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seem to make those early days of my recovery feel as if getting and staying clean was the hardest thing i ever did. in reality, staying clean and maintaining a commitment to my ongoing recovery, is far more difficult.
that statement seems a bit ludicrous of the face of it, after all i often say staying clean is the easier and softer way for me. that is also ta fact and although those two facts seem to be mutually exclusive, they are not. maintaining a commitment to my recovery and staying clean are actually two different things. staying clean is a prerequisite for maintaining my commitment to recovery and boils down to just not using, no matter what. maintaining a commitment to my recovery requires and active participation in my program of recovery, no just “phoning it in.” i am not an recovery tourist who shows up once or twice a year to demonstrate that i am still around. i am not some sort of spiritual guru who walks three feet above the ground and preaches their brand of “supreme” recovery. i am not one of those who thinks recovery is sexually transmitted and gloms on to the newest and the most vulnerable in the rooms. nope i am just, what my sponsor calls a “garden variety addict.” when ii come to that level about who and what i am, it is easy to see that a program of active recovery in my life is NECESSARY to stay clean, just for today. that does not quite answer the question and like the spin coming out of Casa Blanca these days, i am shifting the focus off of what i have been asked and disparaging the my inquisitor with all sorts of loaded language, in the hopes that is i scream “fake news” loud and often enough, the rest of thew world will start to believe me.
why do i consider a maintaining my commitment to an active program of recovery, so hard? simply because i have not felt the desire to use, in quite a bit of time. the “jones” i felt in those first six months was only relieved by the shallow and halfhearted FOURTH and FIFTH STEPS i took, way back when. when i got desperate enough, a year later, i remember that is was only through the steps that i got any relief from my overwhelming and gnawing need to do something, mainly chemical, to alter the feelings i was experiencing.it is hard to remember thousands of days later that i was that desperate and bedraggled spiritual creature, i see crawling into the rooms. i begin to get the notion, that maybe i am not, and never was, that all that i remember is “fake news,” put into my head by the cult-like membership of the fellowship that has shown me the way to get where i am today.i live in a place where more than one substance is legally available to adults and neither one of those substances ever made me into the creature of the night, is how this story unfolds, so what harm would there be in trying just a little bit. after all this time, surely i will discover that i do not like the way i feel and i will quickly put it down again. it is a brave new world, and big brother is watching, so why not feel a little better than i already do?
oh, i could go on, but the point is quite evident, i can rationalize and justifiably using both of these substances and chances are, for perhaps a long stretch of time, my life would not spin down the drain. the fact that i could even consider that as an alternative, is indicative that i have moved beyond my FEAR of relapse. clean-time is the enemy here and my abiding FAITH is the only foils against it. that FAITH? well, if i take the high road and do what my recovery requires me to do today, i will choose to stay clean today and perhaps wake up tomorrow and make the same decision. it is only through living a program of recovery that my FREEDOM from active addiction is sustained and that FREEDOM needs every day action, not just lip service, because “willingness without action is merely fantasy.” convincing myself that i could so just one, is far easier than deciding to bolster my commitment to live a program of active recovery, after all, that commitment includes regular meeting attendance, working steps with a sponsor, being in contact with my peers, maintaining a conscious contact with the POWER that fuels my recovery and choosing to do the next right thing.
so this will be the first twitter-bot post, i am still working out how to make it pretty and such, but the base functionality is there. life is good and if it was not for my commitment to recovery, i would have never attempted to do anything more, in fact this little exercise would have been long gone. today i am grateful i choose to live a program instead of appear to live one, it is after all a great day to be clean.

∞ DT ∞