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a trackless waste, without direction or any purpose. with that thought in mind, one might say that one is lost, and i certainly was, before i found recovery and became a member of the fellowship that is my home today. so the question then becomes, how does someone like myself, find that direction, when the POWER that fuels my recovery has no mouth or ears? where so i find the direction that was so lacking in my life and how do i ask for it. the simple answer and the party line, is that i pray, asking for knowledge of that HIGHER POWER's will for and the power to carry it out. so i get stuck in a circle, prayer is not part of my spiritual path and yet i am required to pray to stay clean today, which means that i either have to adjust my spiritual path, or step out of the box and make an accommodation. the real problem here is not the actions i need to take, but the language i use to describe them. while i may not pray, i do “pray.”
for me, prayer is an acknowledgement that i cannot and need something more. i cannot stay clean on my own, so i ask for the power to do so. i cannot control what other people do or say, so i ask for the power to let that shite go. i cannot control what i feel, so i ask for the power to do the next right thing, instead of acting out in my default manner. those acknowledgements of that which is beyond me, deflate my pride and ego and make me more willing to become humble. nothing in the actions described above is commentary to the spiritual; path i follow, and more importantly it looks very much like what my peers call prayer. as the POTUS once said, if it looks like a duck…
having now dispensed of a notion that once upon a time, like a 18 months ago, made me doubt i was in the correct place, i can work over what has been on my mind the past two days, the men i sponsor and am i doing them any good. i have said it before and will say it again, i do not tie my spiritual state to theirs. i can survive them using, them firing me or them telling to fVck OFF and die. and yet, that subset of my peers has been weighing heavily on my mind the past week or so. they consume my 10TH STEP and pop up again on my 11TH, and that has me wondering if i have given over too much of myself to those men and the notion of sponsorship. am i losing myself in the service to others, or is this just a phase that my life is going through? when it comes down to it, the amount of time, i give to sponsorship is still a small fraction of the time i have available, so based on that metric, the answer would have to be no. the time i am giving, however, seems more fraught with drama and chaos than before, and once again i feel like at times i am screaming in a hurricane and i have to allow the POWER that fuels my recovery, to fill me with the strength i need to recenter myself and let go of that which is swirling around me. today, as i get towards the end of this, i seem to be admitting i am powerless over the lives of the men i sponsor, and my job is to allow them to find what they need, when they need it, even if i am just brimming with all sorts of ideas, suggestions and opinions. what i am feeling is a reaction to what they are going through and my natural reaction to jump in and start “fixing” things. the truth is i cannot “fix” much of anything outside of a few things within me, and i NEED to rely on the POWER that fuels my recovery, to take care of that as well. so once again, i have come back to powerlessness and relying on GOD to provide me what i cannot provide for myself, i guess i am not so far off the beaten path, after all.
time to pack this one in, let the world spin as it will and start off this long day, to see what i can let go of, what i can change and where i need to be going tomorrow. it is an excellent day to be on this side of the grass and being clean is a bonus, just for today.

∞ DT ∞