Blog entry for:

of self-support. okay, what i heard this morning, probably what i have written about before, is that self-support is not the same thing as
self-sufficiency. i was self-sufficient when i came to the rooms, but far from self-supporting. i required others to fill my emotional needs, cover my expenses when i was inevitably short between paydays, and manipulated others into getting me high, when i was hoarding my resources. i would have told you, that contrary to all appearances i was totally self-sufficient and only needed a little bit of help to tide me over. what i was looking for was a handout, a loan with no due date, and never a helping hand, but i certainly could make it seem like it was hand up and not an entitlement. day in and day out, i looked to the world around me to provide me what i needed and more importantly what i wanted, so when the time came for me to take my place in the real world, after decades of active addiction i was more than a bit puzzled.
that puzzlement turned to anger and resentment, in those early days,m and it was not until i finally became a member that i realized that what i was looking at was neither self-sufficiency nor self-support. i was dependent upon my loved ones to provide me everything i needed as a human being, and i got to spend what money i had accumulated chasing the specter of crass materialism as my substitute for the substances that kept me comfortably numb.
when i started this round of steps, after a few days clean, i realized that self-support had come to mean something different and what i saw as my right, was just entitlement in disguise. i had come to believe that since i had clean-time, certain behaviors and attitudes had been removed and that i was better than all of that, in fact i was above all of that, after all it had been years since the last time i put just a buck in the basket. my arrogance had created a situation within me, that fostered the belief structure that i was too broken to be fixed, and still wanting nice things to display my wealth to others was certainly a sign of how far gone i was. supporting others through generous financial contributions was how i wanted to show my peers, how ell i was doing and as much as i would hate to admit it, i had the privilege of looking down on those who still believed that because they were in the rooms, they were entitled to more than just a helping hand.i could find the less than free ones, and chain them to my fan club, and think nothing of it, after all is that not what we all do?
as i progressed through the steps, i began to see the nature of my insanity, the risk of relying on material success to define how i felt about myself and how dependent i had become on getting the approval and admiration of my peers. i was not self-supporting nor self-sufficient, i was a leech of quite a different species, and personality change, mine, was what was needed. today with that insight, i can be okay being myself and placing far less importance on what i think others think of me and more on how i see myself. yes, i am crass and cynical. i am also loving caring and dependent upon a fellowship to provide for my recovery needs. when i step out of what i think i want to look like and step into what i am, i am self-supporting and a full-fledged member of a fellowship that is still teaching me who i am, just for today.

∞ DT ∞