Made A Decision

Wishing You All A Happy Sober New Year!!!

I asked my Higher Power throughout 2022 for ways in which I could have a lighter footprint on our planet. 

So in May of that year my HP brought me to rural Portugal and on New Year’s Day the following year I was in the middle of moving from my rented flat, with all its modern conveniences, into our purchased home (Rocksalot) that had virtually none.  

Change, change, change ... 

On that day - and for many, many days thereafter - I reminded myself  constantly that Change is always the invitation to a richer life!

Rocksalot had not had an upgrade since roughly World War II, and it was built long before The Great War (WWI) was even underway. It is an old, old pile of rocks with lots of potential hidden inside its bones. Our extensive renovation began the day of our moving in.

Because my teenage grandchildren also live there, along with their Mom, two mod-cons went in immediately. The first was electricity and the other was the Internet. 

Both are very important to me, too, as all my A.A. meetings today take place on Zoom.

Are any of you old enough to remember "the nettie?" How about "the out house?" Rocksalot did not have indoor plumbing or running water, and the heat was from an open fire in the kitchen, which we also used for cooking. 

One by one, one day at a time, those things deemed most important were added (the running water project being near the top of that list).  It was an exciting new year for us and by summer I expected to be living in my own comfortable "granny flat" in the downstairs portion of the house. 

As it happened I ended up moving into the shed across the courtyard - now my perfect little “Dollhouse” (Granny Flat) which a neighbor has described as "charming and magical." But more about that another time.

Now. What about you?

 What have you and your own Higher Power got cooking up together for the New Year ahead? Over the holiday season have you reflected on all the changes that have taken place in your sober life this year? Are you looking for expanding those in the New Year?

Most New Year's Resolutions just "go in one year and out the other." But when we reflect upon what A.A. has given us, and think on how we can open up new vistas in the year ahead through our program of recovery, that's when we start to design the kind of life we want for ourselves. And we get to do it all with HP's help.

In this new year  we may decide to go back to school; pursue a new career; commit to a relationship; adopt a pet; learn to garden or add to the one we have; write a book; take an art class; tackle learning a new language; take up hiking; become a hill climber; learn to sail a boat; get and furnish a dollhouse; become politically active; go camping; read more; learn to cook, bake or expand on what we already know of the culinary arts.

We might adopt a different lifestyle; deepen our spirituality through daily meditation; start a program of Tai Chi, or aerobics, or QIgong and Louhan Patting; devote more time to self-care; spend more time with our children, our grandchildren, or any other child we're fortunate enough to have in our lives ... the list of choices is, truly, unlimited. 

When we drank we may have thought about doing many of these things, but we seldom put thought into action. Early in our addiction it was just easier to escape from our life than to try and improve it. At the end time of our drinking it was impossible to even try. 

In recovery the sky's the limit. Our Higher Power will make sure we have everything we need so we can focus on pursuits we find interesting. That's known in A.A. as being joyous, happy and free.

In addition to my house project I also plan to finish writing the book I'm well into at the moment and then get cracking on a second one. I'll have a brand new garden space to get stuck into, too. Then there are the 101 art projects I plan to splash paint and glitter around in. 

And, as always, I'll give my service to A.A. the priority in my life it deserves, for without my sobriety none of the things I hope to bring to fruition this year ahead will happen.

Our A.A. literature tells us we MUST give it away to keep it. We must share our experience, strength and hope with others to keep our own sobriety. I’ve been around long enough to have seen many who didn’t fall by the wayside.

 A.A. is an organization of volunteers who keep it alive to fulfil its primary purpose of helping suffering alcoholics find what has been so generously given us. Add more service to the fellowship to your own list this year - your life will be far richer for it.

In this nice fresh new year we can genuinely try to live one day at a time, making every effort in that one day to focus on becoming the person we know our Higher Power wants us to be. We follow up on that goal by taking actions that will allow us to blossom. 

And I'll close with the following lovely message sent to me from my dear A.A. friend Jeremy in Ireland: 

Good morning to all in our A.A. family:

 We have booked our flight and are prepared to take off into the New Year. Please make sure your Positive Attitude & Gratitude are secure & locked in the upright position. 

