Blog entry for:

comfortable version of myself was certainly not my goal, way back when, even when i read this entry on my second day clean. oh wait, i did not know that in nineteen ninety seven that this would be my second day clean, as i still thought i had got away with using two days previous to this day. in fact, it would be another few days before i realized i was busted and had to get clean or face consequences that were unacceptable to me. as i stay clean and actually learn how to live a program of active recovery. fast forward a quarter of a century and i find myself looking back at how i felt and acted with great dismay. i wonder how i could have ever survived living in the fantasy world that i created for myself, for as long as i did. i was not quite ready to give up being a victim and i certainly was not prepared to take any responsibility for me life, and i had enough enablers left to skate my way through the crisis i had created. after all if they had been paying better attention, i would have never gotten to where i was.
today, after having a great weekend of fantasy football, yes i still have a bit of fantasy in my life, i see that gaming, hiking, and just hanging with others, are activities i find enjoyable and without consequences that are untenable to me. this morning, as i drove to work, what kept coming up was a replay of my weekend. i celebrated the anniversary of my clean date, spent time with friends, went for a hike with a friend and sponsee that ended up in a fifth step and got way more tokens of my clean time than i ever imagined i would get. even though traffic was heavier than usual, i did not give any of my fellow travelers the middle finger salute, although more than one of them, certainly deserved it. no i kept coming back to wondering why i was given this chance at a new life, when so many of those i used to hang out with, were not. of course i would not wish their entry to be as brutal and abrupt as mine, but it certainly is a wonderment to me that i got the opportunity and i actually took it, even though more than once i was ready to pitch it in the shit can and go back to where i was.
today, i am quite certain that even before i was ready to listen for the will of a POWER that could fuel my recovery, IT was speaking to me. even before i was ready to surrender to the fact i was an addict and not just use that fact as an excuse to keep doing the dirty shit i used to do, i was on the path that leads to this day. my life is far from perfect, BUT i am certainly a more perfect version of myself. i no longer need to make excuses, rationalize and justify away my bad behaviors or blame someone or something else for my missteps. just for today.

∞ DT ∞