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longer blame people, places, and things for what goes wrong in my life. well, i guess i have to add this caveat, for the most part, as there are lots of things that happen in the course of human existence that are beyond my control and i certainly do not have to go through that list, as anyone who is living in this post-modern world understands quite well. i have to admin that using my blame-thrower to avoid taking responsibility, was something i was well equipped to do, when i came to recovery. decades of practice allowed me to be a victim of all sorts of thing, society, my culture, my parents, TV, the justice system, bad luck and poor social skills. when i first heard that i was not responsible for my addiction, i went nuts, now everything that was wrong and went wrong could be summed up in the statement: “well, what would one expect, after all, i am an addict?”
those first few days of my recovery, being a victim of addiction worked quite well for me. lots of shit got dismissed, rationalized and justified away and i could start to feel great about being an addict, as i thought it gave me a universal manner of denying any responsibility for my life.
about six months into actually doing this recovery gig, the cognitive dissonance between where i thought i was and where i actually was started to become overwhelming. i may not have surrendered my victimhood to addiction right away, but it certainly was the start of an ongoing process that continues to this day. taking my life back from addiction does not mean that i am recovered by any measure. what it means is that i know that i think, react and feel a bit differently than those who are not addicted and need to rely on my program of recovery, to get me through each and every day. as comfortable as denying responsibility through victimhood may seem, i know that in the long run, it is a damaging way for me to go through my life. what i do not do today is equate my laziness to anything other than being lazy and i can run down that whole list of defects, with the exact same conclusion. i am who i am, character defects and all, not because i am an addict, but rather because i am human. when i own that fact and use my program to feel my feelings and respond appropriately i am taking responsibility for my life, just for today.

∞ DT ∞