Made A Decision

(66)

               Uniquely Qualified

"Giving good wishes to others acts like sunlight, filtering into the dark corners of their minds and lightening their burden."

Who wouldn't want to do that?

We didn't -

not back in those nightmare years of alcohol abuse.

But now that we're awake in AA we have better dreams - dreams that include helping others wake from their alcoholic nightmare, too.

Never fall into the trap of thinking you're too new in recovery to actually

become the hand of AA that reaches out to others ... you reached out to

others at your very first meeting by your courage in being there.

And by coming back for your second meeting you inspired us all once again.

As author Oswald Chambers wrote: "God’s training is for now, not later. His purpose is for this very minute, not for sometime in the future."

As our own Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions book states:

"It was discovered that when one alcoholic had planted in the mind of another the true nature of his malady, that person could never be the same again."

In AA we learn our job is to try to bring out the good, not to criticize the

bad. Every alcoholic has suffered plenty being criticized and judged. That

didn't get us sober. 

Hearing that we could change ... that there was a solution for our problem ... that was the key.

And it's AA members who hand the still-suffering alcoholic the keys to the kingdom.

We are uniquely qualified to do so.

We know from experience what the newcomer is fearing and feeling.

And we know the freedom they'll find in AA. 

We don't look for "the bad" in our newcomers, we look for the good. That kind of "judging others" always pays off.

We encourage the good points we find and ignore any bad, knowing the good will quickly win out as recovery takes hold.

Like most of us (all?) I arrived in AA thinking my life was over. That I was the ultimate loser. That a thirsty life without being able to take a drink was all that lay ahead for me.

Oh, woe!

But I left my first meeting with a new thought ... and with a smidgen of hope ...

that the people in that meeting had the answer I needed; maybe my life wasn't

over? Maybe, just maybe, better days were in store?

The people in my first meeting instilled that in me. They said all the right things. Because they had lived it, they knew all the right things to say. They told me I could have a wonderful sober life, one beyond my wildest dreams, if I just gave AA a fair trial. 

And they were right! 

When we extend the hand of AA we can expect miracles of change in people's lives. We know people can be changed. All we have to do is look in the mirror!

Our troubled world needs good people helping others. We are good people

reflecting the goodness and strength we have learned in AA. And what we

do for others has impact in helping them become all they are meant to

be, too. We must never doubt our ability to channel God's strength for

others. 

What we give we also receive. When we offer strength to others we

strengthen ourselves.

Bill W., regarding his first meeting ever with Dr. Bob, the meeting that was

to launch our wonderful program of recovery, perhaps said it best:

"Dr. Bob did not need me for his spiritual instruction. He had already had more of that than I. 

What he did need, when we first met, was the deflation at depth and the understanding that only one drunk can give to another. 

What I needed was the humility of self-forgetfulness and the kinship with another human being of my own kind."

 

Made a Decision

(65)

Life Lessons Are Never Easy

I'm in the middle of a life "lesson" at the moment and I'm feeling like I'm not doing all that great with parts of it. 

Life lessons are never easy for us alcoholics at any time in recovery. Sometimes old character defects we thought we’d surrendered long ago come back in a new and different guise to let us know we still have more work to do in that area.

My lesson involves difficult neighbors. 

I'm praying for them, doing my best to always be civil with them, not retaliating (much) over their attempts to control my behavior, and surrendering them daily to my Higher Power.

So far I have not smacked anyone upside the head, but the desire has been there a time or two. I've had to keep praying it away.

In our Big Book it says:  "... A.A. is a synthesis of all the philosophy I've ever read, all of the positive, good philosophy, all of it based on love. I have seen that there is only one law, the law of love, and there are only two sins; the first is to interfere with the growth of another human being, and the second is to interfere with one's own growth."

I believe every word of that quote. I know my neighbors are operating from pure motives in wanting to protect me from myself. They don't believe in vaccinations or mask wearing and they flood me with "information" about the dangers of same. 

 Earlier this week I politely (and without even a hint of sarcasm - gold star me) offered them some alternative websites to look at for information and said I respect their right to their opinions and only ask that they show me the same respect.

 I felt pretty good about that. 

So the following day they left me a pissy note saying I shouldn't continue to feed the neighborhood feral cats, because the food attracts rats and other vermin. I have managed to resist telling them cats kill vermin, because that will only escalate the problem. That's how wars get started - and continue.

There was a time I could have drunk over an irritating little problem like this one, or do something mean to harm them in some way, or sulked, hid, not talked to them or - worse - talked to them quite loudly and viciously. 