All self-destructive devices; pity, anger, selfishness & resentment should be turned off at this time. All negativity, hurt & discouragement should be put away. 

Should  you lose your Positive Attitude under pressure during this flight, reach up & pull down a prayer. 

Prayers will automatically be activated by faith. Once your faith is activated, you can assist other passengers who are of little faith. 

There will Be No Baggage allowed on this flight.  God, our Captain, has cleared us for takeoff.... Destination -- GREATNESS!! 

Wishing you & your families a New Year filled with new Hope, new Joy, & new BEGINNINGS!!  

  Stay blessed.

 

Made A Decision

   It's Christmas Day. Thank God I haven't missed it.

When you take the alcohol out of a fruitcake, you still have a fruitcake. Lt. John M.

In homes across the world this week people are gathered around brightly lit bejeweled trees to give and receive gifts and to feast on holiday delights, all to celebrate the birth of the God of Love into the world. 

In other homes the Menorah candles are lit (also in surrounding days) for the Festival of Lights -  Hanukkah - offering celebrants hope, along with enjoying many traditional games, gifts and wonderful foods.

Pagans light bonfires this week to celebrate the turn of the year toward longer sunlit days, a return to the light.

December is a month of numerous religious and cultural ceremonies for many faiths and people. Many Christians celebrate other days this month honoring various saints; Buddhists meditate for enlightenment on Rohatsu (Bodhi Day); Zoroastrians honor the death of the Prophet Zarathustra; people of African ancestry celebrate their heritage and identity during Kwanzaa - and these are only a few.

           It's good to remember today that all over the world people are celebrating the return of light to the world, for the theme of the majority of these winter celebrations is birth, rebirth, light in the darkness, cultural and religious identity, enlightenment and love.

   Always love.

AA's theme today - and every day - is also one of  love, and in the new birth of our better selves to be found in our rediscovered compassion and service to others. 

There are meetings around the world today, in person and on zoom, and in them - - as in every month - there will be joy, celebration, laughter - and love. There will also be enlightenment, words of wisdom, and hope shared to keep the darkness at bay.

We will be remembering our darkest days, too - those December celebrations once filled with drunken behavior, guilt, anger, frustration, cynicism, self-loathing and regret. AA set us free by giving us a blueprint for sober living that allows us to feel and share the actual joys of this season.

AA gave us fellow travelers on our spiritual journey to encourage us, laugh with us, cry with us, and share their strength with us when we most need it.

How blessed are we???

I know of people in recovery on this holiday enjoying the company of once bitterly-estranged family members. And I know of one young man sitting right now at the side of his mother's Hospice bed, able to be there and be present for her today. 

Gifts come in many different kinds of packages.

Look around? Are we sober today? Blessed with a roof over our head? Food on the table? Family and friends nearby? If so, we are blessed indeed. Many in our world have none of these things. 

Are we able to reach out today to share our story of recovery? Will we help another suffering alcoholic find the life we have found in AA? If so, our blessings are without number.

 Love is a power, a gift from our Higher Power. But there are many in the world not feeling much love today. We who do are called to share that love with our troubled world. 

We in A.A. are blessed to be witness the power of Love at work in saving the lives - and more importantly, the souls - of others. We get to see dull eyes brighten, sad faces smile again, and new hope lift and straighten shoulders as people are restored to lives of fulfillment and true purpose.

We welcome our newcomers with that kind of power and then get to watch their miracles unfold - moment by moment, day by day, year by year, right before our very eyes.

Some of us may be struggling today under the stress that also accompanies this month. If so, please have a look at other holiday blogs here for some tips on getting through the holidays sober. Most of us will. All of us can. The prayer is that all of us do.

I wish you every possible joy of this season of joy. And I encourage you to dig even deeper in the New Year to find much more of what the program of Alcoholics Anonymous has to offer. And also to feel the love surrounding all of us right now today.

Then pass it on.

