It’s never about the substance

What I am always reminded of in this process of recovery is that it is never about the substance that I seem to be addicted to. It’s about fear or avoidance of a situations that I face in my life.
The funny thing is that I have this realization about every few month. Then I ran out of the house of my sponsor completely happy, skipping a long to my house, smiling, and saying to myself: “It’s not about the food I eat. It’s not about the food.”  It’s about honesty. About sharing my fears, loneliness, pain and guilt that I think that I am in. I get cought up in my mind and blame it on substances or people out there, just so I don’t have to take responsibility, and so I don’t have to face this black hole of fear by myself. But when I face it and express it, it is gone in an instant. That is the trippy thing. So I am actually always just addicted to seperation. The moment I join with someone, my fear goes away and I don’t have to sedate myself anymore. I am writing this for myself, so that the times when I forget that it is not about you or a substance get shorter and shorter. And finally disapear in an instant of communication with God.

I don’t have to impress you!

As I was reading through a 12 step book one line jumped out at me. It talked about one of 12 Step Promises.
Fear of people and economic insecurity will leave us. The author says that the fear might not be gone all together, but the less she thinks she needs to impress people the less afraid she is.
So the whole day I had that phrase in my mind, I don’t need to impress you! I don’t need to impress you!
Only then did I realize that often my motivation was to impress someone.
I have to recognize the problem so it can be solved.
The moment when I realized I wanted to impress everyone this huge pressure fell from me. Oh my God, I had no idea. Or maybe I did in the back of my mind, but it was not conscious so I counld’nt change it.
I feel completely happy and free. That same day I was at a party, and I never experienced myself so relaxed and at easy around. I don’t need to impress you! - a statement of freedom and joy. It really works if I work it.
I love it!!!!!!!!!

Making amends

As I am approaching making amends my sponsor gave me this prayer, that works every time in the most miraculous way.
The 5 rights prayer:
I pray for
the right time
the right place
the right attitude on my part
the right receptivity on the other part
and the right outcome for everyone involved
Amen.
Thank you!

Fear

I wanna talk about fear today. Fear is a force that seems to run peoples life’s, making them sick and leading them nowhere. Fear is the main emotion a human being experiences all the time. I know because I experience it, not knowing that I could have a different feeling about myself. Fear was such a part of my life that I did not even notice how strong it was. I knew I was afraid of absolutely everything and everyone, but had no means to change it. I saw that some of my friends just changed themselves and adjusted around that feeling of fear, incorporating it into their lives. I could never do that. I could not adjust to it. Through the application of the mind training of A Course in Miracles and the 12 Steps, I lost my fear. This makes me cry. Just the thought alone that I don’t have to be afraid of you anymore makes me so happy. I can shine my light and love in your presents without having to hide it in my ideas of what I am, or better what I am not. I can just be myself. And that is an offer for you to get over your fear and just be who you are. What have you got to loose? Fear is just pure laziness. Fear is just a misinterpreted emotion, nothing more. There is absolutely nothing to fear in all of the universe.

Safety

Through doing a fourth step something got revealed to me, that I could not see before opening those corners of my mind. Every grievance that I had, every story that I was validating and telling myself had absolutely nothing to do with another person. I just made up a story because I did not feel save. That was so revelatory to me. I just did not feel save. And I realized that in so many situations I don’t feel save, yes, almost all the time. Now, realizing that that was my problem I had a choice. I had a choice to decide for God. And pray to God instead of making up storied that have no reality whatsoever. Yes, and herein lies my freedom. Wow, that is beautiful, the complete freedom in accepting my uncertainty. Yes, now I stay uncertain all of the time. And it just makes me so happy, because I don’t have to change you or fix the situation or solve anything. No in fact I just give up. Every single one of my action have brought me to a devastation and now I choose again for something else. I choose for God and that means for me to stand still, wait a moment longer and see which gift God is offering me in this moment.

One Problem - One Solution

Yeah that’s just it. I am sitting here staring at the screen, having an experience of the simplicity of the program, but find myself unable to express it. So I just start with where I find myself - Having the problem that I want to keep my blog updated and don’t know what to write. So I am just starting to write what comes to mind – and guess what? - There right there it is! – The solution to my problem. Isn’t that funny? I just wrote all of those lines coming from an impossible situation. – Heaven is just one though away! I have to see or admit to the problem so it can be solved.

The first step is always: What is the problem?

