Taking Inventory

It is a valuable thing in this life to be willing to consistently take a look at oneself in the mirror and honestly, earnestly evaluate where the person looking back at you stands.  It is both a difficult and worthwhile exercise and one that we far too often do not undertake. We get busy and things are going well and everyone loves us so why mess with a good thing, right?

For an addict, this regular self-evaluation is a necessary component of a healthy recovery. It is often gritty and grimy and difficult; it requires rigorous honesty and a dedication to seeing our own roles in any situation, especially when we feel we have been gravely wronged and couldn't have possibly been a contributor to the negativity. It's much easier to blame and get upset at others for perceived injustices and allow that to turn into a resentment. That resentment will simmer, fester and boil until it spills over and we are left to clean up the mess- 99 times out of 100 the "cause" (I use that term loosely, because we are almost always the cause of our resentments because we don't address the issue immediately) has moved on so far and fast that the aftereffects couldn't be further from their minds because they aren't aware of our wound in the first place.

It is comparatively more natural to look at ourselves when things aren't going well, when others have seemingly abandoned us and success feels out of our reach. It is often these times which bring us back to our roots and compel us down a path of right thinking and acting, but one has to question whether or not these trials could've been avoided by simply being more diligent about checking in with ourselves. Had we established a routine of regular, honest self-evaluation, it is reasonable to think that we very well may have been able to head many of these situations off at the pass.

I can say from my own experience that the period of time when I finally made the decision to get a sponsor and work the steps brought about the most freeing thing I have experienced in recovery: the opportunity to sit down with my personal inventory and go over it with said sponsor. It was as though a ten-ton weight had been taken from my head and I felt as joyous and alive as I ever had. It felt like my slate had truly been set back to zero and that I was free to truly move forward unencumbered.

It would be reasonable to ask, then, if that experience had such a profoundly positive effect on me, why I am not more enthusiastic about having a smaller version on a regular basis by taking my own inventory frequently? There are answers to be sure, but nothing that rightly justifies my lack of diligence. It is too easy to let things of this nature slip when life has me running and gunning, and it is not the least painful process through which a person might go. There is reward on the other side of the discomfort and of that I am certainly aware.

What keeps you from looking honestly at yourself? What would you gain by doing it more often? How would your perspective change if it was more often influenced by honest self-evaluation and reflection?

Courage

All credit due to Brene Brown for inspiring this post. If you’ve not read any of her work on guilt, shame, fear and courage you should consider doing exactly that. The insight she offers may just set you free in a new and beautiful way.

In my younger days, I might have defined courage as more of a physical expression of a person’s lack of fear, like being willing to do something reckless in spite of danger. Now that I have a bit more living under my belt I know that real courage is typically something very different; I believe that true courage comes in many forms and most of the time has nothing to do with anyone’s willingness to do something foolish without regard to the consequences (although it could at times be part of the equation). Courage and vulnerability are strange-but-true bedfellows. What greater courage than to step forward at your most vulnerable? You know the risk, yet step forward anyway.

In the life of an addict, we are at our most courageous when we allow our true selves to emerge in all of their vulnerability and we are at our strongest as we own our weakness. We gain courage by reaching our bottom and deciding that enough is enough. Reaching bottom is not a requirement for sobriety necessarily, but for a great many of the worst cases that’s what it takes for us to decide to change.

At no time in the life of an addict is he or she more vulnerable than at his or her lowest point, after all the things it took to get us there have forced our surrender.  It takes courage to make the decision to say “ENOUGH,” as well as to follow through with all the changes that must occur afterwards. We must not only retool our way of thinking, we must begin taking steps to rebuild our life in a way that will enable us to stay clean and sober- learn a whole new way of life.

Courage is facing ourselves at our worst without giving up on the man or woman in the mirror. Being at our worst isn't necessarily a statement about our physical condition as much as it is our mental, emotional and spiritual state. Courage is continuing to fight that battle after we've been hardest hit - smacked by guilt, shame and remorse over our choices. Courage is indeed getting up when you've been knocked down, but addicts have to take it a few steps further and acknowledge that we're the ones who knocked us off our feet- our choices and behaviors got us here. Courage to face self when self is the problem- that's something with which addict and non-addicts alike struggle daily.