 

Note: This is the second blog posted about getting through the holiday season sober. I will be posting the next two over the next couple of week as we are right now in the slipperiest time of the year for those of us in recovery from alcoholism. There is repetition in all these blogs, but that's OK. We can't hear this stuff too often right now to be safe and stay sober.

Made A Decision

                                        Tiz the Season

     Happy Upcoming

Navihanukwanzasolstikkah .

                            also known as the season for 

Meetings-about-staying-sober-while-surviving-the-holiday(s). 

In the run up to the holidays these meetings are held because ghostly and ghastly memories of holidays past start to dance through our heads along with fears about the holidays just ahead. 

These fears are especially strong in those who haven't yet faced a sober holiday season. But, as in most things, the holidays are just another paper tiger once we face up to them by having a plan in place to get through them. 

Making our sober plan is more important than getting cards in the mail, buying candles, or wrapping presents.

 The first part of that plan is to step up our attendance at meetings throughout the holidays. We're fortunate today in having 24/7 meetings available to us on Zoom around the world. 

I should note there are also a small number of A.A. members who will go into the holiday season with perhaps a bit more confidence than is warranted. Confidence is a good thing, but it's always a good idea to be on guard against the cunning, baffling and powerful nature of our disease.

As it points out in the book, "Living Sober, regarding the "biochemical, unchangeable nature of our ailment:"

"Alcoholism respects no ifs. It does not go away, not for a week, for a day, or even for an hour, leaving us nonalcoholic and able to drink again on some special occasion or for some extraordinary reason - not even if it is a once-in-a-lifetime celebration, or if a big sorrow hits us, or if it rains in Spain or the stars fall on Alabama. Alcoholism is for us unconditional, with no dispensations available at any price."

Over the holidays we'll probably be invited to parties where people will be drinking; or we'll have to get through another session with family members who drink (often the way we did); or we'll be tempted seemingly beyond hope by all the Christmas "cheer" ads on television that can spiral us downward into depression.

(More on this fake cheer stuff further along.)

Even holiday chocolates filled with genuine booze can be a booby trap when we don't pay attention! When in doubt about the candy - or the big bowl of holiday punch - ask!!!

First and foremost, get in touch with your own personal brand of Higher Power before you head out to a holiday event. It's the way to renew your courage and to know with that kind of backing you will be victorious over any situation you may encounter.

If we're single and invited to a plus-one party, we can take along a friend in recovery. Decide with them on a signal and excuse for leaving beforehand should one of you start to get uncomfortable. Long time couples can use this same plan.

Family gatherings can be more tricky. While one or two people there may be supportive of your sobriety, others - especially those who drink like we did - may feel threatened by our sobriety. They're the ones who mock our "inability" to drink while forcibly pushing "just one" at us. 

The key here is to let people know on arrival that you have another holiday party to go to after this one. (No one needs to know your other gathering is an AA meeting). Then get the basic must-do part of the visit out of the way (exchanging gifts, eating dinners, lighting candles, whatever) before heading out as soon as possible to your "next holiday party."

Everyone knows there are many parties around the holidays, some of them on the same afternoons or evenings, so the "next holiday party" ploy outlined above works equally well for quickly escaping the often dreaded office party.

As for all those seasonal "Hallmark Moments" on the telly mentioned earlier  - the ones where perfect families gather around perfect tables filled with perfectly cooked comfort foods ... or joyfully exclaim over perfectly-wrapped, perfect gifts from comfy couches in perfectly decorated living rooms ... they don't exist. 

Tell yourself that. 

             No one - NO ONE - has families like that. 

Most of us have families where in close quarter situations there's at least one snarky member verbally trashing other relatives while others argue about politics (with and without fist fights), get drunk, apologise for the undercooked vegetables, or otherwise devote their time to making everyone else feel uncomfortable.

Some of us have families supportive of our need to stay away from booze and other mind-altering chemicals, but many of us do not. Usually our non-alcoholic blood kin can't even stand up in our shoes, much less take a walk in them. They continually say things like, "I really don't get it. Surely you can have just one?" 

Others at the family party, the ones worried about their own drinking, are made very uncomfortable by our sobriety because they don't want to look at their own intake. We are seen as a danger to them. We're the family odd one they'd happily not have to spend time around.

