Rumination

If I could live my life over would I have left out my alcoholic drinking? I have thought about this often lately and the automatic answer should be a resounding yes.  However, on a second pass of rumination I wonder.  Would I have had the mental tenacity I have now to have done things really differently in my life?  Without time spent drinking and moments contemplating the next drink would I have actually put the clock time of my life to good or constructive use?  There is part of me that will always want to answer yes but fortunately my unlived life, my unlived sober life can only be the metaphor and the energy to live the one I am living right now.   

Desire

There never is an ideal time to decide you’re going to stop drinking.  Some smokers and dieters like to make it a New Years resolution that they are going to begin living a healthier lifestyle. They think that declarations alone will bring them closer to the actual practice they claim they will attach themselves to. Most of these resolutions are but a whisper in the dark and fade before January’s page is turned.  No matter, there’s always next year or their birthday for their next attempt.  

What’s different about we alcoholics? Dieters and smokers state their intention, but what they might be missing is desire.  Desire to stop is much more powerful than declarations or even intentions. Desire comes from within and therein lays the real power to stop. But we also know that desire has to be put into action before we obtain anything but baleful results. 

Compelled

I feel compelled as I sit waiting for my blended family to arrive this Christmas Eve to write to my friends in and out of the rooms of A.A. To those still struggling with the active part of their addiction, I am here to tell you that there is always hope while your lungs can take the very next breath. Nothing is hopeless unless you deem it to be so.  No problem or situation that time cannot heal either in your head heart or mind.  All it takes is for you to make a decision that your life is unmanageable at least the way you’re attempting to run it.  Stay out of judgment of what others may have done to you or how you were dealt a dead hand with jokers not being wild. Stop lying to yourself and bring truth to the only persons it matters to-YOU.  Easier said than done? No I am here to tell you that’s all it takes. It’s not the time it’s just the present moment.  You will never gain sympathy as fast as you wish it and you will never please everyone once you start to make progress.  Put one day in the books but don’t get too caught up in the numbers just log them silently.  

To those that are in the rooms and those that have left I resonate with you as well.  There will never be the time we regret our stay in the rooms, at least not for me because it gave me back my life and continues to be my companion each dawn I live.  Keep going if you need to go. But to those of you that still believe that the rooms are the only place for you, please take note that there is a life outside those confines.  And if you don’t go to meetings anymore let not the only person you talk to be the person inside your head because they can’t be trusted.  Seek outside help in any form that aligns with your spirit. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year my friends and don’t listen to the earthlings they only know how to avoid open manholes, they’ve never been down one.  

I Want More!

I want more!  We always do when something is really really good.  But, do we really know when enough is enough though?  I can remember waking from a hangover and exclaiming I was not going to have another drink again. Only to be persuaded as it passed that it would be different this time and I would face a clear head the next morning, only to be proven wrong each and every time.  Definition of insanity: Doing the exact same thing and expecting different results.  Then there are the rationalizations we endlessly engage in because we ignore what he had to endure, which was the excruciating pain and frustration while we were in the midst of what we thought was sublime happiness.  

However, that was my past life and things are different now and I know better. Well some of the time I do. 

My Conscious Thought

As I advance my new time line, I choose the selfish route of elevating 

my conscious thought which will in turn move my unconscious actions 

away from useless daydreaming and fearful days that God will not take 

me from this place and move me even closer to his will.

I never even thought it was possible to lose my will and 'turn it 

over' to Gods will. When I get neck deep in fear and loathing of 

others, I try to get silent, breathe deep and ask for Gods will. I 

inevitably find that the world slows down and the pain subsides as if 

by magic.

My life after AA is almost like graduation from high school or moving 

from the cub scouts to the boy scouts. Except for the fact that we who 

out grow the shelters of AA should not be alone in the feeling that we 

are caught between heaven and earth. From the safe confines of a church 

basement to the outside world inhabited by 'earthlings' and other 

such folk. Where we may feel uncomfortable in this in between world, I 

can attest we need not be fearful. After all we have all the rudiments 

of fine living, our blue print that AA gave us. The tools to live and 

breathe in a world that used to baffle us.

Meister Eckhart

The distance traveled since my last drink in time and space is not a whole hell of a lot of psychological time when you break it down. Meister Echkart says: “Time is what keeps the light from reaching us”. Something that starts my mind cogitating about the belief that although time may heal all wounds it becomes an impediment to real change because we’ve had too much time to think about it. We get lost in “what’s next” on our agenda and lose perspective on the moment in time we are in always, the present moment. Meister Echkart has something there, and I will take up his writing in earnest. Unless, of course I don’t have enough time. 

21+ years might seem like an inordinate time to some but to me it’s like a fortnight in terms of what I have learned about myself and those people that I have loved and didn’t like.  There are of course many that have entered into my inner and outer circle and many more of them that have left than those that have stayed on for hopefully the duration.  I do know that sobriety has its benefits beyond remembering what I said last night and where did I park my car. Although for the rest of you please know I still don’t remember where I put my stuff when I go to my gym Equinox and where the hell my keys are. 

When Patience Runs Out

When patience is gone what is left behind?  Is it always anger or resentment?  Does it have to be?  Can relief be allowed to speak?  Does it have to be a discourse in a useless expression of hurtful dialogue?  

We all have a little patience and when we reach into our back pocket of tolerance we come up with considerably more.  We usually are lauded when we exhibit a lot especially in the face of trying and tense situations.  

We start out with patience if we are so blessed and at some point it runs out.  What does that mean?  We shift from acceptance even though we may not be in agreement, to rejection.  The conditioned response when we reject is dismissal, anger, and a cornucopia of hurt feelings.  When we do run out of patience it’s because someone didn’t live up to an expectation we had and maybe kept to ourselves. This is our own constructed dead end, because we have failed to establish boundaries and having patience is not always the true course, because the “other” might not have been aware we were extending it to them. We just expect them to know.  When it runs out they might have been anticipating we could hold out a little bit longer.  Our time frame rarely matches someone else’s