Blog entry for:

feeling grateful that anything is possible. yes it looks like farting a few daises may be in my immediate future. it certainly is tough to look at the dark side when i have so much to be grateful for today. i could leave at that, suit up and head out with the dawg on our powerful walk jog routine, but i have never been one to know when enough is enough, it is at the heart of why i am here today, pounding away on the keyboard, instead of letting this just fade into obscurity. part of who i have become, is a person, who finds the time to write something here on most days. not that i believe that i will shake anything loose outside of myself, but i certainly get to find a few new things about myself for the inside out.
gratitude? well for me, it certainly is a slippery concept. i have been known to suffer from a condition of enough is never enough. looking at my life, i can see how far i have come, and yet, there still seems more stuff i NEED to get. the gifts that were listed are certainly more than i ever imagined, and i could negate that statement with a big BUT, i think i will defer. those gifts as wonderful as they are, sometimes feel like things i deserve, rather than things i have earned. when i start to believe that i am ent6itled to this and that, and trust me, it happens, i start to quickly slide down towards bitter ingratitude and painful intolerance, of the very program that allows me the freedom to write this stuff day after day. i have seen it in others, and i have felt it in myself, sometimes staying clean is not worth the work it takes to do so. the addicts that are out, are certainly living examples of what will happen to me, if i, like them, decide that there are more important things in life than the pain of spiritual growth and accepting whatever may come down the pike. when money, reputation, sex, or status, comes in front of my program, it certainly is difficult to say the least, to be grateful for anything. living life in the shadows is no longer an alternative i choose for myself today, and that is also something i am grateful for today. the program is simple, that is true. spiritual growth is painful, in my experience i believe that is also true. the rewards are mostly intangible benefits, such as self-confidence, self-esteem, and integrity, so there are days when i can see that maybe, just maybe, there may be a different path for me to take. after all, i could adopt a spiritual practice not too far off my current world view and become part of a chanting community. or i could give into my hedonistic nature and go full bore back into the world as an addict in active addiction, after all, my experience is that i was fairly good at hiding it, and i could show up for work, most of the time, and do what was required of me.
OR I COULD JUST DO THE NEXT RIGHT THING -- SURRENDER TO THE WILL OF THE POWER THAT FUELS MY RECOVERY -- AND JUST STAY CLEAN!
which is a choice i am grateful to have today. it is getting on, time be slipping, slipping, slipping, into the future, as it were, so i better just say this: today i am grateful that i have found a program of recovery that offers me freedom from active addiction.

∞ DT ∞