Blog entry for:

as the dust from the last little **power** bomb settles and i move into acceptance, i feel a whole lot of resistance to allowing that surrender to happen. it happens that i can suppress my reaction when i am being watched by those in the fellowship, but when it comes to work, all my bile spews out on the co-worker who i have been actively seeking to treat in a manner that i myself would prefer to be treated. that is symptomatic of my DESIRE to look “good” rather than being honest. hiding what i do not want others to see, is a very common behavior for me and as this THIRD STEP rakes me over the spiritual coals, i am becoming more willing to allow some POWER other than me, to care for my will and my life. with the unveiling of my own denial, i get why others may be so totally oblivious to what is going on, right under their noses. i CHOOSE to ignore the evidence of how others are responding to me and my antics to further the stories (LIES) i tell myself about who i am and my place in the world. where once that behaviors was one of self-interest and self-protection, now it limits the horizons, new or otherwise, that i can see. i could go on and on, as i have done over the past few days, but i am exhausted by the topic, the reality is there are odious people in my life, i can accept that as fact and move on, or i can whine, b*tch and moan about that fact. right here and right now i CHOOSE to move along.
when i was in active addiction, i lacked the FREEDOM to choose much of anything and finances, social situations and taking care of myself, felt like “zero-sum games.” when i got clean, i became quickly overwhelmed by the choices i had and the realization that IF i find something unacceptable, i could move along. what i failed to realize was without the buffer of something to alter my perception of reality, there were consequences to making a choice to move along. when i cast my gaze out over what “could” become my reality, i soon got lost in a series of cascading and competing desires. the end result was to fall back on my very well learned and practiced behavior of allowing events to make my decisions for me. that gave me the freedom to blame the world around me. the justice system, my peers, my friends, my family members and anyone else but me, were the barriers to my happiness and if only i could get them to understand how “different” i was, maybe they would further my causes. by refusing to take responsibility for my life, i was drowning in a quagmire of dissatisfaction and malcontent. i stayed clean and finally grew a desire “not to use,” but there was still something missing and i was ready to call this whole recovery gig a waste of my time and effort. when i finally woke up, halfway through my third set of twelve steps, i saw that i was the root cause of all that i found undesirable in my life. my ;lack of paying attention to what those around me were trying to tell me, was the symptom of my lack of desire to change. i had rationalized the notion that i was okay just the way i was and believed that was self-acceptance, when it was avoidance and self-deception.
today, after all the love and attention i have been showered with over the past two days, i realize that i may not be as bad as i see myself, in fact, i just may be making a “positive” contribution to those who choose to allow me in their lives. i am grateful that my view of my horizons are no longer as obscured by denial, deception and dishonesty. i may not see clearly, all that is around me,. but i certainly see it a whole lot better than i did before. in this case, it is my progress i need to celebrate and not my lack of perfection, just for today.

∞ DT ∞