Do you or I have the courage to face ourselves, our greatest fears, worries and insecurities? Maybe not at all or maybe not today, but when we know we are not alone it can help to bridge that gap. We are all in this fight, and just like with the rest of life, we are all in this together. Take heart, take courage and take aim at your opportunities. 

What Would Change?

I have seen many relapses in my (relatively) short time in sobriety and have often pondered the consequences or effects of a relapse in my life. What will happen? How will my life change? How will I change? Let’s look at each of these questions and drill into an honest answer.

1.       What will happen if I relapse?

This scenario has truthfully played out in my mind hundreds of times, in passing thoughts or in response to stressful situations. Without fail, it proceeds thusly: somehow I am convinced that I should forget everything I know about the inanity of the first drink for the alcoholic. I’m at no point operating under the false assumption that I’ve learned how to drink like normal folks; I never wanted to drink like a normal person from the very beginning. I am overcome with guilt and shame and begin to punish myself for that first drink with many, many more. I also become a recluse because I cannot face the literally hundreds of people who’ve come to know my sobriety as a fundamental part of who I am.

2.       How will my life change if I relapse?

The first thing is physically I become weak and sick. I go to bed earlier and wake up later and feel like crap in between. The drugs follow shortly after the drink and most likely I end up out of a job within two months (if I am lucky). I also become a recluse because I cannot face the literally hundreds of people who’ve come to know my sobriety as a fundamental part of who I am. I know that I am not out and about nearly as often these days, but I will become a ghost if relapse becomes a part of my story.

3.       How will I change if I relapse?

The positivity is gone. The desire to be of service to others vanishes. The fragile sense of self-worth becomes extinct. My life as I know it is over.

Now, I won’t say that there’s no way I could come back from this or that redemption would then be impossible. I will say that the odds are in favor of me drinking and drugging so hard, so fast that I don’t live longer than 6 months after I pick up again if it ever happens. My guilt would consume me and my shame would hang on my head like a lead weight. The life I would have left would consist of me being alive, but not really living. The good things in my life would melt away and I’d be left in the company of my own self-loathing.

This thought horrifies me. I can honestly, unashamedly say it frightens me to my core. However, it is also not what I choose to use as my reason to stay clean and sober, although fear is indeed a powerful motivator. Today I choose to move forward, drawn by the beauty of my life rather than away from the dark reality of the possibilities if I relapse. I will also freely admit that if in the pivotal moment this fear is all that stands between me and the first drink or drug, I will use it to stay sober for that day. I won’t choose to stay there, because that fear too would consume me eventually and bear the same consequences.

I choose to move towards the light and towards the love today, and I also choose to not lose sight of what relapse would bring.

Six Years

Six years. Just for today, times 2,192 and countless other “please let me just get through the next fifteen minutes” moments.

At times, my sobriety feels like my oldest and dearest friend, while at others it is not nearly so comfortable. Sometimes it is natural and a lot of the time it isn’t easy at all. As some of those reading this already know, I’ve had some fantastically beautiful moments and some devastatingly difficult ones as well over this time. Living clean and sober is not always easy, but without fail it has been worth it.

You see, I spent fourteen or fifteen years operating from a place where I had no desire to face anything or anyone, including myself. I was boisterously fraudulent to others and a small, scared kid within my own mind. I lied, manipulated and many times could think of nothing besides my own desires. Selfish and self-centered at my core, my occasional grand generous gestures were performed with a payoff in mind.

I had surprisingly low self-esteem and even today I am often haunted by self-doubt. There are many things these days that just feel so out of my depth and I know that I can’t handle them alone. It would be the easiest thing in the world to pick up and act out instead of facing these things.

There are days when everything inside me wants a half-gallon as if it were food or water.  I want to get stoned and watch movies all day, or get high and bounce around the planet for a while. Many of you reading this post don’t want to see that or believe it, but I don’t lie these days and I don’t try to hide things about me that are scary. My sobriety is not guaranteed.  

