Lack of Power is a Dilemma, Not a Problem

A dilemma is "a situation requiring a choice between equally undesirable alternatives." It's not a problem. Lack of power over alcohol is not a problem; it's a dilemma. The two equally undesirable alternatives are: (1) We needed to find a power by which to live and (2) that power had to be both greater than ourselves.

Alternative #1 was undesirable because we knew that this power could no longer be alcohol or any other substance.

Alternative #2 was equally undesirable because that power greater than ourselves also had to be something other than alcohol or any other substance.

Like many dilemmas, the problem is in the perceiver not the perceived.

I suspect when we alcoholics use the phrase "lack of power" we're assuming that "normal" (non-alcoholic) folks "have power" over alcohol. I don't think non-alcoholics consider that they have "power" over alcohol any more than they think they have power over water, milk or bread. They can take it or leave it. They aren't addicted to it. It doesn't effect them the way it does alcoholics.

Shakespeare might have had a better way of characterizing the dilemma of an alcoholic teetering on the edge of a sober life: "To be or not to be! That is the question!" That is the real dilemma for one who is an alcoholic. Once we're alcoholic: the situation requiring a choice between two equally undesirable alternatives: To be an alcoholic or To pretend not to be an alcoholic. Interestingly, there really is no choice in terms of "being" alcoholic or not. You either is or you isn't. The choice is in terms of either accepting the truth and living in accord with that or denying the truth and suffering the consequences.

The supposed dilemma presented by "lack of power" led me one morning to wake up to the understanding that my inability to stop drinking was the sign I had been waiting for....no, dreading from the very beginning of my drinking: I was an alcoholic. I had a disease and that was OK. Now I just needed to do something about that. My dad had died from this disease because he was unable to understand the truth underneath his drinking. I didn't need to go down that path. Instead, I did what my son was doing (he was 5 months clean at the time): began going to meetings, listening to other people's experiences, sharing my own truth, getting better....one day at a time.

Take care!

Mike L.