Blog entry for:

that is correct, i AM developing the ability to survive my emotions, although i have not yet died FROM a feeling. so the tried and true has been said, i think i can move on.
alright, i have to 'fess up here, i am more than a bit of a pack rat, especially when it comes to paper. anyhow with the sudden and unexpected death of a friend and the retrieval of her recovery writings it got me to thinking, what if…
my writings are no big deal as the bulk of them are here on the internet, to be read by anyone, anywhere at anytime, so what i have in my notebooks in my office would be no biggie either. some of the men i sponsor, however are incarcerated, and we do step work by mail. i had saved every scrap of paper every single one of them had ever composed in my fire-proofish box. so after being presented with another addict&s dilemma the other day, i started thinking, should i really be leaving behind their personal and often incriminating writing to be dealt with by someone else. i quickly let it go and allowed myself to FEEL my way to the final decision. this morning i awoke to a certain certainty, that what i needed to do, was to grind that collection of writings and send them to the dump, hence those writings are on the way to oblivion, although they have already been manipulated beyond the capability to be read by a human agency. i am saddened by the fact that i could not be a better custodian and find a way to keep them around forever, BUT it is not like i keep the writings of the other men i sponsor under my desk, they share with me, and then do with what they have written as they will, which is how it should be. i do think that there will be a brief retention policy that i will have to feel my way through, but just for today, i have done what i needed to do.
how does this apply to surviving my emotions and feelings? well if i put my mind to it, i am quite sure i could find the hook. that is not where i want to go, nor spend the energy doing this morning, so instead i will just jump to the next thing on my mind, which happens to be related to the reading.
yesterday, i shared about how in active addiction i could easily fake my feelings, as a result, once i started actually feeling my emotions, i kept second-guessing whether or not they were real, and if they were real, were they valid. it took time, and yes some writing for me to come to where i am today. YES my emotions are real and no matter how inappropriate they are, THEY ARE ALWAYS valid in ALL situations. this is not a surgical semantic strike, it is however a clue for me to understand what is going on inside of me. not that i NEED to understand why i feel what i feel, i WANT to understand that, so i can address any issues within, as they bubble to the surface. which goes back to me wanting to be in control, and therefore starting to believe that i have some POWER over how and what i feel. i just may, but it is so limited that unless i decide to use again, i would be better off, accepting that i am powerless over my feelings, and concentrate on where my power lies, namely in how i react to those feelings. once again, it comes back to moving in FAITH, and as i sit here and let my head catch-up with my heart, i can see that i am moving there, albeit at a glacial pace, but there is progress nevertheless. with progress, there is HOPE and with HOPE i can and will be okay, no matter what i feel today, it si after all, a great day to do this recovery gig.

∞ DT ∞