Sometimes I have no idea how I got through a day at the end of it. Sometimes the past is a crushing weight on my mind. Sometimes I miss my dad and my sister more than I can bear and I just sit and hurt and cry and scream. Sometimes (a lot of the time, actually) I miss being able to not feel the pain or the joy or the agony or the thrill. Some days I am THISCLOSE to the liquor store and then I turn around and tell someone else how to stay sober, just for today. Sometimes I just want the rollercoaster to slow down long enough for me to jump off.

My peace today comes from knowing that at any given moment, I am exactly where I am supposed to be. I know that what I think I want is definitely not always what I really need, and that my own designs have been and will always be flawed at their best. I do myself a favor when I allow awareness to be present and can then self-correct when I am comparing myself to others too much or I am getting inside my own head too much. I am at my best when I am sharing the experience, strength and hope with which my struggles have blessed me; when I am focused more on others than myself, I am focused an happy. The balance can be delicate (as expressed in a recent post) but service to others is ultimately service to myself and my sobriety.

Six years into what I pray daily is a lifelong journey I wouldn’t change a thing. Six years’ worth of highs, lows and all that comes in between GENUINELY felt and experienced; I was actually there for all of it and none of it was chemically rendered or tinted. Real life, guys and dolls and I am grateful for every wonderful, awful, amazing bit of it. It’s not often easy, but it is always worth it. 

External Validation

As much as I hate to admit it, I must own the fact that I need external validation/approval much more than it might seem. When I sit and think about it, the root of this need (desire) is fairly simple to trace: as much as I love my father, he was not one to make it very clear to me that he was proud of me (or proud of anyone to their face). That fact was my favorite thing to drink and drug over for years. 

He told anyone else who would listen how proud of me he was. He was deeply proud of the way I handled blowing out my knee my senior year in football and he almost admired the resiliency I showed in bouncing back from my car wreck. I never got to hear these things first hand and he will never have the chance to tell me. This is a void that can't ever truly be filled, although I have tried desperately to do so. I try to fill that void now without admitting it - until this post, that is. 

I shun or deflect praise whenever I receive it, but the truth is that I crave it more than you can or will ever know.

Sometimes I really feel like my mom has gone out of her way to try and make up for those expressions of pride that my dad left unsaid. Growing up there was never any doubt that my mom was proud, and I have no room to doubt it now. Some of that probably also comes from her mom (my grandmother, obviously) making a conscious effort, as she once told me, to never let someone feel too good about themselves lest they get a big head. She told me this years ago and it’s plain to see the effect it has had on my mother.

The truth is that if I only have my own best estimate to guide me, my worth is much less than you’d imagine. I need reassurances that the average adult has grown beyond seeking. I still usually feel weak and only occasionally worthwhile. I mostly just dislike myself.

If I care for you and if I think you’re disappointed in me or have started to dislike me too, it literally makes me feel as though my soul is collapsing in on itself and I want to die. The darkness is crushing.

I have a very fragile sort of strength when it comes to “me.” I obviously make it by day-to-day and have a fulfilling life that involves helping others, which is all I’ve truly wanted since I was a child. I can be a magnificent resource in that way for others, but I have a difficult-nigh-impossible time being kind to myself so I need you to do that for me. To depend on another human in that way, selfish and self-centered beings that we are, is to set myself up for repeated disappointment because that is no one else’s obligation.

The first kindness that I owe is to myself and I simply must do a better job of paying it. Does any of this resonate with you? If so, this may be a bill you owe to yourself as well and maybe we can grow better at this together. 

Feeling Overwhelmed

Work. School. Meetings. Spouse. Volunteering. Kids. Exercise. Sponsorship. Tee ball practice. Pets. Life. Sometimes it’s just too much for even the best of us, and the first thing we neglect is ourselves.

I feel this sensation of overwhelm much more often than I will own in conversation. I don’t like to admit that sometimes it’s just too much, or that at times folks collectively ask too much of me. I allow myself to be pulled in eight different directions at any given time and often wish that I could be doing more for more people. The fact is that I can’t really do what I am already doing most of the time- I find a way, but at the expense of my own serenity and joy (not to mention the time away from my wife).

