Recovered Alcoholic

This quote reminds me of the 9th step promises, notably ""We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it". EVERYTHING I have learned is by failure. I can't emphasize that enough! I can't learn something unless I try it; and I can't already know how to do something unless I learn how. In sobriety I was given the courage to be wrong and the tools to get back up and try again. This is the exact opposite to the way I learned and processed failure before AA.  When I was a child, I was given no information or false information as to how to respond to, and then process mis-takes accordingly. My entire being took a beating because my adolescent processor was interpreting information from the feelings that were produced by the failure. My feelings were not facts but I had no way to gauge that. I had to unfortunately experience the learning process through the lens of survival because no one around me taught me otherwis...

  “We had to see that every time we played the big shot we turned people against us. We had to see that when we harbored grudges and planned revenge for such defeats, we were really beating ourselves with the club of anger we had intended to use on others. We learned that if we were seriously disturbed, our first need was to quiet that disturbance, regardless of who or what we thought caused it.” AA 12 x 12, Step 4, p. 47 The BB expands on this concept with some marching orders:  "We saw that these resentments must be mastered , but how? We could not wish them away any more than alcohol. This was our course: We realized that the people who wronged us were perhaps spiritually sick.  Prior to this passage, it says that resentments have the power to kill me-not just with alcohol, but with gut wrenching torment-and that death is long and painful. The unprocessed energy will get lodged in the body and start to metastasize blocking adequate flow and circulat...

"This thought brings us to Step Ten, which suggests we continue to take personal inventory and continue to set right any new mistakes as we go along. We vigorously commenced this way of living as we cleaned up the past. We have entered the world of the Spirit. Our next function is to grow in understanding and effectiveness. This is not an overnight matter. It should continue for our lifetime. Continue to watch for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment, and fear. When these crop up, we ask God at once to remove them. We discuss them with someone immediately and make amends quickly if we have harmed anyone. Then we resolutely turn our thoughts to someone we can help. Love and tolerance of others is our code." I was taught early on I have time to mentally take your inventory, my neighbors inventory, the guy online who doesn't share my views inventory, my husbands inventory, watch tv, comment on posts, make a million and one judgments about what others are or are not doing; the...

  From Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 132 …. We aren’t a glum lot. If newcomers could see no joy or fun in our existence, they wouldn’t want it.  We absolutely insist on enjoying life. We try not to indulge in cynicism over the state of the nations, not do we carry the world’s trouble on our shoulders. If the fellowship were cynical and critical like I was when first walked in, my spirit would have recoiled while my physical ego self would have felt right at home. Instead I felt hope for the first time-and through that, I was able to witness joy-which, now that I think about it, I don't think I had ever seen before! If I had, my heavy judgments and burdens blinded me to seeing it let alone experiencing it. I heard that the biggest "sin" is despair and hopelessness and that the only thing that can bridge that lowered state to the higher state into trusting in God territory, is hope and trusting that person's experience until I can hav...

  I, like many of us, looked into becoming an alcohol and drug counselor after I got sober. I mean who better than to counsel alcoholics and addicts then someone in the program-and get paid! The problem I see over and over is when you interweave financial stability or ego in with sacred service, it is automatically tainted because I am now doing it to make money instead of selfless service.  I do however think it is possible to do- if  that person is actively working all three parts of the program, including sponsoring, expanding on their spirituality and service outside the job they are getting paid to do. I mean this person has to be pretty freaking on it. I couldn't, I know my limits. I know of 2 people who successfully do this-I know of over 10 who couldn't. One committed suicide -he was doing AA workshops and a "life coach"-it's very sad.  When I was newly sober I was living with a friend, and her friend came over, she was a therapi...