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and the results are apparent in their lives. if i want the lives i see others living, i can find out what they have done to get where they are. as i have been discovering lately, the converse is also true, if i do not want the lives i see, then i also need to discover what it is they are doing, or sadly what they are not doing. my two object lessons, are living examples of what happens when you think you can do this on your own, or even worse that somehow you are exempt from the need to work steps with a sponsor.
but enough about them, for me, i am quite guilty of another lapse in my program. meeting attendance! i am lucky if i make two meetings a week these days, and for me i know that is the bare minimum, although this week i had the chance to add an extra meeting into the mix. my big gripe about meetings is i always here the same old sh!t. newcomers prattling on and on about how proud they are of themselves that they have 30 days clean. or coming back two weeks later whining about how everything has gone to sh!t in their lives because so and so…
when i am spiritually connected, i hear the message that addiction is manifest in their lives, and like them, it is also manifest in my own. i hear the message that denial of what is really going on in my life and mu head will lead to eventual relapse, as my spiritual condition will eventually deteriorate to nothing. i hear that, but i want to hear more, and honestly that more is not around a whole lot. BANG, there i go, that more is not around because members like me, who have a few days, tire of the prattling and stop coming to meetings, telling ourselves that we can get what we need from our network of fellow addicts, our sponsors and our sponsees. so if i want to hear the message of HOPE instead the SH!T of the disease, i need to go to meetings myself, i need to share the HOPE that i have found, and i have to participate in building an atmosphere where addicts like myself, as well as the FNGs can find what they need to recover.
a simple solution, but one that will be hard to implement, as there is quite a bit inertia here to be overcome. be that as it may, tonight will be a good night to venture out of the comfort of my home and see what a new meeting will be like. it is after all, part of what i need to do to recover.

∞ DT ∞