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i gain the freedom to become who i want to be and i begin to realize that i have many good qualities to share with others.
for some reason, that is one of the most difficult concepts for me to buy into on my worst days. on my best, well maybe not quite so hard.
after years and tears of abusing myself, and riding roughshod over my emotions, i came to believe that i was worthless. i have heard that same theme, expressed hundreds of time, by people with whom i share this path, and have come to wonder if that is just part of the package of being an addict. each day i walk this path, i see how i lie to myself, and how delusional i get as a result. bit by bit, i come to see myself for who i really am, and when i start to get too close to the truth and i reach out and rescue someone. after all, if i am playing the hero, at least i am worth something to anyone else.
this whole topic, humility, is one that give me the shivers every time i approach it. for one, when i got clean my opinion of myself swung wildly from the greatest thing since sliced bread, to the lowest life form currently walking the planet, and nothing in between. recovery has expanded the area between, but the wild swings to the extremes is what i know and because of that, where i tend to want to comfortably dwell, when life is too tough, in my perception, for me to face. this is after all, a perception problem and not a honesty or reality problem. the solution i seek today, is freedom from the extremes. just as recovery has freed me from the flat-line emotions that characterized my active addiction. it has as well, freed me from the roller-coaster of emotions that were part and parcel of my first days recovering. i have FAITH, that recovery can restore sanity in my life, in regards to how i view myself and my place in the world. do not get me wrong, for the most part i live more in the middle than out in the long tails of my humility continuum, there can however still be a greater tendency toward the middle, which would make life a helluva lot more comfortable for this addict.
as the reading suggests that ONCE i can accept myself, all of this is not only possible, but actually probable. i see it in others, and as a result, i can be certain that others can see it in me. i have to learn to trust their perceptions and discount my own, as they are still warped by addiction, no matter how long i stay clean.
so off to the office i go, and i am certain, that IF i allow myself, i CAN get out of the way and have yet another good day. who knows, just for today i may accept myself just as i am: a work in progress who has more than one thing to offer the world around me.

∞ DT ∞