Blog entry for:

my ideas of how the world should be run begin to lose their importance, and i stop trying to impose my will on everyone and everything around me. so one again it is the 25th of December, and once again, i am surprised bu this reading, in fact, this morning it really floored me to find it here, even though this is hardly the first time i have read it. since it feels like the first time, i am not going to refresh my memory about the other times, by reading what i have written and posted in the vast wasteland of “cyber-space.”
before i really get rolling, i hope all who happen to read this entry today, has an excellent holiday. i know for me, spending time with the ones i love is certainly something i cherish and dread at the same time. these days more cherish, less dread, but nothing is ever pure is it?
a bunch of stuff is going on inside of me. some of it triggered by the secular and very religious stuff posted on the social networks by my friends and acquaintances. some of it from taking the day almost totally off yesterday. part of it, from anticipation about what the next 12 hours will bring. most of it from my own head and the whole concept of self-will versus acceptance. the snippet from the reading i chose this morning was not haphazard but very deliberate.
where do i begin? yes i know, at the beginning, but is that two thousand years ago? fifty-five years ago? or 16 years ago? all interesting choices and all marking the beginning of new eras, even though maybe only the middle one, seemed to have any significance in the here and now. the other two, were easy to miss by the rest of the world and it was not until some time passed, that their significance was realized. since every one knows what happened just over two thousand years or so, give or take a decade, i will focus on the latter and get a running start at the topic at hand.
so, sixteen years ago, December 25,1996, i was two days away from the final sentencing for my first major trip through the justice system. more than likely i drank, and more than likely i participated in imbibing some party favors, that i knew were going to leave very little trace in my bodily fluids. after all, i was steeling myself for the the three year drought that enforced abstinence was about to kick-off. i had lied about how much alcohol i used, and the professionals i interacted with,m were clueless about the true nature of the relationship between alcohol and people like me, addicts. in fact i can hear myself saying that i lied so i could continue to drink, because there was no way i could make it through three years without something and since i was an addict and alcohol was legal, that would be my fall back position. so as i planned my default situation, i can remember being pissed-off, that was about the only emotion i still could identify, and scared, FEAR was another, about what was my life going to look like in two days and how could i make it look better. so the courts were about to give me a very nice Christmas present, and i was about to spit in their face and say fVck it i will do anything i can get away with, for as long as i can get away with it, which in my case was not very long, less than two weeks as matter of fact, so begin my climb out of active addiction and into the new life i cherish so much today. it will be over nine months before i start to get clean, and another 22 months before i land in the fellowship that gives me this new way of living but y'all know that already.
that Christmas, the feeling of everything slipping out of my control, was alarming, disturbing and quite overwhelming, and i doubt i was present for anything that went on. this morning, i see that when i let go of self-will, i get everything i need. including the time to write this entry and get then get a bit of exercise, removing the white Christmas from my sidewalk and driveway. i am grateful for what i was given in a material sense last night and will be grateful for what i get this afternoon. most importantly i am grateful for the love i have been shown and the care and concern i am given daily by those people who are in my life, as well as the POWER that fuels my recovery. my task for today is to let go of my expectations, be present and listen for what i need to hear as this day unfolds, and perhaps it will end at a meeting tonight, we will certainly see. today i no longer need to defy authority or deny who and what i am. right now? well i am about to impose a bit of my will on the fresh fallen snow, than on some cauliflower for dinner this afternoon. and as this day goes forward, i will do my dangdest to remember that i am part of this world and not some sort of special being who's insight into how things should be, is any more important than those i happen to be with, as the day passes. it is a great day to be clean.

∞ DT ∞