Progress Not Perfection

“Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom.” Lao Tzu      I was sober over a year by the time I turned 21. I thought I knew everything there was to know.  I believed my only true character defect was chewing tobacco and a foul mouth. I was also full of shit!  I made an effort to quit cursing and replaced Copenhagen with Camels Lights. That was the extent of my recovery efforts beyond not drinking.      Like all young adults, I lived with an air of immortality. I gave no thought to who I was or what I wanted. I left my future in the hands of fate and figured it would all fall into place in the end. In truth, I was full of fear and self-loathing and had no idea who I was or what I wanted. All I knew was that I was cursed with alcoholism and could not drink. I felt like I was missing out on life. Oh, how I resented it!      I went to meetings on a regular basis only because the...

FEAR – Fuck Everything and Run!  Flight has always been my reaction to fear, and there is no emotion I hate more than fear. Anxiety and its incessant mental ruminations always accompany it. It chews me up and spits me out. Then there is the awful feeling in my gut that steals my breath and a pulse so intense it feels as if my heart is going to beat straight out my chest. It often feels as if there is no escape from this self-inflicted torment. No matter how much I drank, I could never escape my fears or myself.  I already wrote a blog post about dealing with long-term sobriety. This post centers on the risks of unresolved fear in recovery. There are no mincing words here, dealing with fear newly sober is a bitch! When first get sober, our only conscious fear is that of getting drunk again. It could also be the possible fear of being sober. Addiction has a twisted comfort; we love our booze. The bottle was often our best friends. Letting go of it seems terri...

A blessing of long-term sobriety is perspective. Charting my growth through the lens of recovery. There are many instances where I sputtered and stalled but my life is certainly better than I ever dreamed possible. Without a doubt, getting sober when I did, saved my life. It took me too long to understand the gift of sobriety.  I still don’t see the entirety of it all. I feel blessed catching only glimpses of possibilities, which range from the mundane to the spectacular. I am convinced AA is but a start to a greater life. But I have to stay centered on the principles of the program to get there. The Steps are not a one-time exercise taking me from misery to serenity. They are living guidelines that can take me as far I want to go. Practicing the AA principles in my life has brought about a dramatic transformation of being. In the beginning, AA granted the means to get sober. It offers me a safe place to go for community and support. Most of it all it gave me hope. ...

                 Resentment! The awful poison we take while hoping someone else dies. The Buddha said that holding onto resentment is like picking up a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else – we get burned.    Unresolved resentment leads to feelings of victimization and increased negativity; a state of mind where we are consumed by bitterness, anger and discontentment.    Long term effects can make us physically sick, emotionally hostile and bleed over to affect all of those around us. A life centered on  deep resentment leads to only futility and unhappiness .    For the alcoholic harboring them it can be fatal. How do we overcome resentments?   How do we let go of our negative feelings toward those who have “wronged” us?    Resentments can come from anywhere. Maybe we have an unsympathetic boss or a controlling spouse...

Citing the dictionary, resentment is defined as the bitter indignation at being treated unfairly. Commonly it is said that resentment is akin to drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.   Real or imagined, resentment, shapes and darkens the twisted view of our self-importance and self-impotence.   Left unchecked resentment becomes our identity blinding and burning us with anger and hatred. I know because I lived that way for shameful number of years. What really causes resentment within us? What personal slight could cause us to spiral downward into such a poisonous state of mind?   Is it a knee jerk reaction to perceived wrongs or our egocentric view of the world? Most of the time I am positive that those who have wounded us in such a manner do not even know they have harmed us. Perhaps it’s because we have no way of expressing such feelings, of if we do, they are emotionally immature and anger filled responses. I don’t think it can be...