Sometimes, even after we've done our Step Nine and it has been accepted, our family members (those not in recovery) can't let go of the person we were when drinking. We remain the butt of the family jokes because they hold tightly to resentments made at those long ago ruined family events.

We, after all, were the embarrassing ones who knocked over the tree, blew out the sacred candles, punched our father-in-law, fell asleep at the table, upchucked in the sink, made a pass at somebody's partner ... and so on. 

We've put those memories behind us (or don't even remember them), but others have not. They still watch us warily for more of the same. In their eyes we will always remain the family bad guys.

Under the burden of all that baggage, family gatherings - or just family, period -  often remain the hardest place to navigate in our sober lives. 

Or, as I once heard in a meeting, "If it's not one thing, it's another. If it's not another, it's your Mother." 

The good news is, we now have another family - our A.A. family - to validate, support, encourage and get us safely through the holiday season and all other life events. 

Our A.A. family members "get us." We don't have to explain our discomfort at being surrounded by people drinking, trays full of drinks on offer, and people gulping down drinks while eyeing us like we're the weird ones. 

All the meetings about holiday hazards help get us centered for the tinsel-strewn days ahead. There will be people in them who have lived through all the dangers of holidays past and still stayed sober. They assure us if they could do it, we can do it. And they're right!

 A.A. members in our holiday meetings are there to share their experience, strength and hope on how to safely get through "the most wonderful time of the year" ... 

               and to top up their own sober resolve in the process.

So go laugh and be merry. The holidays only roll around once a year after all -

Thank God!

 

Made A Decision

    Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps ... 

The Spiritual Experience, or Spiritual Awakening, is said in our literature to be critical to our ongoing sobriety. So how do I know if my spiritual experience is real? 

The short answer is: Are you sober today?     It's real.

A spiritual Experience is basically a radical change in our life direction via a connection to a power greater than ourselves. It can be sudden - (1) as was the case with AA's co-founder Bill W. - or (2) it can take place over time, one day at a time, as we put spiritual ideas into practice. 

Most spiritual experiences in A.A. (and probably elsewhere) are of the type 2 variety, a combination of a slow awakening, but one having clear guidepost experiences along the way.

We see it in newcomers when they suddenly start to see the wonders of nature all around them and when they take real delight in helping a fellow member of the fellowship. We often don't immediately see spiritual growth happening in ourselves, but we can see it happening in others around us in the program.

One Big Book story illustrates that perfectly: Yet I had a spiritual experience the night I called A.A., though I didn't realize it until later. Two angels came, carrying a real message of hope, and told me about A.A. 

My sponsor laughed when I denied that I had prayed for help. I told him that the only time I had mentioned God was when, in my despair at being unable to get either drunk or sober, I had cried out, 'God! What am I going to do?' 

He replied, 'I believe that prayer was a pretty good one for a first one from an atheist. It got an answer, too . . .

A few of the signs someone is experiencing spiritual growth is they start having an increased empathy with others, while becoming more intuitive about themselves and the events happening around them.  (We will intuitively know.)

They feel a stronger connection with nature and realize that all life is sacred, not just human life. 

They are uncomfortable around negative people or those behaving badly. 

Spirit-guided people live in the moment and generally bring peace to those around them.

The effects of a spiritual experience are long-lasting and ever-evolving. Critics of Bill W.'s immediate life-changing awakening suggested he had hallucinated God's presence, but the results of his experience were both long-lasting and world-changing. Those who hallucinate simply don't reap those kinds of lasting benefits!

Dr. Bob, on the other hand, suffered strong cravings for alcohol for a long time in his recovery. He only found relief through helping others which probably helped with that rapid growth of Akron's AA Group Number One.

In an early letter between AA's founders, one wrote: Though it may seem a paradox, we must believe in spiritual forces which we cannot see more than in material things which we can see, if we are going to truly live. In the last analysis, the universe consists more of thought or mathematical formulas than it does of matter as we understand it. Between one human being and another only spiritual forces will suffice to keep them in harmony. These spiritual forces we know, because we can see their results although we cannot see them. A changed life - a new personality - results from the power of unseen spiritual forces working in us and through us.

