RITUAL AND SPIRITUAL

I heard a sermon where the pastor pointed out that the word Ritual is within the word, Spiritual. It may be coincidental, but I found it fascinating. And, I think they are linked to each other in a powerful way, especially in my recovery.

The etymology of the word Ritual is from Latin—ritualis, from rite.

The etymology of the word Spiritual is from Latin—of breathing, of wind, from spiritus.

A breathing wind from spirit rite—prayer.

Every morning I rise early to take my dog out. I pray the Third Step Prayer for this day. Many mornings I am surprised by the joy I have just looking at the ocean waves roll in and out. I take it very personally. Nature is God’s reminder of Himself. I am thankful for this gift to remember that it’s not all about me! I need to get out of my own head first thing in the morning. It’s not about what I have to do for me in my schedule, but what I will do for others today. It is that preparing for the day. Sunrise ritual.

Another day to show up sober and serve.

Third Step Prayer: “God, I offer myself to Thee, to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt. Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of Life. May I do Thy will always! Amen”

The line that gets me is, “Relieve me of the bondage of self,”—I actually have a physical reaction to saying this out loud. My body relaxes and peace takes its place. Whew. I can breathe. That is the spiritual part of this ritual. I believe as we practice our rituals of good habits, we grow exponentially toward our spiritual self-awareness and our purpose.

I was not big on ritual or habitual things when drinking—except when it had to do with my drinking habit, which I spent a lot of time planning. How to acquire it, drink it, then hide or get rid of the bottles afterward. Rinse and repeat. Sounds like I was good at that ritual, right? Looking back, how exhausting that was!

Now, I count on the habits and rituals I have adopted to replace the destructive cycle that does not serve me or others anymore. This is definitely the easier, softer way. In the program of recovery, it is established that once these new habits and rituals get put in place, there is a spiritual component that kicks in to carry us.

I am free—and—I need to continually let go and not try and control the outcomes in my day.

Try it.

It works for me.

“For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness.”
2 Peter 1:5-6

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STILL ROW TO SHORE

There is a difference between giving up and surrendering.

BIG difference.

Giving up is all about me. If I give up, I have thrown in the towel. I can’t do it anymore and that is the end of it.

Surrender involves a partnership. Surrender means that I acknowledge there is something else out there to help me once I let go of my old ways.

God.

That doesn’t mean I have no part in it anymore. It means that I have surrendered control and now my action plan to move forward has an invisible motor—power beyond myself that will lift and carry me through my own actions.

I saw a poster once in a meeting hanging on the wall. It is of a man in a boat rowing all by himself. Water leaks into the boat from holes in the bottom making it look like he will sink. Above his head reads:

Trust in God. Below the boat it reads: And, still row to shore.

We are partners now. With God’s help and my own action steps,

I can do this life sober—not giving up, but surrendering.

Sweet surrender...

Power.

“In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path.” Proverbs 3:6

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EXPAND YOUR FRAME

When you think of the word, “frame,” what do you think about?   

Framing on walls usually hold one photo or a collage or a painting…one theme or thought. It is limited in content, right? It can only hold so much inside.

When I first got sober, my sponsor used to say, “Heidi, expand your frame” She was saying this for me to look outside the way I have always seen things inside my frame of reference and try to frame it differently. For example: include other people in my consideration process.

I like to look at it visually, like the borders of a frame on the wall expanding out to include more within the box. The inside of a frame continues to be limited, expanding the frame allows for new thoughts, new ideas, new actions as responses to old habits or behaviors, to be included in my consideration. Looking from a different angle, broaden the scope of my possibilities for action. 

Framing also refers to the way we present or perceive information. It shapes our understanding and influences our reactions to various situations.The way an issue is framed can change how we view it. For example, How we frame decisions can impact our willingness to act. Positive framing can motivate us and negative framing can keep us stuck

This takes courage. 

I thought all that I was doing was working. Well, apparently not, or I wouldn’t be needing to “expand my frame”

My old frame looked like this:

"I did not think that I would be able to live my life without alcohol."

In THE PROMISES of AA it says that, “...We won’t forget the past nor wish to shut the door on it.” For me the context of my past experience, including the poor decisions and failures can ultimately lead me to better framing for future decisions.

Growth is hard and requires a little pain, a little patience, and a LOT of reliance on God. 

My new frame looks like this:

I CAN be sober and still have fun.

