โ only when i make recovery my first priority โ
Posted: Tue, Dec 2, 2014 08:01:38 AM
does my situation begin to change. such a change in my life, finally i get a break from the whole HIGHER POWER gig, and into something else. a couple of ideas popped into my head as i sat down for the 2.2 seconds i could eke out this morning to meditate. the first was something i now view as kind of trivial and trite, that i heard over and over and over and over again, when i sat in the wrong rooms. the second being a blow by blow recap of what my friend in active addiction was talking about a week ago.
when i was young in recovery, one of the memes around the rooms i happened to be sitting in, was this notion of a recovery totem. to those who ascribed to the idea it was like, their priorities had to be GOD -> RECOVERY -> SELF, as all things, including their recovery flowed through GOD. i get it. it is simple, easy to understand and elegantly puts the relationship of us to GOD into proper perspective from the Abrahamic view of the divine. something bugged me about it back then, and although i was just beginning my journey towards the POWER that fuels my recovery, i was still disturbed by that notion. another of the memes around just about every different flavor of recovery meeting i have attended is what i put in front of my recovery i lose. so the war between these two was quickly settled, and the the notion of the recovery totem was pitched to my garbage pile of ideas that did not cut it. the literature won out over the colloquialism and i have never regretted that particular decision. for me, my relationship with the POWER that fuels my recovery, is BECAUSE i am clean and working an active program of recovery. HIGHER POWER, SELF and RECOVERY are not hierarchical in my view rather they are intertwined and all dependent upon the other, a totem or any other construct that suggest a greater importance of one of that triad, just does not cut it in my world view anymore and i reject without prejudice.
which brings me to the second theme, the words of my friend the using addict. in fact he said the craziest shit happened when he was clean. now i know that at max, he may have scraped together six maybe seven days, over the course of the past six months, since hitting the streets again. i know that at one week clean, i was certainly more crazy than the day after i stopped using. in fact for me, if i did not use at least once in every month, when i was forced into urinating on demand, i was a total basket case and everything that happened around me, happened to me. things that were just life on life's terms, were big deals to me. my feelings were easily hurt, and i walked around with a perpetual grey cloud over my head. staying clean, looked less and less attractive, but never sunk to the level of the alternative for me. all that i saw, felt and yes experienced seemed crazy and worse than when i had the buffer of chemical bliss. when after thirteen months of being around the program, but staying clean, i finally started to find a path of recovery i could follow, there was quite the relief, my pain and suffering had paid off. i am not speaking of the pain and suffering of active addiction. no i am speaking of the pain and suffering with being resigned and compliant to a period of time of not using. the craziest sh!t happened in those thirteen months, but i was not prepared for the life i have been given today. that took a major paradigm shift to a different worldview, where substances were merely a symptom and not the focus. today, recovery and by that i mean active recovery, is my life and even though i have some days clean i still do most of the stuff i learned in that other fellowship, albeit, quite differently than i did way back when. one of those things, is to be where i say i am going to be, so the time has come to shut this down and get headed down the road to work. today i am good with the notion that anything and everything i put in front of my recovery, is making the choice that i am willing to lose it. today i am good that even though there is stuff to do, sometimes a night off, is a better plan than working like a mad man. and today i am secure that when i pay attention i will get everything i need, just for today.
when i was young in recovery, one of the memes around the rooms i happened to be sitting in, was this notion of a recovery totem. to those who ascribed to the idea it was like, their priorities had to be GOD -> RECOVERY -> SELF, as all things, including their recovery flowed through GOD. i get it. it is simple, easy to understand and elegantly puts the relationship of us to GOD into proper perspective from the Abrahamic view of the divine. something bugged me about it back then, and although i was just beginning my journey towards the POWER that fuels my recovery, i was still disturbed by that notion. another of the memes around just about every different flavor of recovery meeting i have attended is what i put in front of my recovery i lose. so the war between these two was quickly settled, and the the notion of the recovery totem was pitched to my garbage pile of ideas that did not cut it. the literature won out over the colloquialism and i have never regretted that particular decision. for me, my relationship with the POWER that fuels my recovery, is BECAUSE i am clean and working an active program of recovery. HIGHER POWER, SELF and RECOVERY are not hierarchical in my view rather they are intertwined and all dependent upon the other, a totem or any other construct that suggest a greater importance of one of that triad, just does not cut it in my world view anymore and i reject without prejudice.
which brings me to the second theme, the words of my friend the using addict. in fact he said the craziest shit happened when he was clean. now i know that at max, he may have scraped together six maybe seven days, over the course of the past six months, since hitting the streets again. i know that at one week clean, i was certainly more crazy than the day after i stopped using. in fact for me, if i did not use at least once in every month, when i was forced into urinating on demand, i was a total basket case and everything that happened around me, happened to me. things that were just life on life's terms, were big deals to me. my feelings were easily hurt, and i walked around with a perpetual grey cloud over my head. staying clean, looked less and less attractive, but never sunk to the level of the alternative for me. all that i saw, felt and yes experienced seemed crazy and worse than when i had the buffer of chemical bliss. when after thirteen months of being around the program, but staying clean, i finally started to find a path of recovery i could follow, there was quite the relief, my pain and suffering had paid off. i am not speaking of the pain and suffering of active addiction. no i am speaking of the pain and suffering with being resigned and compliant to a period of time of not using. the craziest sh!t happened in those thirteen months, but i was not prepared for the life i have been given today. that took a major paradigm shift to a different worldview, where substances were merely a symptom and not the focus. today, recovery and by that i mean active recovery, is my life and even though i have some days clean i still do most of the stuff i learned in that other fellowship, albeit, quite differently than i did way back when. one of those things, is to be where i say i am going to be, so the time has come to shut this down and get headed down the road to work. today i am good with the notion that anything and everything i put in front of my recovery, is making the choice that i am willing to lose it. today i am good that even though there is stuff to do, sometimes a night off, is a better plan than working like a mad man. and today i am secure that when i pay attention i will get everything i need, just for today.
∞ DT ∞