The Weight

Acceptance is the key.

Those in the rooms of recovery who are making a genuine attempt at sobriety oftentimes live by this mantra, and everyone who has entered one of those rooms has heard it. It is part of our new way of thinking and it is a cornerstone of that new and mentally health mindset. It is one of those statements whose meaning you begin to grasp when you look for the way to live “normally” and try to deal with life’s issues in a constructive way. For me it has meant peace and balance in the worst of times and an anchor in the rest.

A philosophy of acceptance can lead you many good places, but acceptance without due time and attention to processing and grief can provide only a temporary respite from the storm. By itself it can keep you sober, but if that is as far as you get you might be setting yourself up for relapse when the unresolved junk bubbles back up to the surface. It is the first step but truthfully should not be the only one taken, much like stopping the drinking, using or acting out behaviors is the required beginning of your walk down the path of sobriety but that alone is simply not enough.

Acceptance with no follow-up can be a temporary victory. As many of those in my life are aware, I've seen my share of difficulty both in and outside of the context of addiction or recovery. I have dealt with tragic loss and my own physical and mental limitations. It is only very recently that I came to realize that I had a great deal of anger and hurt that was seemingly lying dormant inside; these negative emotions popped back up in full force because I’d not allowed myself the space to work through feelings and emotions that resulted from some difficult circumstances.

That energy doesn't just go away. You have to respect your own need to think, feel and process in order to work through the difficulties and trials you will inevitably face.

A few days ago I heard something profoundly powerful in a twelve step meeting: sometimes you just have to sit and hurt. In dealing with the roller coaster of beginning a new career and learning of my sister’s death within an hour of each other, I haven’t ever really just allowed myself to sit and hurt because I am deathly afraid of getting stuck there. As with most things, I see it as very all-or-nothing and struggle to find moderation. I didn't really acknowledge my own feelings and by extension didn't really deal with them.

In this sense I have not progressed that much from my days as a raging alcoholic and ravenous drug abuser who was running from the pain of losing my father barely more than a year after I myself nearly died - I have still been avoiding my feelings and emotions rather than dealing with them.

Progress, not perfection.

This is another mantra of sobriety, and it may just be the one that gets me through today.