I CAN go to a party and not drink

I CAN live this life sober with clear thoughts and actions.

"With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."

Matthew 19:26

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FOGGY LENSES

When I was drinking, it felt like I was looking at everything through foggy lenses.

At first, I was just checking out to not deal with my interpretation of what was going on. Then, after living that way in the fog for so many years, I began to think I needed alcohol to take myself down a notch to deal with things. That was just the way it was. 

I was dependent upon it to be OK—Or, so I thought. I didn’t think I could live or deal with anything without alcohol. 

Not true. But, I didn’t know another way.

We say in our program, “alcohol and drugs are but a symptom.” The alcohol that I thought was helping me deal, was just fogging my vision of the truth—keeping me in the fog. It was taking me further into darkness. 

G.K. Chesterton said this, “God is like the sun; you cannot look at it, but without it you cannot look at anything else.”

I heard a woman say in a meeting yesterday, “I can truly say that there is no spirituality without physical sobriety.”

When I fully surrendered my obsession to God, the fog lifted. My lenses cleared. I could see everything clearly and was no longer dependent on a substance that was standing in the way of God’s access to me. 

What was the way out?

Walk out of the fog.

Surrender to God.

Turn on the Light.

“But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light, for everything that becomes visible is light.”

Ephesians 5:13

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VOLUNTEER

This photo is so sweet and reminds me of how my recovery works.

I’ll tell you why.

This beautiful flower coming up between the bricks of our patio is called a “volunteer.” There is a pot with luscious soil not a foot away with that same plant flourishing in it. This little volunteer, pushed up through the bricks with minimal soil and little chance of it growing there. It was determined, despite the odds—accepting it’s conditions, admitting it was powerless over where the seed landed—sprouting in what seemed like unmanageable circumstances.

Wow.

This is Step One: “Admitted we were powerless over alcohol and our lives had become unmanageable.”

I learned that what I resist, persists. Think about it. If I resist something, I have an adverse reaction—resistance. It causes me to think about it and mull it over and over in my head. I don’t get resolution about it, causing it to persist, until I accept the situation is not working and resolve it—

This is how it was with my drinking for years. I resisted loved ones’ concerns for my excessive drinking and pushed back, “I don’t have a problem. It’s under control.” So, my condition persisted.

Definition of resist: to exert force in opposition

Definition of persist: to continue to do something or to try to do something even though it is difficult or other people want you to stop

Now—I am like the flower in the hardscape. I volunteer to show up for my recovery, despite the hard conditions or circumstances that come up in my life. I am not resisting anymore or finding reasons or excuses to hide and escape from things that are hard. Or, people who are difficult. I am not resisting others’ concerns or for help they may want to give me. I have a chance of resolving it and responding in a healthy way and flourishing in my life—but, I can’t do it alone.

If I can do this life sober, so can you.

I am not saying it’s easy but it is simple. Like the flower metaphor, there are people, close by beckoning us to plant into the rich soil of a sober life, to live and to flourish among others like ourselves.

Ask for help—from others and from God.

It starts with you.

Then, volunteer to show up and help somebody else.

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

Matthew 7:7

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HUMILITY

At the end of my drinking I suffered humiliation. I had embarrassment for things I had done and who I had become. I was hopeless. I found out that humility is not the same as humiliation.

Humility: Low estimate of one’s importance.

Humiliation: Feeling shame or injury to one’s dignity or self-respect.

Big difference.

I can have humility and not suffer humiliation. Being humiliated, I am stuck in victim mode, jealousy, resentment, and fear. You don’t even exist for me in that state. It’s all about me. Being humble, my ego is right-sized. I can look at others with respect and rejoice in their victories because mine are not threatened. I set aside my own ego and self-thought to make other’s needs important to me.

Today, humility is something I long for and consciously practice.

It serves me well when I am serving.

“For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

Matthew 23:12

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THE STORY

Funny, right? 

I saw this sign while shopping last week. So true. I do eat salads, but can’t share anything inspiring that happened while eating a salad.

But, my story also includes overuse of alcohol that took me to my bottom. 

Now there’s a great story.

The story isn’t the alcohol or even the trip to the bottom—The story is how my life has been transformed since taking alcohol out of the equation 7,662 days ago and surrendering to God. It is truly God’s story through me. 

When I woke up one day in the middle of the day and realized I could not do this life anymore on my own power in this broken condition, I finally surrendered to God. “Help me God. I can’t do this on my own.” 

