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that have eluded me, my entire life. i have heard it said more than once, that new ideas cannot be grafted on to a closed mind. as trite, mundane and yes even cliché as that may sound it certainly has been true in my case. others, pah, whether or not their minds are open is not what i am about today, at l;east just for right now. further on down the line, one will certainly see.
coming to recovery, was quite the shock for me. as i have went on and on about in the past, i was certain i KNEW how to live, how else would i have made 40+ years on this side of the grass? finding out how much i really do not know, has become my life's work, as it seems. these days i am okay “not knowing,” although i still suspect some of the sources of the new information i am receiving are less than reliable or worth paying attention to. in other words it is the messenger not the message that is suspect and my difficulty lies in disregarding the “who” and focusing on the “what.” part of the issue for me lately, is that i have not been hearing a whole lot of content from those who share. unlike some of my peers, i will NEVER say i “liked” what i have heard shared, or that i have heard some “good stuff” in a meeting. the reason for this, is simply this, they may have been playing to a crowd, but for me, i do not know what it was i NEEDED to hear, until long after the meeting is over. while i am sitting there, i certainly know what it is i WANT to hear, but as always, i get my wants or needs all confused. what i want to hear is a new take on spiritual principles what i often hear is “groundhog day,” sort of shares.just like when i was hiding in another fellowship, i cringe, internally when certain members share, because i am almost certain that i know exactly what they are going to say but i am back into the messenger part and not the message.
for me, opening my mind, means that i NEED to let go of my biases and prejudice and actually pay attention to what is being shared. if one of my peers, always say they have nothing but good to report, or they are so fVcking proud they have so many days, my mind clamps down and <BOOM> i have lost anything that may have been worthwhile. it is truly my loss, not theirs. part of the focus of this new round of steps, is examining and implement a new way to treat my spiritual condition, shutting off the auto-pilot and making conscious choices in my recovery. i can see where prejudice and bias play into this pattern of living, i have developed and finding the means to move beyond that will certainly be a challenge, <here it comes> i am after all, only human! my favorite bucket to drop all of my crap in to! 😉 the part of recovery, i find the most enticing, is that i no longer have to fall prey to my humanness. i can acknowledge it and move forward. when i want to tell someone to shut the fVCK up and get a therapist, i can refrain form acting. hell i can even have that thought and let it drift back into the white noise of everything else that goes on in my head.
i may certainly never be cured, perfect or walk on water, BUT if i pay attention to when and where i am closing my mind, i will certainly get better. i know what it is like to be clean but not in recovery. i also know what it is like to move beyond, just not using, no matter what. for me, learning how to accept an idea that is foreign or contrary to my belief system, is a task i can undertake, one idea at a time. those groundhog day messengers? well they are who they are, and regardless of what they may say or how much they protest, they volunteer to stay stuck. me? i want to be become “unstuck” which certainly requires an opening of my mind and accepting, for real, that i may have many answers, but i do not by any means have all of them, more will be revealed.

∞ DT ∞