But in AA I have learned to believe in the power of love by having seen it in action. I've seen how it can - and does - change people for the better. It works, when we work it.

                                     I don’t want to be at war with my neighbors. 

So I'm not going to react to my current "lesson" with old behavior.

 I already know how to annihilate people. I still don't always know how to love them, though, but I'm working on it.

And it’s not just one character defect poking me with a stick right now, either. I also know how to manipulate people, having at one time been quite good at it.

I’ve done a negative bit of that this week, too. 

Acceptance, of course, is the key to getting through this lesson with a minimum of harm being done to others or to myself. So is striving for patience, tolerance, kindness and a lot less self-centeredness. 

Thank God I have the AA tool kit to work with right now. But even with it wide open in front of me, I still have moments of wanting to hammer the problem into a shape I like, rather than reaching for a tool I find more difficult to use.  

The lesson I’m here to learn from today appears to be mostly the application of "The Golden Rule" …  to do unto others as I would have them do unto me.

I’ll be a better person if I can manage to learn what my annoying neighbors are here to teach me about me, and to work on it - and to continue working - no matter how they respond.

We all have lessons our Higher Power sends to teach us. 

What's yours today?

 

Greetings …

I have begun another book project, so I no longer have as much free time available for this blog.

I will continue to write one every week, but new entries will be less than 500 words and therefore not as lengthy as those written previously.

Hopefully they will still offer something of use in your recovery.

___________________

 

 

Made a Decision

 

(64)

 

  

Living Sober Takes Practice

 

When we have turned to mild-altering-chemicals for dealing with life over the years - with alcohol being our big one - we don’t jump ship into sobriety easily.

 

It takes time and practice - Slowbriety - to become comfortable with the very different lifestyle sobriety offers us. 

 

In the beginning we have no idea how to even live a life without high drama. We will even create situations to produce it just to elevate our comfort level.

 

 We’ll start fights with our neighbors, gossip at work, shake our fists (and fingers) at other drivers, and angrily exit meetings - with or without leaving tire rubber in the parking lot.

I know this, because I’ve done all of this - and much more.

 

As long as we don’t drink over any of the above, it’s all OK. 

We’ll learn over time that a life without high drama contains serenity. And serenity will truly - eventually - become our goal!

 

Newcomers often speak of the beauty in life they are now just noticing … of the butterfly on the neighbor’s window, the magical full moon, the sparkle on the sea water … things never noticed when lost in our disease. 

 

But it can still be hard to see the butterfly when we pick a fight with our neighbor. Nor will the full moon shine as brightly when sleep eludes us because of our quarrel.

As for that sparkle on the water? Silver quickly turns to pewter when our minds darken in anger. 

 

Our happier sober lives are built with new attitudes - step by step. When we develop - with practice - the daily use of the 10th step and begin to examine our part in our problems, we’re on our way.

Was I intolerant, impatient, self-centered, afraid? Did my own confused emotions cause this problem to escalate? 

 

These are the kinds of things we learn to identify and correct as we trudge along our sober path. Don’t be impatient with yourself. If you didn’t drink over a situation that would have once sent you to the bottle, pat yourself on the back and promise yourself you’ll try to do better next time. 

 

AA's co-founder, Dr. Bob, himself said, "I don't think we can do anything very well in this world unless we practice it.

And I don't believe we do A.A. too well unless we practice it … That was not easy for me, and I assume that it is difficult for everyone else."

 

Made A Decision

(63)

                   Here's a Question for You ...

     What have you done for AA - or for a still suffering alcoholic - today?

Have you had a thought today about others still out there caught in the hell of our disease? 

I try to, but it's only because it was once sharply brought to my attention. 

It happened in the building I was living in.

My apartment back then, when I was much younger, was a busy place. People in recovery dropped by regularly for coffee and AA chats. I had sponsees there doing step work. I held weekly studies on books that had helped me in my own recovery. 

But one day an ambulance arrived out front. 

The paramedics were searching for a man who lived in my building, but I didn't know him. His apartment number, however, was from "around back," so I directed them there.

In due course the paramedics wheeled a stretcher from the back apartment to their ambulance out front. 

On the stretcher was a living skeleton, a rack of bones covered with tight yellow skin, topped by an enormously swollen belly. 

My neighbor. 

Dying of alcoholism.

So there I was, Little Miss AA, living the promises while my neighbor was quietly drinking himself to death just a few doors away.

How about your neighbor? 

Is he or she dying of alcoholism? 

Do you know?

 

More importantly, do you care?

Because of my own apartment experience I learned to pay closer attention to the people living near me. And I let people know I'm in recovery from our chronic terminal illness whenever I think that information might be helpful. 