Step One: “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.” 

My life started when I admitted I was powerless. The partnership began with letting go. Not “giving up,” but surrender—big difference. I had to release control over everything in my life to God. Only then, could He come in and restore me to sanity—to break the patterns of bad behavior and be able to submit to God’s will and not my own will. It does not logically make sense, I know, but it is true—surrender to win.

I became free.

Free to choose again. The power that was there all along became accessible to me, when I moved myself out of God's way. Power to be who God meant for me to be. My will and God’s will became aligned. 

I had to take that first step of letting go of the alcohol that I thought, at first, was helping me, calming me, relieving the stress…when, in fact, it was taking me further into physical dependence upon it as I continued to repeat the pattern daily. The pattern was solidified by conforming to that solution—over and over. I was looking to the wrong source for comfort and relief. The only way to break this pattern was to surrender to God. I could not do it alone. 

When that happened, I was released from the bondage of myself and became willing to be useful again to God. I had access to Him and He had access to me. Now…

I get to:

Pray to be available for life.

Ask God to renew my mind daily.

I urge you to try it.

It works.

"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

Romans 12:2

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ABSOLUTES

I woke up in the hospital on my 50th birthday after seizing from DTs—obviously, I didn’t die, but I could have. I had no idea about the detox process and that when you had been drinking as much alcohol as I had, you can’t just stop cold turkey. I learned that I needed help with the withdrawal process.

While in the hospital, I answered the phone with four days of sobriety and a friend said these words, “Does this mean that you will never drink again?” My mind could not wrap around the concept of “NEVER DRINKING AGAIN.”

My alcoholic brain cannot think in terms of absolutes—ALWAYS, NEVER, FOREVER. Those concepts are too big, too overwhelming—why bother stopping? I hadn’t been able to stop drinking for even a day by this point, so “never again” seemed impossible.

If I could have stopped on my own before this point, I would have. Once I surrendered to God and asked for help, I was able to start that process in that one day.

I have to stay in today, this day, and now.

That is all I have. I will not drink today. I will decide whether to drink again tomorrow. It is still a surprise, even to myself, that I have been able to string together many days in a row like that—one day at a time—by not looking too far ahead, not regretting the past, and planting my feet firmly in today. I am grateful for 7,647 days today. In less than one month, that will be 21 years of sobriety—but I can’t get ahead of myself!

Thank you, God, for my sobriety this day.

Trust God. Don’t drink. Stay in today.

If I can do it, so can you.

“This is the day the LORD has made. We will rejoice and be glad in it.”

Psalm 118:24

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NEW BEGINNINGS

It was a very emotional weekend last Sunday with the ground-breaking ceremony for a new building we are constructing at our church. This new “Hope Center” building will house our food pantry where we feed needy people in our community. Also, it will house our recovery meetings and other mental health meetings and support groups. 

I am touched and proud that our church embraces those in need and the souls willing to be transformed and used by God. 

In my many years of sobriety (7,641 days to be exact!), I have seen so many lives change and transform as they get sober and stay sober, and then help others to do the same. It is truly magic happening before our eyes. 

This dedication ceremony and ground-breaking is such a metaphor for recovery. As we go about the demolition of our lives in our addiction, we have no idea who we affect and take down with us in our destructive behaviors that play out. There is huge fall-out. Damage we need to clean up when we finally hit our bottoms and begin to reconstruct our lives in a new way.

Our new beginnings are a way of making amends to those we have harmed along our path. We get to start over. We begin to own the destruction and begin the clean up. We get to be redeemed. Be supported by others on our new journey. We get to be part of others’ new beginnings also, as we discover that in our recovery, we can be there for them. Supporting them as others supported us. Others who watched our destruction, also get to watch our reconstruction. 

Joy all around.

I am so grateful to a my church who embraces recovery and supports our groups we host there. What a privilege to be a part in that.

Come join us in your recovery journey. 

We can help build new lives together—

Your own. And, those you love.

"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” Romans 12:2

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KEEP IT SIMPLE

I have always heard in AA meetings that this is a simple program, but not easy. We need to stop the addictive behavior. Staying stopped is the “not easy” part. That requires a little work. Looking at those behaviors and replacing them with healthier choices. Establishing a new routine that supports my new life. 

Not complicated. I am the one who tends to over-complicate things. Keeping it simple is the first part of the plan for recovery. 

Like my dog, I need to listen to my Master’s voice and...

Come.

