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changing my old ways of thinking. okay, so i admit it. here i am about to parrot the entire party line about what needed to change when i came to recovery was everything, especially my way of thinking. well not quite, as i rarely stay within the line, even when i have no real beef with what those boundaries are. it is true, that FEAR was the motivating factor for me staying clean in the very beginning and is more than likely why i developed the recovery routine that i did. i have often said, what gets an addict into the room is not relevant, it is what that addict dies once they get here. my desire to get out of jail and stay out, got me through those first eighteen months, and FEAR of relapse and what i would become, kept me clean for years after that. across the span of that time, my attitudes shifted, my life started to look a whole helluva lot better and i stuck around, until that next spiritual awakening occurred: i did not come to recovery to live in FEAR.
yes that simple realization changed everything. once i realized that i was making myself miserable, and i was, i decided that just for today i could practice an active program of recovery and live in the HOPE, that i would decide to stay clean, once again, tomorrow. the depth of misery, and the automatic and superstitious way i worked a program up until that time, really did set the stage for my life beyond the FEAR of relapse. it is not that i think i am immune or graduated to a state of recovered, it is just that i am certain that IF i do what i need to do today, i will stay clean, just for today. IF i stay clean today, chance are good that i will decide to not use no matter what, tomorrow. If i can maintain that sort of zeal and zest for my personal recovery program, there is no reason my recovery will not extend into a chain of tomorrows, thus the HOPE of recovery has replaced the FEAR of relapse in my life.
i have heard it often said that i did not come to recovery to be miserable, and yet before i made that paradigm switch, that was exactly what i was, a miserable wretch living under the guillotine blade of certain relapse, degradation and doom. it is wonderfully freeing to remove my head from that block, with my head still intact. i certainly wish i could infect my friends and my peers with that same sort of enthusiasm for what the program can give them as well. the interesting part of all of this is this: i am basically a lazy person, who is always seeking the easy way out. switching my worldview, was one of the most difficult tasks i have undertaken and yet it happened beneath my notice, i just did the footwork and i behaved my way into better thinking. i may have become addicted in one day, and i did, but i certainly have not become recovered in the days since my last use. what i have become is recovering and it is only because of what i learned here and now,m that i could replace what i thought i knew, with knowing that there is all kinds of stuff i do not know, you know, the longer i stay clean the more i know what i do not know.
what i know today is that i can FEAR what a Donald Trump presidency may look like, but i need not live in fear of that day. i can FEAR Daesh and the reign of terror they are currently enacting across the landscape, but i need not live in the FEAR that every follower of Islam is a terrorist and out to get me. in short, i can FEAR all sort of things, what i do not have to do is live in FEAR of all that i have little or no control of, and i certainly need not use my FEAR to paint myself into a corner where everyone and everything is a threat to me, my way of life, my sanity and my recovery. i need not let FEAR transform me into a bigot, and if the past few weeks are any indication, i can m,ove beyond and be okay just being another recovering addict, living in HOPE instead of FEAR.

∞ DT ∞