Blog entry for:

...broader vision of my life than just my own; i can have that vision by seeing myself through the eyes of others. okay back to one of those foreign language readings. what i hear and feel when i read this, is that it is a good thing to listen to what others say to me, and regardless of what i think about the validity of what is being said, to examine the idea, and see if there really is any fire behind the smoke they are reporting. so for myself, it is important to be listening and evaluating, rather than defending and dismissing.
what i SEE, is quite a different behavior, especially from some members with decades clean. when i have told them what i have seen, they rationalize their behavior, point their gun back at me, and then summarily dismiss me as if i am some sort of not so precocious child that does not ‘get it.’
so where does that leave me? do i model the behavior presented in the reading, or do i follow the experience of other members, who have after all been clean for a whole helluva lot longer than me?
the answer to that question, at least for me today, is to look at both sides of the coin, as they are certainly polar opposites. those members who i have seen, who do their best to live in the model presented in the reading, seem happy, serene, confident and connected. those members who do not seem to be bitter, isolated and alone. and the rest of us, myself included fall somewhere in between. today i do not want to be some isolated, bitter, old, martyr. been there done that. in fact that was at the root of my NINTH STEP work. as i have moved forward from there, i can see that the vision of the man i wish to become, is more than one who needs to be in control of what is going on in my local fellowship, one who does not always have THE ANSWER, and most importantly one who can consider constructive criticism of my character defects with a rational eye, and allow whatever changes are needed to be manifest in the process of my recovery.
but enough of looking at what i do and do not want to be as i progress through my active recovery. today i will listen to what is being said, and if that source happens to be someone for whom i have little respect, i will redouble my efforts to listen to what they may be trying to tell me, after all, today it is all about me and my recovery.

∞ DT ∞