Sit.

Stay.

Listen.

Heel (heal.)

People ask me, “Heidi, why do you still go to meetings after all these years? Aren’t you cured?” I realized that a huge piece of my staying sober was connection to others. Being in meetings with others like myself, reminds me that they are doing this sober thing too. And, with each others’ help and God, we can maintain our sobriety daily. 

When I sit in the meeting rooms, I hear God talk to me through the others in the room. I go to meetings to hear God talk to ME! It’s magic. 

I always come away lifted.

Try it.

"My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me”

John 10:27

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Spiritual Principles of AA

Today, I want to talk about the Spiritual Principles that go along with each step of the 12 steps—how each principle helps support addiction recovery.

Step 1: Honesty

“We admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable.” Admitting the problem is a crucial first step. Once addicts admit their problem is out of control, they can begin to heal. The spiritual principles behind this step are honesty and acceptance.

Step 2: Hope

“Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.” Alcoholics Anonymous believes addicts should look to a higher power in order to recover; this higher power can be anything or anyone that works for the person. The spiritual principle behind this step is hope.

Step 3: Faith

“Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of god as we understood him.” At this step, the addict fully turns to that higher power. The spiritual principle behind this step is faith.

Step 4: Courage

“Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.” This step can be one of the most difficult and requires soul-searching and self-examination. To make this step most effective, addicts must take an honest look at negative consequences of their behavior, including past embarrassment, regret and guilt. The spiritual principle behind this step is courage.

Step 5: Integrity

“Admitted to god, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.” By admitting to the past poor behavior examined in step 4, addicts and alcoholics are able to let go of shame and guilt. The spiritual principle behind this step is integrity.

Step 6: Willingness

“Were entirely ready to have god remove all these defects of character.” At this point, addicts admit they are ready to allow their higher power to take away the wrongs they admitted in step 4. The spiritual principle behind this step is willingness.

Step 7: Humility

“Humbly ask him to remove our shortcomings”. Recovering addicts ask the higher power to eliminate character defects, which may include impulsivity, selfishness, impatience or anger. In order to do this, addicts must admit they are not strong enough to remove these character flaws on their own. The spiritual principle behind this step is humility.

Step 8: Responsibility 

“Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to all of them.” During this step, addicts make a list of all the people in their lives they have wronged as a result of their substance abuse. These wrongs could be small things, such as a white lie to hide intoxication, or big infringements, such as stealing money to buy alcohol or drugs. The spiritual principle behind this step is justice and responsibility.

Step 9: Discipline

“Made direct amends to such people whenever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.” At this stage, addicts attempt to rectify their wrongdoings by confronting the people they harmed. The conversation may take place through a written letter or email or by sitting down face to face. The spiritual principle behind this step is self-discipline.

Step 10: Perseverance 

“Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.” It’s never easy to admit you’re wrong, but this step requires it. Addicts must commit to monitoring themselves for behaviors that could harm themselves or someone else and to freely admit when they are wrong. The spiritual principle behind this step is perseverance.

Step 11: Awareness

“Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with god, as we understood him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out.” As part of this step, recovering addicts must commit to some form of spiritual practice. This practice can come in many different forms, including meditation, prayer or reading the Bible once a day. The spiritual principle behind this step is awareness.

Step 12: Service

“Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.” This final step encourages people in recovery to go on to sponsor others once they themselves have completed the 12 steps. By giving away the gift of recovery, they are better able to keep it themselves. The spiritual principles behind this step are love and service. 

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.”

Galatians 5:22-23 

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BEGINNING TODAY

I have never been particularly good at “endings” in general. Goodbyes are always hard. In every way. Death for me is in that category.

Death took me to my bottom. The end of my drinking.  

The end of my drinking was the beginning of my sobriety. I have been sober many days in a row since that bottom and have not felt the need to drink over the deaths I have experienced since getting sober 7,620 days ago (Over 20 years). I have experienced many deaths, humans and dogs, along the way and know that now, I don’t have to drink over it. I know it can be done.

I like beginnings. They are all about hope for the future. Weddings. Beginning relationships, births, sunrises, being sober each day.

There is a place in between endings (past) and beginnings (future), called “the present” where I find it hard to stay some times. It’s one of the reasons we talk about One-Day-At-a-Time in recovery. I don’t want to stay stuck in the past and how I was dealing with life with drinking or chaos as part of the solution. I don’t know what the future holds either, but I can begin in today, arranging my life a little differently. Making better choices to support myself in today. Planning for the future in a healthy way and trusting God for the outcome and how it may turn out.

