๐ it is not easy ๐
Posted: Tue, Mar 17, 2026 10:53:35 AM
to get out of my own way, but that is precisely what frees me from my self-made prison. my source material suggests that one of the means i have at my disposal to get out of my own way is service to my fellowship, my peers in recovery and the world in general. i understand that selfless service certainly does thew trick, but i wonder if it is a cheat of some sort. in early recovery i was told more than once to “fake it until you make it” and faking it almost took me out, in my period of mere abstinence. faking having a HIGHER POWER that worked for me, kept me sick for the first fifteen years of my recovery, even though i knew from the start where i was going to end up. faking being someone i was not, kept me apart from the world and my peers in my recovery for two and a half decades.
as a result of all of that stumbling and bumbling around, these days i look for the real way forward instead of distractions. i have men that i sponsor, because i have something i want to give away. i attend and participate in my home group, because that is where i belong and i have the desire to keep it going and growing. all of my service may appear to be selfless, but i have a motivation between each act of service that i do, even if it only because it is the next right thing to do. in a sense, i do see it as getting out of my own way and freeing me from my self-made prison.
for me, these days, service is a conscious choice i make, not something i do to distract or divert myself. whether or not i am aware of what my motives may be in the moment, it really does not matter. it is true that service does give me a warm feeling of self-approval and boosts my self-esteem and self-worth. feeling good about myself, however, is a side-effect and not the main attraction, just as getting high was the main attraction and changing how i felt, a welcomed side-effect. being of service, at least in my book, helps to make the world a little less cold and brutal to those whose lives i touch and it takes a bit of a bite of the cynicism that rules my roost. just for today, i can serve myself, my family and my customers to make their lives a little less bleak and to make my own a bit more open and certainly a whole lot more free.
as a result of all of that stumbling and bumbling around, these days i look for the real way forward instead of distractions. i have men that i sponsor, because i have something i want to give away. i attend and participate in my home group, because that is where i belong and i have the desire to keep it going and growing. all of my service may appear to be selfless, but i have a motivation between each act of service that i do, even if it only because it is the next right thing to do. in a sense, i do see it as getting out of my own way and freeing me from my self-made prison.
for me, these days, service is a conscious choice i make, not something i do to distract or divert myself. whether or not i am aware of what my motives may be in the moment, it really does not matter. it is true that service does give me a warm feeling of self-approval and boosts my self-esteem and self-worth. feeling good about myself, however, is a side-effect and not the main attraction, just as getting high was the main attraction and changing how i felt, a welcomed side-effect. being of service, at least in my book, helps to make the world a little less cold and brutal to those whose lives i touch and it takes a bit of a bite of the cynicism that rules my roost. just for today, i can serve myself, my family and my customers to make their lives a little less bleak and to make my own a bit more open and certainly a whole lot more free.
∞ DT ∞