โ the POWER โ
Posted: Tue, Aug 9, 2016 09:59:08 AM
of love.
so a year ago, when i struggling to bring what i see as my spiritual path into alignment with that of my peers in the fellowship, i punted on this topic and wrote about something else. with an additional 366 days under my belt, i have no problem with how i see things and speaking about that vision and sharing about it with my peers in recovery, as the POWER that fuels my recovery is of LOVE and LOVE is of that POWER. as cryptic as that sounds, when i try to explain it any less succinctly i quickly get caught up in words and what they mean, independently or in context. instead of tripping all over what i see and what others see, i will just leave it at GOD's love = the love of the POWER that fuels my recovery. now that i have established that equivalence, i can move on.
what i do not stumble on, is that i have no belief, whatsoever, that recovery was my destiny and that GOD had meant for me to end up in the rooms. so when others, including the reading, talk about being protected by GOD, until they could find recovery, i silently cringe. once again i run smack dab up against the notion of predestination, which is not just a Western or deist concept. once again i need to remember, that for me, it was not all about being “saved,” it was about awakening in a brand new world. not that the world was new, it was that i finally left the reality of active addiction and then the reality of trying to find a spiritual path that fit what i was “feeling” all along. that silent cringe, is the part of me that screams to be different, asserting itself once again. when i return to the notion that the POWER that fuels my recovery is of LOVE, the feelings i am experiencing subside. once again i become one with my peers and move along, after all there really is nothing to see here.
so how in the world do i reconcile the fact that i survived the idiocy of my active addiction, long enough to finally get forced into recovery? i do not, i just accept that it happened. i do not need to put any explanation upon it, it just is what is. if one looks at the tragic absurdity of the events that drove me to the rooms, it even becomes more murky. after all, the only reason that i am here, is that another addict dies from an overdose, and that addict's family could not accept that they dies at their own hands and wanted to make sure that anyone who had any connection to that death, needed to have consequences. based on that, i would have to say that, that addict needed to die to get me into the rooms, and for me that is a very difficult premise to accept. how could a loving GOD sacrifice someone else die so that i could be saved? from there it only gets worse, so i leave it at the self-will of two other addicts created the circumstances necessary and sufficient for me to find recovery. it not that GOD loved them any less or me any more, it was just a chain of events that demonstrate the powerlessness that was part and parcel of my active addiction.
so it goes, today the facts are that i am clean, and that no matter how hard i tried to get myself out of recovery, recovery has won, time and again. is that the will and love of GOD? don'\'t know and i do not care. i am grateful for what i have today and will do my best to honor and cherish and yes accept the LOVE i am given regardless of the source.
so a year ago, when i struggling to bring what i see as my spiritual path into alignment with that of my peers in the fellowship, i punted on this topic and wrote about something else. with an additional 366 days under my belt, i have no problem with how i see things and speaking about that vision and sharing about it with my peers in recovery, as the POWER that fuels my recovery is of LOVE and LOVE is of that POWER. as cryptic as that sounds, when i try to explain it any less succinctly i quickly get caught up in words and what they mean, independently or in context. instead of tripping all over what i see and what others see, i will just leave it at GOD's love = the love of the POWER that fuels my recovery. now that i have established that equivalence, i can move on.
what i do not stumble on, is that i have no belief, whatsoever, that recovery was my destiny and that GOD had meant for me to end up in the rooms. so when others, including the reading, talk about being protected by GOD, until they could find recovery, i silently cringe. once again i run smack dab up against the notion of predestination, which is not just a Western or deist concept. once again i need to remember, that for me, it was not all about being “saved,” it was about awakening in a brand new world. not that the world was new, it was that i finally left the reality of active addiction and then the reality of trying to find a spiritual path that fit what i was “feeling” all along. that silent cringe, is the part of me that screams to be different, asserting itself once again. when i return to the notion that the POWER that fuels my recovery is of LOVE, the feelings i am experiencing subside. once again i become one with my peers and move along, after all there really is nothing to see here.
so how in the world do i reconcile the fact that i survived the idiocy of my active addiction, long enough to finally get forced into recovery? i do not, i just accept that it happened. i do not need to put any explanation upon it, it just is what is. if one looks at the tragic absurdity of the events that drove me to the rooms, it even becomes more murky. after all, the only reason that i am here, is that another addict dies from an overdose, and that addict's family could not accept that they dies at their own hands and wanted to make sure that anyone who had any connection to that death, needed to have consequences. based on that, i would have to say that, that addict needed to die to get me into the rooms, and for me that is a very difficult premise to accept. how could a loving GOD sacrifice someone else die so that i could be saved? from there it only gets worse, so i leave it at the self-will of two other addicts created the circumstances necessary and sufficient for me to find recovery. it not that GOD loved them any less or me any more, it was just a chain of events that demonstrate the powerlessness that was part and parcel of my active addiction.
so it goes, today the facts are that i am clean, and that no matter how hard i tried to get myself out of recovery, recovery has won, time and again. is that the will and love of GOD? don'\'t know and i do not care. i am grateful for what i have today and will do my best to honor and cherish and yes accept the LOVE i am given regardless of the source.
∞ DT ∞