Time Wasted, Wasted Time?

Early in my recovery I was obsessed with the idea of making up for the time I'd wasted in my active addiction. I thought my life had become a race against time and I had to double my output in every way to catch up to my age. Most of my friends were (and to a point still are) ahead of me in life as the world measures it and I was stuck beginning a wholesale rebuild of my life, my habits and my priorities at 28.

One idea with which I am becoming familiar to the point of being well-versed is the concept of morbid reflection. I hadn't really considered it until it was spoken of in a cruise ship 12-step meeting and it has stuck in my mind consistently since. It dawned on me how much time I've (wasted) spent in that very state. I can remember something from the past, either during or after my active addiction and it is as if I was transported to that moment in time and I can become just as angry/sad/disappointed/jealous/angry/angry/angry/enraged as I was in the moment itself.

Morbid Reflection.

Morbid: "Characterized by or appealing to an abnormal and unhealthy interest in disturbing and unpleasant subjects, especially death and disease."

Reflection: "Serious thought or consideration."

So it's safe to say that morbid reflection could be accurately described as giving serious (to the point of being abnormal) thought to unpleasant subjects from the past, the present or the future. Obsessing over things you can't change (past and future) as well as having an unhealthy interest in things about the present that are disturbing. I can't speak with any authority to how this affects anyone else, but it saps me of so much time, energy and gratitude that it's hard to admit. 

I catch myself in this space multiple times a day, but thanks to my cruise ship meeting partner I now have actual awareness of it and can call it out and change course. If I take a moment to look back, I've wasted MONTHS worth of hours lost in morbid reflection in my life. I am especially susceptible to it - who'd have thought, an addict getting caught up obsessively thinking about stuff - but my awareness of it enables me to make the conscious choice to step out of it.

I control my thoughts, words and actions. Today I choose to make my thoughts a weapon I wield in the fight for my own good, not a weapon of self-destruction.