As it says in our Big Book: 

"Near you, alcoholics are dying helplessly like people on a sinking ship. If you live in a large place, there are hundreds. High and low, rich and poor, these are future fellows of Alcoholics Anonymous. 

Among them you will make lifelong friends. You will be bound to them with new and wonderful ties, for you will escape disaster together and you will commence shoulder to shoulder your common journey. 

Then you will know what it means to give of yourself that others may survive and rediscover life. You will learn the full meaning of 'Love thy neighbor as thyself.'" 

That's as true - maybe even more so - than when our Big Book was written.

So what can we do?

 We can invite doctors, nurses, police officers, social workers, and others to our open meetings. We can provide those same people with AA brochures. We can answer their questions. 

Our groups can hold 4th Step and other kinds of workshops offering information about AA. 

And we, as individuals, can carry the message to that person in tonight's news who is now headed to jail after causing a fatal accident while drunk.  

My home group had business cards printed to hand out or leave where they might do some good. They read: 

"If you want to drink, that's your business. If you want to quit, that's ours ... AA has been helping people stay sober for nearly 100 years."

 (And then it gave contact information). 

I recently heard about people in AA who were repelled and repulsed by a wet drunk who showed up at their meeting. Can you even imagine that?

 That drunk was there to show everyone what we were like - so that those there could help him become the sober person he was meant to be. 

That's Our Job!!!

My sobriety - and yours - is given us just for today and is "contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition."

 That means prayer, meditation, step work, book studies, meetings and giving our sobriety away to someone who needs it. That's how we get to keep it, people.

The seats in AA are never empty. Lost members are soon replaced when God points another newcomer in our direction, a person perhaps more willing to do the job we've been given our sobriety to do.

I was fortunate in early recovery to be taken on a lot of 12-step calls. There I got to see late-stage alcoholism up close and personal. I hated those calls at the time, but I'm very grateful for them now. 

It was there I learned those of us who have escaped drinking - just for today - are uniquely qualified to pull others out of the jaws of our ugly disease.

But all of us can, and often do, coast along on our own sobriety, skipping meetings, not calling our sponsor, not being willing to do service in our group ... truly skating along on thin ice. 

We are not ever cured of our cunning, baffling and powerful disease. Not paying attention to the basics of our recovery every single day is truly playing with fire.

Coasting for too long leads many of us back to drinking. That wake-up call sometimes does the trick and we, with new understanding, return to fully embrace our miraculous program. 

But some of us don't make it back, and for us, to drink is to die.

Our lives before AA weren't pretty. Lives of baffled defeat never are. Those of us given a second chance at life in AA are the lucky ones. Most drunks never even get inside the door for their first meeting. 

So every recovering addict is a miracle. Many of us should have been dead long ago. 

We have been given a second chance at life and the promises of AA guarantee us a good one - as long as we continue to give our sobriety away to others.

"Helping others is the foundation stone of your recovery. A kindly act once in a while isn't enough. You have to act the Good Samaritan every day, if need be."

Alcoholics Anonymous 4th Edition

One of my good AA friends, a man with 30-plus years recovery, says he gets choked up with emotion every time he hears the "Responsibility Pledge" read in a meeting. 

Here it is:

"I am responsible. When anyone, anywhere, reaches out for help, I want the hand of A.A. always to be there. And for that: I am responsible."

My friend takes that pledge seriously. 

I do, too. 

Every single sober one of us owes a debt of gratitude to AA that we can never repay no matter how long we live. 

So my question remains: 

What have YOU done for AA - or for a still suffering alcoholic - today? 

 

Note: A lot of you email me with input about these blogs. And I love reading them. But I have also discovered that here at the very end of each blog there is the tea-tiny phrase "no comments" written in pale blue. If you click on that it allows you to make a comment right here. Feel free to indulge. 

Made a Decision

(62)

Mental Meanderings of an AA Old-Timer

During my now 78-years of living I have survived: infancy; childhood; teenage angst; teenage drinking; abuse; the betrayal of friends; debt; bankruptcy; poverty; the 1960s; exposure to murder; divorce; single-parenting my four children; deaths of best friends; alcoholism; living in five different countries; a brutal beating during an attempted rape; living in five different states; the death of my ex-husband; my parents’ funerals; homicidal attempts; smoking; quitting smoking; suicide attempts; burying a brother; burying a nephew; burying two grand-nephews; a destructive affair; a totaled car wreck; loss of precious pets; being fired; winning international awards; getting fat; clinical depression; authoring five books; hurricanes; loneliness; unbelievably wonderful friendships and ongoing occasions for hearty laughter (mainly at myself).

