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...at the direction of my Higher Power, the more i will trust that those changes are for the best. FAITH will replace FEAR, and i will know in my heart that all will be well.
fear of change, fear of remaining the same, fear of anything in between; quite a bit of fear to deal with on a daily basis, at least for this addict. so what am i to do? well as the reading suggests, surrendering to the changes, examining the evidence of the past changes, and learning to accept change as part of the process is a good place to start. for me, FAITH is something i needed to grow, bit by bit. i have never been the type to accept anything on face value. i have always had to dig, examine, tinker with and perform more than a few mental gymnastics to get to a place of FAITH about anything. that included the path of recovery. i was told that it worked from the very beginning, but naturally i had more than a few doubts. how can anything work to remove my desire to use? as i allowed those very first changes to creep into my life, i discovered that i too could have that promise fulfilled. it took time, it took acceptance, it took step work and it took total and abject surrender to a spiritual way of living, in order for that particular change to be manifest in my life. even after all of that, i had my doubts that the desire to use would be permanently relieved. it has been gone since i worked that very first fifth step, and has only returned briefly in times of great emotional distress. so although i did not get the permanence i was seeking, if i look at the sum total of the evidence, i was given the tools to counter that desire when it reared its ugly head.
just as that change has been beneficial to me across the course of my recovery, so have many others. i left a job after twelve years, i graduated from college, i found the woman with whom i wish to spend the rest of my life with, we moved in together and we bought a house. each and every one of those changes were surrounded with great fear and resistance on my part. i do not let go of anything without leaving claw marks, and learning to trust a process that i hardly understand is one of the greatest exercises in FAITH i have ever had to do.
these days, i am better at allowing change to happen, i am better at accepting things on FAITH, and i am better at living in a place of TRUST. better not perfect, and i guess the day i become perfect at that i will be some sort of recovery saint, ready to be canonized and take my place in the pantheon of recovery deities. BUT until that day comes i will muddle through the best i can and live each day with as much FAITH as i can muster. anything else would be silly and counterproductive. so once again out into the cold chilly world to face what i need to face.

∞ DT ∞