Price Of Loss

 Recovery can teach anyone about a lot of things.  Example:  a bottom is when the next thing you are about to lose is more important than drinking.  What to learn?  Well, say you are thinking of suicide in the midst of a miserable life at that moment.  It is a life in that moment full of feelings of fear, despair, hopelessness, and self-pity for instance.  Your future is all behind you.  But you don’t do more damage at that moment because you decide that living is more important than dying.  You don’t have to be an alcoholic to have the above feelings of emptiness.  Newcomers to AA know these feelings, but come into the rooms because they decided to live or feared dying more than that next drink.  What is important is that you reach out and contract someone, such as suicide prevention or even 911.  Let someone in who can help you.  This could be a first step in spirituality.  

Honesty

 Honesty is not easy.  It is not painless.  It generally invites change.  Change from what we thought was important, who we thought we were, even the rutted pattern of our daily life.  If you are a Jesus believer, he says, “Where I am you must be.”  You might be a believer, but you are only working from the mind, the creed.  Honesty will generally tell you that you are anywhere but where Jesus is.  Your prayer is for him to give you what you want in your set of priorities.  His plea is to change your life.  If you are in recovery, page 58 of the Big Book, the chapter on “How It Works,” honesty shows up three time on that first page.  You have to change, but cannot if you won’t admit you need it, and maybe are clueless how to do it.  Honesty is surrender for believers and non-believers.  This is painful.  But traveling the wrong road for you, being who you are not, is worse.  

Bad News Days

 Now and again we can get some bad news, such as a physical illness, cancer, chronic stuff, or that we are being laid off, or our rent has doubled, or the car is come to the end of its useful life, unexpectedly.  Fear can then dominate our emotional life.  Fear can be buried in various ways, none of them very good, or good at all.  If we are in a fit spiritual condition with some trust in a God or some spiritual power of our own discovery,  then the fear need not dominate us emotionally.  We will have the tools to face it in a balanced and healthy fashion.  I try to meditate every day, especially on the good days, because I never know when that good day may be interrupted by bad news.  And even bad news is my opportunity to pick up some spiritual tools taught to me by adepts, wisened persons, who live life on life’s terms one day at a time.  And I still have the day.  I am not dead.  

Riches

 I ran into a drunk who is in recovery.  She no longer drinks and feels much better physically.  She is helpful to others, and tries to avoid any bad habits in thinking and acting.  But she had one fear she could not get over.  It was the lack of money, $$$ since her drinking gifted her with the consequences of unemployment.  I reminded her of something that was passed onto me when I was “unemployable.”  She was rich with ‘spiritual currency.”  In her drinking days, she was spiritually bankrupt.  Each day of prayer, service, avoiding emotional drama, is a day in which we can all add to our spiritual account.  Our riches then can be shared with others who are trying to get out of the holes they have dug for themselves.  

Eventually

 I cannot relate to the little girl who has a vision of Mary and decides to dedicate her life to serving her God, doing good for people, becoming a religious and being quite pious.  That was never me.  When I was a little boy I was clueless and though I did a lot of stuff on the outsides, I remained clueless for another 30 years or so.  I can relate more to Jesus and Buddha.  They did stuff before eventually going into their “desert experience.”  I am an “eventually” guy.  Playing a role got old and I was not very fulfilled in it.  Outsides OK.  Insides, not so much.  I still do some desert time of silence and solitude each day.  I find a Power that keeps me in the right direction.  So if you are still in your “eventual” stage, that is, not yet you, there is still hope.  You can stop chasing something you were never meant to catch.  Be still, in quiet.  Ignore your mind, your thoughts.  Breathe.  You are not alone.  

The Finish Line

 Many So-called Christians are whiners and complainers.  “Life is not going my way,” or “ I am a failure.”  They are what I call Good Friday Christians.  They think that Good Friday is the finish line.  If so, then the one they say they believe in, was a complete failure, and his life was over on Good Friday.  Two things I notice.  One, he did not complain a lot.  He even forgave people for being mean and nasty and hurting him very badly.  He did have his moment of feeling abandoned, but he sucked it up and surrendered to the God he believed in.  When he said, “It is finished,” he only meant that part of his journey.  Resurrection came next.  Good Friday was not the finish line for him or for any of his believers.  So, as one of his believers I am going to get off the pity-pot and just say I am having a bad moment, a bad patch, a rough day, a Good Friday day, but it is not the end.  A little hope or I am a hypocrite 

Moving On

 At some point in the too near future, I might have to move.  In order to avoid putting this on any resentment list, along with self-pity and whining, I need to focus on gratitude.  If I don’t want to move, it might be because I have a list of good things I have enjoyed where I am.  So I need to focus on gratitude for what I have and not whine about what I will not have when I move.  Some people do “geographics,” moving from a mess to what they think is the promised land.  But then they find that they are the mess that went with them.  Gratitude keeps me from my own mess.  Now will any of my friends come help me to move, pack and haul to ship, all my stuff?  Maybe I can downsize first.  End of blog.  Gotta go to the dumpster and recycling!  Yikes.