How do I do that?

I look for the constants in my life. And those are confirmed in “The Promises” of our recovery program below:

The Promises

"If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.

Are these extravagant promises? We think not.

They are being fulfilled among us—sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we trust God and work for them."

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MY SIDE OF THE STREET

When we get to Step 4 in the 12 steps, we start to examine our ways and see that what we are doing is not working anymore. We begin to clean house. There is a saying in AA about this:

“Keep your side of the street clean.”

“Cleaning up my side of the street” takes on a whole new literal meaning when my neighbor lets their dog come over and poop just outside of our gate, right in line with the tires of my husband’s car, so that when he backs out, he will flatten it. So I usually check, ok, there it is—pick it up and throw it in our garbage. The vindictive me wants to put the bag of poop on his doorstep. But, I don’t. Not the dog’s fault. His owner is not being responsible. I can’t make him be responsible. He probably doesn’t even know it’s happening—But, I take it personally as an assault on me. 

I know—this photo should have been of dog poop. The QTIP is a more pleasant reminder to not take everything in life so personally. 

A friend in a meeting the other day said this acronym:

QTIP  Quit Taking It Personally

Every day, things happen to us that are out of our control, that we can choose to take personally—or not. I can recall times in relationships when I’ve been hurt, and then taking it out on them or others, focusing only on what that person did wrong or go straight to fighting back and revenge. While that may have felt good at the time, what I didn’t realize when I was doing these things, was that I was actually making my side of the street dirty – I’m not improving the situation for anyone. I will just have to “clean up that mess with that person later”

We can try to be in control, but things are going to happen to us regardless. We cannot control the actions of others – but what we can control is our response.

Our response is everything.

Instead of worrying and taking things personally, I can keep my side of the street clean, by focusing on the positive – and what I can control – and not let myself get in the negative thought cycle obsessing on “what they did or didn’t do.” Having an attitude of gratitude puts my mind in right-thinking and then right-acting.

My neighbor’s poop in my driveway is just an example of when I think someone has offended me. My response to anything said or done to me is critical—for my own mental health. I can torture myself with revenge thoughts or actions, which helps nobody, or pause, or go about my own business doing one positive care action for myself or somebody else.

Things I can do:

• Pick up my own dog’s poop—Clean up my thoughts

• Pick up his dog’s poop and put in in my garbage can—Right action—letting go of negative thoughts or actions.

• Be grateful that I am alive and sober—Grateful thoughts

• Go help somebody in a small way—Positive thoughts or actions.

• Pray for that person for calm and peace—Turning over outcomes to God.

• Kiss my own dog and smile—Action for myself

Serenity prayer

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.

Amen

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HISTORY

HISTORY.

His Story. The past.

The hearing of another person tell their history becomes part of my story when I listen to it today in the present. In hearing it, we can find the hope for the future—that there is a way out of it.

Out of addiction. Out of the patterns and behaviors that keep us stuck and without hope.

This is why I love meetings. Telling our story out loud in a meeting is the magic part. The details of our stories are vastly different. But, the general thoughts and behaviors are the same. I can find things to identify with that help me know that I am not alone in my struggle. 

I heard a woman say in a meeting, that she didn’t come here to find a “design for living” she started coming to meetings because: she could not stop drinking and maybe these people all knew something she didn’t. We don’t get to recovery meetings on a “winning streak.” We get here because our life is not working the way we are living it. We came to find a new solution other than alcohol or drugs for our lives.

The magic of what we find in recovery is each other—connection.

When you tell me you have experienced coming out to the other side of addiction without using alcohol or drugs—you help me. When you get your sobriety chip or a certain number of days, it is a celebration. For you. And for me.

It becomes my story. Your victory is mine too—together we celebrate that it can be done in community. We find that actually taking these 12-steps becomes a “design for living” and after going through them with our sponsor, we realize that we can also show others the way.

Your victory story, tells me I can do it, too. I also hear God’s voice speak to me through you in meetings. That is service on your part and you don’t even know it in that moment. That’s why I have to show up for others. For them to hear God’s voice through me. 

I want to celebrate our victory together, so we can live this life sober and free—Together.

Come and join us.

"And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another.” 

Hebrews 10:24-25

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SELF CARE

When service becomes exhausting for me, it’s called codependency!