And those are just the highlights.

If you are reading this, you are a survivor, too, and have quite possibly survived far worse than anything I have ever experienced. But the past is now just smoke. We learn to blow it away as we embrace our new way of experiencing the world as productive sober people.

Ideally we reach out to help others get up that steep hill, too. We nudge, but we don't demand. We encourage, but we don't push. We cheer always, but we never condemn. That's the goal. We get to keep our sobriety by continually giving it away to others.

Before my 40th chronological birthday I had become divorced, cynical, angry, tough and confused. I would have lived and died that way, too, but as it turned out, I haven't had to. Because at the age of 37, I stumbled into the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous and there, against all the odds (and possibly bets), I have remained.

We're all survivors here in AA; damned lucky ones.

Today, through no special gifts of my own beyond longevity, I have become an AA old-timer.

So in addition to those things listed earlier, I have now also survived the certifiable madness of early recovery; the rebellion and depression of teenage-years recovery; the sometimes smugness of 20-something recovery, and the third decade's evolving desire - at least for me - for more spiritual awareness.

Being now just barely into my "40s," I'm discovering the possibility of an end to that yearning feeling, that semi-contented-wondering, that certain-uncertainty that has been with me throughout my sobriety.

I have spiritually meandered all over the place in the process of staying clean and sober … from leaving the Christian church of my childhood to explore guitar-playing too-happiness churches, to atheism, agnosticism, Wicca, studying Judaism, Buddhism, Shintoism, New Age pink-paint-ism, embracing Nature Worship, Edgar Cayce’s teachings, reading more spiritual books than I can count, accepting near death experiences, belief in reincarnation, the Bible, pondering the nature of evil, and back now to studying the actual teachings set out by Jesus, that making-wine-out-of-water guy I first heard about before the age of five.

I've been told by a lot of people over the course of my life that I think too much, and given that last paragraph, they're probably right. I can complicate anything when I really set my alcoholic mind to it. So getting mentally clear on the God thing didn't come easy.

What I have finally learned, and now know for sure, is that my God loves all people, including boring people, angry people, humorless people, and political Conservatives.

God also loves ribald sinners, drunks and fallen women. He seems to like them quite a lot, actually, or so many parts of the Bible would indicate.

God may be saddened by our actions, but he never gives up on us, either. Redemption is always just around the corner when we most need it. We just have to want it.

(If you are still struggling with the God "idea;" or don't believe in the God who believes in you; or don't want to think about this God thing much, it's maybe time to bail on this blog. I won't be offended. I've been right where you are. I was there for a very long time. I'm just grateful I'm not there now.)

Before I write another word, I must digress to get the gender thing out of the way. The way I interpret Genesis 5:2 ("Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam ...") is that we, the Divine representatives of God on earth, are both male and female. 

So I tend to use the words He and She interchangeably when talking about, and to, the Father/Mother God of my own understanding. My Higher Power seems fine with that. But feel free to put whatever spin you want to on Genesis 5:2 - or anything else you read in that book. Preachers were the first spin-doctors after all.

The absolutely most beautiful thing about AA is that the people sitting around us in a meeting can - and do - hold every possible personal opinion about politics and religion, but they park those big guns at the door when they enter the rooms.

Our meetings are all about learning to live happy, sober, productive lives and helping one another do the same. How beautiful is that? How God given?

As author Melody Beattie wrote: "We give others and ourselves the right to grow at our own pace, without judgment, and with much trust that all is well and is on schedule. When we are ready, when the time is right, and when our Higher Power is ready – we will know what we need to know."

One of our founders once wrote in a long-ago letter: "I am today more a pupil in AA than the teacher I once thought I was."

I think over time all of us in AA get to that place.

I know today I learn from every member, either how to behave or how not to; how to achieve my goals, or sabotage them; how to complain or how to overcome.

The choice is always mine to apply what I learn, or not. The quality of my life will always reflect those decisions.

As we grow in faith we discover our Higher Power goes before us to smooth the path, untangle the knots, heal the resentments, and make living life easier.

Faith or fear? That's the ongoing choice. I find when I choose the former worry vanishes from my life.

And yes, there are still "lessons" to be learned at every stage of recovery, and they remain just as tough as our earlier ones. The difference is, we eventually learn how to get out of our own way faster. We also find them easier to navigate once we know our Higher Power really does always have our back. Or so it has been for me.

I have at last come to understand my Higher Power has always been rooting for me on a personal level, pointing me in one clear direction - toward deepening our own one-to-one relationship - every single stumbling step along my way.