Searching and Fearless

Confront the dark parts of yourself, and work to banish them with illumination and forgiveness. Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing. Use the pain as fuel, as a reminder of your strength.
-August Wilson-

Inventories...we all do them at one time or another. We take stock of what is in our pantry before going to the grocery store and we make our list accordingly. Each season we look at our wardrobe to figure out what we have, what we need, what no longer fits, what needs to be discarded or donated, and what might be salvageable or even made almost new with some attention and mending. In business, inventories are designed to give us the information that we need to make decisions and plans for how to move successfully into a thriving future.

An inventory is a fact finding mission. Still, it is easy to get caught up in judgement. Who knows the annoyance associated with going to the grocery store and buying something only to find, as you stuff it into your already full cupboard, that you already have 15 other cans of whatever it is? Ok, well, maybe just me - I am obsessed with always having enough tomato sauce. But I would venture to guess that we have all been through the big closet raid - trying on pants that haven't seen action since Madonna was making bad movies and skinny jeans were the ones you wore when you weren't feeling bloated - and men didn't wear them at all. If you are anything like me, time has taken it's toll and, well, those pants bring up all kinds of feelings and judgements, don't they? Our questionable taste and that extra pound or two (ha!) collide head on with each other to create an epic session of self loathing and shame...do they not?

And so it goes with Step 4. We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. By embarking on this journey, we commit to taking stock of our fears, resentments, indiscretions, and responsibilities. We count specifically and remember in detail the people that we have injured and harmed. We seek out and own our part in the situations and events that have injured and harmed us. It is not an easy task and while it provides many opportunities to judge and berate, it is also ripe with opportunities for growth and compassion towards ourselves. This is the crossroads that step 4 presents to us after the understanding and relief that we find in steps 1, 2, and 3. When all of the unearthing is finished and our findings are laid out in front of us, how will we choose to use the facts that have been revealed? Will we use the information to expand our spirit or diminish it?

It is no coincidence to me that my step 4 work comes about in the spring season...around the same time as Lent. In Christian faiths, Lent is a time of observance for the sacrifice of Christ and preparation for the new hope that is coming through His resurrection. In nature, Spring is a time when the frozen ground of winter thaws into fertile soil ready for new growth and abundance. In both, we sacrifice. We remember. We prepare. We humble ourselves. We dig in the dirt, and analyze the light, the weather, and last year's successes and failures. Instead of getting stuck on what we didn't know last year, we marvel at how what we didn't know last year has taught us the things we need to know this year in order to plant the most amazing garden ever. Likewise, by practicing compassion with ourselves as we work through step 4, we are creating the space, conditions, and light that encourage spectacular new growth inside of our own souls. It is not always easy, and it hardly ever comes naturally - we have to choose it, and work at it to overcome the years of training that have taught us to do just the opposite.

I am not there yet, but I know that in the end it is going to be worth everything that I have to put into it...I have faith.

Nunc ceopi. Now I begin.
What was is past
What will be is hidden in the future
It is only now, this day, this moment, that counts.
Not what I did yesterday, or what I may do tomorrow...
Now I begin.
As long as there is life, there is the chance to start over.

Great Friends

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not
the same river and he's not the same man.
-Heraclitus

I came to the realization fairly early in my process that recovery is not just about reading a book or going to a meeting. It is a way of life that keeps evolving - and sometimes it's a little hard for me to keep up. 10 years ago, I was so clinically depressed that I was on disability, going to therapy every day, taking a cabinet full of medication, and just sort of wandering my way from place to place with no real direction. My personality was completely trapped by my emotions and my self esteem was completely non-existent. I always felt like I was not as smart, talented, funny, or cool as my friends. I always felt like they were doing me a huge favor just to remember my name. Seriously, I know that seems extreme...but it is absolutely true. It set me up to really be emotionally abused by a lot of people - because I just felt so desperate to be liked, accepted, and valued that I was willing to do absolutely anything for it. Many years and life changing events later, my life is SO different now. Looking back at that time in my life feels so weird - because it is like I am just looking at a completely different human being. It's just that, sometimes, I feel like have not quite grown into this new life and the new person that I am.