I realized after getting sober, I was also very codependent. I heard someone say the definition of codependency that resonated with me: “Helping another person at the expense of myself.” That is the exhausting part. Giving up something I need to do for myself and my own sobriety to help someone else. That is not helping either person.

I learned in early sobriety, that the quickest way out of my own spiraled thinking, was to help someone else—to be of service. This worked for me, and I also have to balance that with self-care. There is a middle ground where I can be in service and still stay healthy. Boundaries. To, not only, leave time for me, MAKE time for me.

How do I do this and reframe it?

Self-care.

Self-care is not Selfish.

What is Self-care?

Self-care is being intentional with your time and with boundaries for your own sobriety, meditating, praying, spending time with loved ones or outside with exercise, going to meetings to hear God speak.

We can’t give what we don’t have.

We need to fill our spiritual tank. 

Rest in this day.

“Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”

James 4:10

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MORE

In a meeting, I heard a woman say in her story, “If I had I known that was my last drink, I would have had another” That is something only an alcoholic would say.

I can identify with that logic. Logic? That is not logic—that is insane thinking. I was not insane, but I was not of sound mind. I was in the logic of denial.

I thought that alcohol was my security blanket. I needed it. It was safety. What I thought I knew worked for me. Having another drink was my solution. It kept my mind flattened, dull, and not thinking. There couldn’t be another solution—Alcohol was what I knew worked for me.

Until it didn’t.

When the alcohol didn’t work for me anymore, in fact, it started working against me—I was at a turning point. Keep going and die, or try another way. 

Another way was surrender: Fear. Unknown. Scary. 

I had to start trusting in a power outside myself for help. “Myself” was not cutting it. It was self-centered fear. I needed more than me. "God help me. I can’t do this alone.” That was my prayer 7,591 days ago. That was the beginning of my sobriety. 

I had tried for 30 years to stop on my own. I could not. If I could have done it on my own power, I would have. I had to surrender my will and life over to God and trust that He could help me do this life without alcohol.

He did.

The funny thing about God is that you have to actually do this “trust” thing for it to work. Not just think about it, try harder, or say you will eventually trust God—You need to do it now for things to change.

Trust me. 

It works. 

You won’t regret it.

"He must become greater; I must become less.”

John 3:30

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PAYING ATTENTION

This joke makes me laugh, mainly because it is so true. Maybe you have heard it.

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A storm descends on a small town, and the downpour soon turns into a flood. As the waters rise, the local preacher kneels in prayer on the church porch, surrounded by water. “Better get in, Preacher. The waters are rising fast.”

“No,” says the preacher. “I have faith in the Lord. He will save me.”

Waters rise and the preacher is up on the balcony, another person calls to him in a motorboat. “Come on, Preacher. We need to get you out of here. The levee is gonna break any minute.”

Once again, the preacher says, “I shall remain. The Lord will see me through.”

Flood waters rise over the church until only the steeple remains above water. Preacher standing on roof and a helicopter descends. A state trooper calls down to him through a megaphone.

“Grab the ladder, Preacher. This is your last chance.”

Once again, the preacher insists the Lord will deliver him.

And, predictably, he drowns.

Preacher goes to heaven and he asks the Almighty, “Lord, I had unwavering faith in you. Why didn’t you deliver me from that flood?”

God shakes his head. “What did you want from me? I sent you two boats and a helicopter.”

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I love this joke because it accentuates that the person has faith, but does not choose to take the action and partner with God to save himself. This is how it works with addiction at our bottoms.

We have to first admit we are powerless over alcohol and drugs and that our lives have become unmanageable. 

Then when help comes in the form of others who are there for us when we become ready for change— we then ask for help, and then to surrender to God for help. God can work through others in our lives, but only if we are ready to hear or see that help right in front of us.

When we take the action of admitting, then asking for help, then surrendering to the process—that is when the magic of recovery happens. 

Sometimes, as in the last part of this joke, even a megaphone does not work to get our attention. We have to choose to pay attention. Until we do, we continue in the chaos until our ultimate bottom.

If you think you are close, open your eyes and heart to what is actually true. Then reach out for help—first to God, then to others to guide you on this new path of recovery.

We are in the boat waiting for you to get in and join us.

You are not alone.

We will be with you along the way.

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”

2 Timothy 1:7

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DRASTIC THOUGHT

When I was drinking, all was drama and chaos. I needed to make a drastic change to get out of that lifestyle and thinking. First, I needed to stop drinking. Period. 

