Blog entry for:

when it speaks, the heart understands.
after the week i have had, i do not really know how much i can talk about gratitude. i guess, if i truly consider the events of the week, in the whole BIG picture of my life, i can see that it was not that bad. in fact, it probably does not even come close to the top 100 bad weeks of my life, and looking at it like that, there certainly has to be at least a bit of gratitude in me. it is so ironic, hearing newcomers go on and on about how grateful they are for the little bit of change that early recovery has brought to their lives, when i sit here, with more than just a few days clean, wondering what the fVck to be grateful for, and how the fVck i am going to express that gratitude. things are way different today, and amazingly, the longer they stay different, the less grateful i feel. i get into the same sense of entitlement that i often rail about here and in my conversations with others. after all, clean time means that i SHOULD be getting everything my little heart desires. those desires are my REWARDS for staying clean and turning my life around, so where the fVCK are they!
as you can see, i can quite quickly spin something good such as extended clean time into something not so good, a sense of entitlement, unmet expectations and resentments.
BOOM!
this where i pull out the gratitude card!
i have to look at where i was, and where i was going. the sponsee that called me the other night, who incoherently tried to tell me that the world was out to get him,. is the living example of the direction my life was taking. three or so years of hard time, may not have made me a career criminal, but chances are, like him, i would have turned a three year sentence into a life sentence, never quite getting that i was worth more than three hots and a cot. or perhaps i would have successfully discharged that burden and ended up with a McJob somewhere, scraping by, but living my life in a cocoon of chemical bliss. i certainly had lost the ability to care about anyone else, and was quickly losing the ability to care for myself. life certainly would have been different. looking at where i am today, from where i could have been, and i start to feel grateful that despite all my resistance, despite all my seeking of the easier, softer way, despite all the ways and means i sought to disqualify myself, i stayed clean and actually started to recover. somehow, i was given the grace to stay on this path, even though my life got really, really good.
when all is said and done, and it almost is, here and now. what i see today is a life beyond my wildest dreams. i see a man that i would have never recognized, back in the day. and most importantly i feel grateful that all of this happened with a minimum of exertion of personal power on my part. yes i did the footwork, but the results, that which i am most grateful for, comes from the POWER that fuels my recovery and the people that are put into my life to carry that message to me. yes it still is all about me, but this is my place, so i am entitled to use it as i see fit.
the time has come to shave and shower and hit the road to work. i GET to have a life today, which includes a job that i am very good at on most days. i can be teachable and learn how to be more than i ever was, at work, at home, at play and most importantly as another human being walking upright today. yes i am grateful for the life i have been given and will do all that i can to keep it intact, just for today.

∞ DT ∞