dealing with all of those things. I needed some relief from all of the things that were constantly prodding at my mind.

It took going through the Twelve Steps of recovery to allow me to see that I wasn’t ‘unique’ or ‘different’. I came to see that my ‘terminal uniqueness’ was another deadly form of Ego disease. I realized that I hadn’t accepted the package that made me who I was. Thinking I was different was my ego telling me to run away from all that I was instead of embracing it. My problems weren’t connected to my sexuality, my religion, or my environment. My problem was me and my solution was acceptance.

Recovery has helped me to face myself honestly, without judgement and without expectation. I have a garden variety addiction. My story is very similar to the stories of the other folks around the meeting tables. Some dove deeper into their addiction than I did but the result was the same and here we all sit. I learned to dig below the surface to see my past for what it was. I learned to accept my story, my past. I learned to embrace the person I was discovering, perhaps for the first time.

Today I focus on gratitude. I am learning to be grateful that I have all of those qualities that I had been running away from. I have come to understand that I can’t change my past or those qualities, nor to I want to. They are part of my make-up and they are something to celebrate rather than escape from. My ego is a bit tamer these days. Oh, I still fall into the trap of thinking that I can’t make it through whatever I am going through. But, I have survived every challenge that has ever come my way. How do I know? I am still here.

I have learned that accepting what happens as ‘life’, makes it neither positive or negative. I live my life on life’s terms, not mine and that allows me to remember that I can and will make it through.

And for that I am eternally grateful.

Photo by Abhiram Prakash on Pexels.com

Tough Times; Times of Growth

February 16, 2019 / Tim / 2 Comments

I brought a friend home from the hospital yesterday. She had the fourth operation on her back to replace a spinal disc with one made of titanium. It’s part of a series of replaced discs that will allow her to continue to live independently and pain free–once it heals. Until then she will have to go through a lot of pain and three months of recuperation. However, had she not had the operation, she would go through many more months of pain and suffering with no guarantee that the spinal column might be completely severed by the shifting vertebrae. Kind of a hard spot to be in, especially having gone through it three times previously.

A few things come to mind. First, sometimes we have to endure a great deal in order to make it through the present challenge. It may be physical, mental or spiritual pain that we are enduring. And like any change, it brings discomfort and few of us relish being uncomfortable. But we must keep our eyes on the end result to help us keep our sanity. If all goes well, in three months, or however long this challenge should last, life will establish a new normal. We’ll find a new comfort zone and hopefully the pain we experienced will be a memory and we can be grateful to have lived through the experience.

Second, I am struck by the difficulty in accepting help when we are so used to being independent. I was thinking this morning that we all know that infants and elderly need our assistance. But I think that we must remember that all of us are dependent on everyone else. I can’t do it all, and I never could. I rely on the ‘kindness of strangers,’ as well as that of my family and friends. I needed people when I was going through difficult times in my life and I need them to share the wonderful times as well. When we share our interdependence, we help to balance out the good times with the challenging ones. I willingly assist you and later you assist me.

Third, no one likes to give up control. Placing ourselves into the power of another is very difficult for many people. I want to control what is happening to me. Yet, there are times, such as going under the scalpel of a surgeon, or getting strapped into the seat of a jet that we do give up complete control of our lives. But we usually don’t do this on a whim. The people upon whom we rely are trained professionals. There still are risks, but they are minimized by their experience.

All of these three: passing through an ordeal, relying on others and giving up control all are part of trust: trusting others, trusting the process and trusting life. And they have to do with taming our egos as well. ‘I can’t do it all and I never could,’ is a good lesson to practice once in a while. It is also a lesson that we survive everything that comes our way. It may not be the manner in the which we had envisioned or in the time frame that we were hoping for, but we get through it. I am reminded of the character in the movie ‘The Most Exotic Marigold Hotel’ in which the young entrepreneur says “It will all work out in the end. If it’s not working out, it’s not the end.” Whatever it is, you will make it through.