Then begin to deal with my mental and spiritual mindset.

Sobriety is about doing everything the exact opposite of what I did before I got sober. Drastically-changed behaviors. I have learned that whatever my mind thinks first as a possible good idea needs to be challenged. I have to ask God to help me pause and review what I am thinking and direct me to the next right step or behavior. I never did that before. I just reacted. I just did things—without thinking.

It got me thinking about opposites.

I recently came across these paradoxes put forth by Alcoholics Anonymous:

• From weakness comes strength

• We suffer to get well

• We die to live

• We surrender to win

• From dependence we found independence 

• We forgive to be forgiven

• We give it away to keep it

• From darkness comes light

I think this 11th Step Prayer or the Prayer of St. Francis emphasizes the weaknesses to show the drastic nature of what the solution or hope will be. This prayer always lifts me and makes me know there is hope.

11th Step Prayer

“Lord, make me a channel of thy peace, that where there is hatred, I may bring love. That where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness. That where there is discord, I may bring harmony. That where there is error, I may bring truth. That where there is doubt, I may bring faith.That where there is despair, I may bring hope. That where there are shadows, I may bring light. That where there is sadness, I may bring joy. Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted to understand, than to be understood to love, than to be loved. For it is by self-forgetting that one finds. It is by forgiving that one is forgiven. It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life. Amen”

There is hope.

“Whoever walks in the dark does not know where they are going. Believe in the light while you have the light, so that you may become children of light.”

John 12:35-36

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SPIRITUAL FITNESS

What is spiritual fitness?

It’s like physical fitness, which requires a work out, only with your mind!  

And, I’m not talking about “over-thinking” or “Thinking our way out of a situation”—neither of those, although it does require our minds to change our mindset and perspective.

The other day, I heard a friend talk about feeling “spiritually homeless”— I am sure we have all felt that way at some point. Alcohol only enhances this feeling, or state of being. We are born with that natural feeling of needing something outside of ourselves to complete ourselves, spiritually, mentally and physically. As if we are “missing something.” That is the feeling of spiritual homelessness. 

I searched for a spiritual home here in the physical world through alcohol. The world could not complete me or validate me. I held on for a while, but was still missing something. Eventually, it was not enough. I knew God before I got sober, but wasn’t talking to God and exercising that “relationship” muscle. I could not stop drinking and get sober on my own. Well, if I could have gotten sober on my own, I would have. But, I needed more. 

I was far from home. I needed a spiritual fitness. A friend the other day talked about learning of God growing up in church and then, falling away as a young adult. But there is a “homing instinct” aspect of spirituality, that once we get the addiction out of the way (the physical) we have access to our own spirituality once again and we instinctively know where to return for that feeling of HOME.

That home for me is God.

This is not a one-time deal. It takes active participation. Daily. Ongoing.

"What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God's will into all of our activities.” Page 85 of The Big Book of AA

In the scripture at the bottom, it talks about being alert and of sober minded. The enemy (alcohol) is doing push ups behind the scenes ready to pounce in the form of relapse. What are you doing today for your spiritual fitness? Metaphorically speaking, what kind of mental push ups are you doing for your sober maintenance?

Daily Mental Push-ups:

Gratitude list—Keeps me in solution and not the problem

Prayers—Keeps me in the action step of surrendering to God.

Go to a meeting— keeps in active listening to others and out of my own head

Service— Helping somebody else, strengthens my “selflessness” muscle.

What are you doing today for your spiritual fitness?

"Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.”

1 Peter 5:8

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HEARD

Sometimes all it takes to know that you are not alone is to be “heard.”

I heard this in a meeting long ago—"If you want what we have (sobriety), do what we do—stay in the middle of the herd." When you to this, you will be protected and safe. Especially when you are new in sobriety and are feeling so vulnerable.

Think about nature, when the babies of the herd stay in the middle, they are protected and not “picked off” on the perimeter, by predators. Makes senses doesn’t it? Away from all the influence of what can distract us and can take us down that same path of chaos and destruction again. 

Here in recovery meetings with us, you will not only be “heard,” but you will hear others like yourself. You will be supported and guided back to healthy and sober living. You will heal here in meetings. Many of them in a row. You will become stronger and able to go out again into the world with more confidence. Community. Safety.

Come and sit and be heard.

Come and hear others.

Come and be healed.

"Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective."

James 5:16

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