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started out skeptical, but when desperation forced me to, i began to pay close attention to what my peers were saying doing and how they were living. i have to admit, that in those first eighteen months of mere abstinence, was unwilling to let go of who i thought i was and admit that i might be desperate. ironically, being a cynic and skeptic allowed me to pick out those of my peers who were actually living a program of recovery and those who were just paying lip service to it. amazingly, what i found, was where i started at, was not where i ended-up at, in fact, i saw more posers in that local fellowship than i founds in the fellowship that has become my lifeblood. it is true,in was looking for a way out, but the harder i tried to disqualify myself from this fellowship, the more i realized it would be the ONE for me. i know that what i was seeking forced me into a view that was more than a bit askew and many of those that i dismissed as posers, probably were not. i will never know, as i have left that brand of Twelve Step recovery and am more than comfortably ensconced in another.
today, i take those early lessons to heart and look to my own behavior.. i am certainly nowhere close to be the model of an recovering addict, but i am certainly not someone who speaks the words, looks all spiritual while in the company of my peers and walk out the door to get what i believe i am entitled to from the rest of the world, regardless of who i have to step on while on my mission. been there, done that and got the T-shirt. as i sat on listened this morning, i kept coming back to the book i just finished. the theme seemed to be that one may need to renounce who they think they are in order to get what one needs. there was no happy ending and as that is often the case in real life, i can see the message i was getting was that life is a mixed bag of events and consequences. i can sail through, stepping on whomever, grabbing whatever and basically ignore the cries from within to be a better person. OR, i can live the principles of recovery in my every day life, to the best of my ability and be okay with what comes about. it may not make me rich, famous or powerful, but it will make me a better fit in the world around me, just for today.

∞ DT ∞