I allow myself to get over-committed because I feel the siren’s song of overactive service as a means of making amends to the entire world for my years as a Grade-A self-centered schmuck. I feel like I owe a debt to everyone that I can never possibly repay, but that I also cannot neglect to make “payments” towards.

A big part of healthy sobriety is sponsorship and service to others (in or out of the context of recovery). Part of my service is because I must get outside of myself to maintain my sobriety, and part of it is because I feel called to do it out of an obligation to be unselfish. I never feel like I do enough even though I basically always do way too much.

The reason it never feels like enough is that I am chasing a ghost I can never catch- I cannot possibly get back the opportunities to do the right thing that I missed while in the throes of my active addiction, but I refuse to believe that not being able to “win” is ever a good enough reason to not try. I never want to be unavailable to the call of another person in need, because in many cases I am uniquely capable of offering support in a way that others cannot. I know that, so I answer the call.

The question becomes this: If I am doing so much for others in the name of maintaining my sobriety that I am actually putting my sobriety at risk, is it still the right thing to do?

Many of you don’t believe I will ever drink or drug again, but that is out of a lack of understanding about addiction. I promise you that you can’t fathom how close I have already come to relapse in my own mind. There are days I can taste the whiskey and feel the “drip” and all I want is to disappear into a soul-crushing black hole of my own creation. You can’t imagine how inexplicably drawn I am to crawling under a rock and hanging out with the rest of the decay.

Some moments of some days all I want to do is upset the apple cart of your expectations with my own tendency towards self-destruction JUST TO SHOW YOU THAT I CAN. In those times, I want to disappoint everyone and wreck everything just to destroy everyone’s expectations. I want to make you realize how unpredictable I am while at the same time craving your trust. I want to rage against the life I have built for myself because my base instinct will always be to self-destruct. I am addicted to self-pity. Part of me will always want to back myself into a corner so I can fight my way back out of it.

Yes, that is absolutely crazy. So am I.

Thanks goodness that my memory is not nearly as short as my ability to control my impulses. I can’t afford to forget what that life was like and how horribly miserable that non-existence actually was. Do I need to be more effective at setting boundaries? 100% in the affirmative. Is that a good enough reason to drink today? 100% in the negative and it never will be.

Attraction, Rather Than Promotion

Many of the most successful fellowships supporting those with addictions, obsessions or compulsions operate off of the principle of attraction rather than promotion regarding those outside the four walls of the meeting.  No one is supposed to be out in the community at large "evangelizing" on behalf of AA, NA or any of the other numerous Twelve Step-based programs (I'm only addressing those types of programs here, although as an aside I readily acknowledge that many other successful programs of recovery exist). This idea is based on the eleventh tradition as authored in the early years of Alcoholics Anonymous. Today I’d like to dive into some of the reasons why this is the rule and some of the strengths of this “policy.”

The things about a choice-based lifestyle change (positive change, obviously) is that a person has to want to do it for reasons that will genuinely make it stick. “The right reasons” don’t often coincide with advertisement or solicitation, (or court order for that matter) although they can and sometimes do. When a person has come to a turning point they are typically looking for hope, support and the chance to grow. All of these things can be found in recovery fellowships if they are healthy, and that should be evident in the everyday lives of the members of the fellowship. Good sobriety typically begets maturity, understanding and serenity and these qualities are pretty attractive when lived out.

There are a good many groups who could learn a thing or two from the practical application of this idea of attraction rather than promotion. It’s based on not just having a “thing” that people are seeking, but having members who are more engrossed by living out the principles of the group than trying to win the crowd. It’s “I am who I am, and if you like who I am, I can tell you a bit about how I got to be this way if you ask.”

There’s not supposed to be the constant attempt to publicly spoon-feed anyone anything if individual members are honoring this tradition. No advertising or promoting is needed because those who are actively living this way of life have something good that is also contagious. If you hear something that resonates and you want to give that way of life a shot, there’s a pretty clear path forward - you keep coming back. If not, maybe you don’t; the fact is that the ones who are in need and ready to change tend to find their way back sooner rather than later.

No one needs to rent billboard space to say “Come see what all the fuss is about!” If you are ready, you seek and then you find that which you sought.