Blog entry for:

the politically correct version of the longer is stay clean the less i know, is certainly the more i know i need to learn. that flip towards reality does not pack quite the same punch, although the message is perfectly clear. staying clean, especially after many days in a row, opens my eyes to the huge amount of information i have yet to learn; about myself, about addiction, about relationships and about my place in all of that.
it is true, i KNOW how to stay clean, just do not use no matter what, but if i stray away from the things that have given me the grace to do just that, no matter what becomes a whole lot more difficult. when the growth stops, and it does when i become closed-minded, defensive, dishonest and isolate myself from my peers in recovery, my desire to stay clean diminishes to the point of why bother. when i start lying to my sponse, my closed-mouth friends to supposedly keep the behaviors i am ashamed of under wraps, i lose any relief valve i ever had to reduce my desire to use. when i pretend to be what i am not… well the litany of what i know not toi do, goes on and on and on. i could continue down that path, but i will not, at least not this morning.
“I KNOW,” was one of my favorite phrases of all time, especially after i had a bit of clean time but before i really “knew” anything. i have said before that for me, recovery is more of a journey of un-covery, rather than discovery, as more and more i find, that as i stay clean, i am finding all sorts of stuff i really did once know, but was buried under the layers of detritus created by decades of using. each of my trip[s through the steps, reveals ideas, notions and opinions that are truly amazing. some of those i once knew, some of them are new twists on knowledge i never forgot, all of them are necessary for me to maintain my life as a person in recovery.
i do, however, need to be moving on a bit early this morning as once again something failed to complete overnight. it is a good day to be clean and i am more than open to learning what i have yet to learn as this day goes on. it is a very good day to be in active recovery and to be clean.

∞ DT ∞