Blog entry for:

my defects, my successes, and my failures. take ninety-seven, well not really, but this morning i am having trouble getting started.having finished my 12TH step last week and not quite starting on the latest incarnation of the FIRST, i have a moment to stop, look around me, and see what it is i NEED to set as my focus for this step cycle. my sponse did suggest a focus and it may end up being where i go, however, even that does not “feel” quite right. as i sit here his morning and ponder the meaning of life the universe and everything and how i fit into all of that, i can pause and think about what it is i uncovered in this last 12 STEP cycle of discovery.
first and foremost, i am not broken, i was not built flawed and i can be a victim for as long as i want to be. that declaration is at the heart of my recovery today, and each part taken separately can certainly be seen as empowering. as a whole, however, that statement is so much more powerful than the sum of its parts. much of that statement seems to go against the grain of the program of recovery that has given me this life, but when one takes a deeper look, it does not.
it is true that i am an addict and am afflicted by addiction. even if one drops this into the “disease” bucket, it does not mean that i am broken. one may argue that diabetics are “broken” and in this post-election frenzy when courtesy has been ditched with political correctness, one might be seen as having a sound argument. however before modern medicine, diabetes was fatal, addiction, not so much, save by our own ideas and actions. i have come to accept that like my gray eyes, addictions is just part of me. i am not broken because of it, nor does addiction make me any less of a person or any less deserving of living in this world, hence i am neither broken nor flawed, i just am. accepting that as my reality and taking responsibility for what i do and did, is part of removing myself from under the abusive thumb of addiction. no longer am i willing to make the excuse that after all, i am only human and an addict on top of that. no longer can i use addiction as that metaphorical bad angel that sits on my left shoulder, suggesting that i do things that violate my values and morals. well i can, but i CHOOSE not to today, and that is where STEP TEN comes into play.
once i accept responsibility for who and what i am, responsibility for what i do follows. my peers can fall back on their 90 percent justifications and rationalizations if they choose to, but i will not. i have the means today, to evaluate what i am doing in real-time and alter the course of my behavior. i have the means today to evaluate what i did over the time i was awake today, and make corrections in the here and now. making mistakes is what i do, correcting them is also what i do and neither action makes me any better or worse than my peers, it just makes me who i am today, an addict in recovery who IS doing his best to work with what he has been given. mistakes and defects no longer need to be denied, because i am afraid of embracing them, as they do NOT define who i am. i may be an addict living in the post-modern world, wondering what the president-elect is going to do, but i do not have to succumb to any of that pounding me down into the dust. i no longer need to believe the lies i once told myself about this being as good as it gets and that i would fade into the sunset in a chemical haze. yes that day may come, but just for today, i choose to actively oppose that outcome, because dammit all i am worth it. i can run and i can hide, but in the long run , all that does is start my spin down the drain and today, well i have already said it, so i guess before i repeat myself it is time to pack it up, head to work and participate in the life recovery has given me, today.

∞ DT ∞