For a long time after I got clean, I really limited the people that I interacted with to a very few longtime friends. I didn't really see myself as ready to relate with the world and knew I had a lot of work to do on myself before I could really allow others to be a part of my journey. I'm really a very shy person anyway, so the idea of meeting new people and integrating them into a life that I was trying to keep numbingly simple, was kind of overwhelming. But the universe always seems to know best, and in the last couple of years, I have begun to meet so many new and surprising people that bring so much joy into my life - even the old relationships that have been built over years seem to feel new and different. For the first time, I don't feel like I have to change myself according to who I am talking to today, or this hour, or this moment. I haven't quite gotten used to the feeling of not having to bribe, coerce, or guilt someone into being my friend. It still feels weird to me when someone says, "I think you are smart" or "You are funny"...and I sometimes still find myself thinking the old "they don't mean that" kind of thoughts and I hate that. I try really hard to just take what they are saying at face value as the truth, without trying to force it through the filters of my own self doubt. Somehow, in spite of myself and my own internal craziness, I have managed to draw into my life the most amazing, honest, genuine, and totally cool circle of friends. They make my sometimes complicated life more peaceful, more interesting, and more joyful.

I don't really know that I deserve them, but I am awfully glad that I have them...and my gratitude just keeps growing...

Thanks for letting me share :)

Right,Wrong, and The Places In Between

We continued to take personal inventory and
when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.

If someone were to ask me which of the 12 steps has the most meaning in my recovery, I would have to say step 10 - for it is the one that helps me to know and understand myself better, stay on a right path, and maintain an awareness of my own motives and how my actions affect both myself and the world around me. Step 10 requires me to ask more of myself in terms of my recovery and the way I live my life. I work step 10 in a number of ways - but I think the most effective way for me is to talk with people I trust and hold myself accountable to about the things that bother me, or situations in which I find myself having trouble making good decisions. I have an amazing support system made up of people that I consider to be examples of the way I want to live my life - and that is extremely important and helpful to me.

I think we all like to believe that in every situation we try to do the right things for the right reasons. Unfortunately, at least for me, that is more of a goal than a reality. The best thing I can say is that I try - and my success rate has definitely increased with my clean time. But it certainly is nowhere near perfect. The daily practice of step 10 is an opportunity for me to think about moments and situations in which I fell short, and to think about action plans for the next time that I face the same challenges.

Recently, I have spent a great deal of time with my personal inventory, trying to understand how situations spin out of control so quickly, and how my own insecurities and low self esteem contribute to the way I interact with myself and the world - and ultimately influence the choices I make in my own personal behavior. Looking back at a time when I was making wrong decisions every single day has not been easy, but living with the resentment that developed in the wake of all of those bad choices has been much harder. During this time, I failed miserably at being a person of character and I failed miserably at setting appropriate boundaries for my own behavior and the behavior towards me that I would allow of someone else in my life. I allowed my feelings of loneliness to overwhelm my sense of morality - which resulted in confusion, shame, and anger when the real needs that I was trying to satisfy only ended up frustrated and unmet...and I still felt alone, I still felt unloved, and I still felt untouchable. Not only did the choices I made NOT solve those problems for me, they made them worse. I thought I had all of the answers when it was happening, and I did - all the wrong ones. I wouldn't listen, I made excuses, and I stubbornly continued for several months on a path that was risking my sobriety and tearing me apart. I am left now with the pieces...looking for the lessons, learning from the pain, and figuring out what this was meant to contribute to my journey.

And here is what I have learned :

1. shut your mouth and open your ears - sometimes people outside of the situation know better
2. choose what you know over how you feel - often, feelings lie
3. be proactive in finding healthy ways to address loneliness and low self esteem - people will value you if you value yourself...and if you don't, they won't either.
4. there is a reason for the practice of rigorous honesty, and for the saying "Secrets keep you sick"
   

Here is the biggest thing - today - and every day for the last 5 years and 9 months - I am clean, sober, and clear headed.

That makes it a good day :)

Thanks for letting me share...

Demons of My Own Making

Early in my recovery, I once said "I'd rather feel it than not feel it - whatever it is." Sometimes I can be so dumb.

It's a bad day today, and by bad I mean sitting in a dark room hugging my dog listening to the same song over and over staring into space ruminating about my horribleness oh my god I just want a pill kind of bad day.

On days like today, I reconnect with an uncanny ability to look inside myself and find a way to remember every mistake I have ever made, every sideways comment that I have ever said, every disappointment that I have ever caused and put them all together as the best evidence ever of my own stupidity and badness. Everything people say (or don't say for that matter) goes through my "I hate me" filter and straight into my heart.