I once heard a speaker give four reasons that people change for the better, but he was talking about non-alcoholics so only one of his reasons applied to us - this one:  

People change when they hurt enough and they have to.

Even then many A.A. members seem content to achieve sobriety while essentially not seeking the true spiritual experience that changes them into entirely different people. 

We've all met them in the rooms, old timers who share the same story every time. They talk a lot about their drinking days, but not a lot about how they've stayed sober or what's going on in their life right now. We are always left wondering who they really are. What I know for sure is I don't want what they have. 

I was once envious of Bill W.'s immediate spiritual transformation, but the Big Book promised me I could have one of my own no matter how long it took, as long as I stayed sober and kept trying. 

I stayed sober and I kept trying, but I will admit it took a long old time before I understood even the basics of God's will for me. ("Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly.")

We - WE - are God's worker bees, both in A.A. and in our larger society.  Any spiritual power we may manifest is God in action. We don't change others, but God working through us can bring change in the lives of others. A.A. gives us a tool kit for living so that we can become God's "tool kit” out in the world. 

Our founders understood this, and they understood their (our) limitations. As Bill W. wrote in a letter in 1967: Day by day, we try to move a little toward God's perfection. So we need not be consumed by maudlin guilt for failure to achieve His likeness and image by Thursday next. Progress is our aim, and His perfection is the beacon, light-years away, that draws us on. 

Well all this might sound very uplifting, but where's the fun in it? Is there any? Look around you in the rooms. Look for the people working a good program and reaping its rewards. Have you noticed they smile a lot? That they seem to find the fun in everything they do? Spiritual people tend to be joyful people.

As the Rabbi Rebbe Nachman noted:  Joy is the highest expression of love. Joy is not incidental to the spiritual quest. It is vital. 

And the spiritual guru whose writings inspired A.A.'s founders (and A.A. members ever since), Emmet Fox, wrote this about smiling: A smile affects your whole body from the skin right in to the skeleton, including all blood vessels, nerves, and muscles. It affects the functioning of every organ. It influences every gland. Even one smile often relaxes a number of muscles, and when the thing becomes a habit you can easily see how the effect will mount up. Last year's smiles are paying you dividends today.

The effect of a smile on other people is no less remarkable. It disarms suspicion, melts away fear and anger and brings forth the best in the other person - which best he immediately proceeds to give back to you. A smile is to personal contacts what oil is to machinery, and no intelligent engineer ever neglects lubrication.

Spiritual seekers also tend to have a lot of gratitude for their lives and their life lessons. They pray for others and they meditate to discover the will of their Higher Power for themselves. When we pray it changes our attitude toward God. When we meditate we feel God's presence and know that all is well. 

When we stop being grateful our negativity creeps back in to stop the flow of good into our lives. 

A.A.'s 12 & 12 has a lot to say about the benefits of prayer and meditation, including: Meditation is something which can always be further developed. It has no boundaries, either of width or height. Aided by such instruction and example as we can find, it is essentially an individual adventure, something which each one of us works out in his own way. 

Daily prayer and meditation, laughter, friendship, meetings and all the other things that make up our doing-the-doing of A.A. bring us to the discovery of our own true wonderful inner self. From them we gain strength and experience a sense of well-being.

 We eventually  become open to all that life has to offer and we become filled with gratitude at knowing God is doing for us all those things which we would otherwise be unable to do for ourselves.

My first waking thought before becoming an active and contributing member of Alcoholics Anonymous was not I arise, O God, to do Thy will. My thoughts then were frantic with worry about just getting through another day of a life that felt like I was on a toboggan to hell. 

But one sober day at a time, using the tools of recovery, that morning prayer has become my mantra to a happy fulfilled life - where laughter and miracles are the soundtrack and visuals. 

If A.A. could do that for me, a one time fear-filled miserable angry drunk woman, it can do it for you, too. Just follow the instructions. A.A. is your shortcut to your spiritual awakening. 

And don't forget to smile.