 Basically what it comes down too, my problem is that I think that I am separate from God, yes, it shows up in being broke and my car being at the garage, or any other impossible situation but it always comes down to GOD where the fuck are you?

The second step is the solution. Which is simply a spiritual awakening. Seeing that I am the problem not GOD.

And the third step is the action. Working the 12 steps, doing the mind training of the workbook of A Course in Miracles etc…

So that’s it for today – buh! I wiggled myself out of that one pretty good. And it actually all began to make sense. - At least to me. If I think there is a problem there has to be a solution and it is always closer than I think.

I don’t need to lay up stores…

The twelve Step program is all about God dependency. Relying on a Power greater then myself to supply me with everything I need. Every moment of fear is a lack of trust in my higher power. It is a fear of lack that something will not happen the way I want it to happen. There is this deep fear in me that I am not taken care of. It is part of my limited thought system; it keeps me trapped in the cycle of addiction. I don’t have to hold on to my old though system anymore and in fact I can’t. It is taken from me through the grace of God. It makes me so happy to be able to say that found what I was looking for. Nothing was ever enough in this world. I have learnt that I don’t need to lay up stores, because I am given everything I need in any given moment. And that can be as true for you as it is true for me.

One day at a time

One day at a time. Tells me very simple that there is no past and no future. The only moment that counts is today. Today I can be sane (sober, absitent etc.) This just gives me a focus in my mind. I can never handle more then one instant anyway. But I certainly have tried everything not to see that. Remoses and regrets from the past and fear of the future kept me in my addiction and gave me no solution no way out. Today I am sane because it is the only day there is, it is the only day that I can be happy. So I hand my life and my will over to the care of God, so I can be free to be who I am today.

Acceptance

"And acceptance is the answer to all my
problems today. I need to concentrate
not so much on what needs to be changed
in the world as what needs to be changed
in me and in my attitudes."
The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous

There is one problem and one solution. Resistance is the problem and acceptance the answer. But how do I become willing? I was in a situation today, where I saw clearly that, if only I could let go of my ideas I would be happy. But I could not. Whatever prayer I used, whoever I plead for help. The idea kept circling in my mind. I realized that I still try to use ideas from the past to help me now. Like I had a revelation once with The Serenity Prayer and now I want to have the same result. It dawned on me that I even these prayers can’t help me, if I am trying to help myself. My only solution is the surrender to my Higher Power. Let go and let GOD.

4.Step

Well, until now the program has been great. To accept unmanageability, that was natural and to believe in a Higher Power was an act of grace and to give my life and will over to the care of god was the biggest relief. If you have come so far in the program - congratulations. But now oh boy! Lots of people do not make it through the 4th step. They give up. It’s too uncomfortable. I don’t want to go into my past, I don’t really have any grievances or any excuses that you can think of will come up in your mind. But please do not stop. At this point I always have to remember what I wrote in the first step. All my addictions and the conditions that I don’t ever want to find myself again. I have to remember how I have been and the willingness to do my inventory comes by itself. It is amazing what comes up, when I just give myself the quiet time to just think and watch my mind. All those things that I thought I had already forgiven or that I never wanted to think about again. Every thing goes on the paper. It is amazing to me too, that I was so dishonest when I did my first 4th Step. And I did not even know it. For that time in my recovery I was as honest as I could be. But looking back I thought I could have saved myself a whole lot of pain through complete honesty.
The thing that I love so much about this program is, that I found out through meetings and being a sponsor, that there are no thoughts that have not been thought before. Isn’t that amazing? Every thought that I feel guilty about and want to hide, lots of other people have had that thought. So in other words it is never a big deal. It is only a bid deal when I keep those thoughts hidden. Meanwhile I love the 4th Step and the power and freedom I derive from doing it. The most amazing discovery is always the 4th column. What is my part of the story. I never want to see that, and if I do it is hard to see the whole story. That’s were my sponsor comes in. I often think when I have a grievance - oh I don’t need to write it down, I can just work it out in my head… But I have done that forever and it has lead me to my addiction. The power of writing it down, and seeing it there black on white with nothing to hide or alter it, is immense. In the action of writing it down I am actually breaking my habit of trying to find a solution to my problem. I simple admit that I am powerless, hand my life and will over to the care of God, write it down, tell it to another person and let God completely take care of me.
This is the 4th Step in a nutshell. It takes guts to do it, put the rewards are undescribable.

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