Today, I am struggling with a demon of my own making. More than a year ago, I had a brief affair with someone that I knew was otherwise attached. To make it ok inside my own heart, I told myself that their relationship must not be what it should be, or the affair wouldn't be happening at all. I told myself that I was in love with her before the two of them ever even met. I told myself that it was only a matter of time before she would understand that I was actually the one she needed. I lied to myself over and over again.

What it took me a while to really understand was that, to her, I was nothing more than a conquest, and ego stroke, a toy. She had the life she wanted barring a little forbidden excitement - which was where I came in. When the forbidden excitement threatened to affect her stability at home, she decided we should just be friends - unless, of course, I could find a way to reconcile my position in her life in a way that would NOT affect her loving committed PRIMARY relationship - and then it would be great to continue on exactly as things were going. Her argument was that if I couldn't be happy being her friend with benefits, I must not have ever cared about her to begin with. After many attempts at the friendship thing, I eventually began to pull away...the truth was just too hard.

This weekend, they are getting married.

And I can't watch.

And she doesn't get why.

My emotions are cycling all over the place, I hate it. Sad, angry, hurt, guilty, ashamed, grieving, self loathing, resentful. impulsive, crazy, overwhelmed... and I remember saying that thing about how I would rather feel it than not.

Dumb....really dumb.

A demon of my own making...

All I have to do is not take a pill...this will pass

This will pass...

Spring Cleaning

You know, I can't believe it is already April, springtime, almost hell hot Texas summertime...the days, weeks, months - they all just seem to fly. It seems like yesterday that I was shopping for Christmas presents.

When I was a kid, the edge of our front yard facing the road was sort of gulley like - for lack of a better term. To make walking to our front door easier, there was a little bridge across the gulley. It was white, and one spring, it became my job to paint it. I loved the idea - but what I wasn't that crazy about was preparing it to be painted. I really didn't understand why I couldn't just slap the new paint on top of the old paint...why all of that sanding and scraping was necessary at all. It has taken me years to learn the lesson that covering up something that you don't want to look at doesn't mean it is no longer there.

If you have ever watched the Style Network, you have likely seen the show "Clean House." It's one of those shows that the network runs marathon style - back to back episodes for several hours a day...and, believe me, I can watch every one of them over and over. The idea is that people who are living in out of control clutter call the show up and have them come over and go through their house to de-clutterize it. After taking all of the accumulated junk out of the house, they then have a yard sale and use the funds to redesign and decorate one or more rooms in the house. I never cease to be amazed when the crew first enters these people's houses. Who in the hell lives like that??? It's just crazy!! These people have so much crap that they can't even see their bed, or the floor, or the kitchen counters. When they begin to go through the house finding yard sale items, it is like pulling teeth. I remember one guy that had some sort of weird obsession with dead computers. He had a fantasy that he would repair them all and sell them on ebay. While he was not getting around to that, he had collected enough non-functional keyboards, monitors, towers, etc... to render an entire room in the house completely useless - and this grown man, no shit, threw a big ol' "I gotta go lay down" hissy fit about getting rid of that crap - EVEN when they offered him a completely new, fully equipped office space...he still put up a fight...he just couldn't let go.

I was thinking about that guy tonight. Often my life feels just like the inside of these people's houses. I've gone through life collecting the things that have made up my journey, and many of those things served a purpose for a while but then, for whatever reason, stopped working for me or maybe even started working against me. Some things never worked to begin with, but I just didn't know what to do with them so I tucked them away, vowing, with the sincerest of intentions, to deal with them later. Commitments have gotten lost, irritations turned to resentments...before I knew it, I had no room in my life for anything else. Eventually, I found myself overwhelmed by emotional clutter, chaos, and a complete inability to find peace. And yet, when someone tried to help me let go of the junk cluttering up my life, my basest instinct was to fight them...to hang on to it with everything I had.

So, it's springtime again. Time to pull out all of the crap, examine it, and sort it into bags marked keep, throw out, and donate. Time to get uncompromisingly honest about what works, and what doesn't ... what should be tossed, what might be worth the cost and effort to repair. Time to figure out a course of action for the things left tucked away, understanding that in order to have room for the things and people that contribute to my peace and happiness, I have to get rid of those that do not... scraping and sanding to make way for the new coat of paint...

And so my spring cleaning begins....