Recovery's Stages: Physical, then Mental, then Emotional, then Spiritual...

From a safe distance, I've been watching "one of us" struggle through the pains of early sobriety. Not that those pains are limited or restricted only to the first few days and months of recovery, but they seem to be more visible and consistently experienced by those who for whatever reason get to begin a process of recovery from the disease of addiction to alcohol or other drugs. This person's current struggle reminds me that Earle used to talk about the various levels of recovery and that the process goes through stages, beginning with:

--physical sobriety (no physical ingestion of alcohol or mind-altering drugs... Period. No matter what you feel, think, or wish.),

--then mental sobriety (there are healthy and not-so healthy ways of thinking, we need to focus on learning more healthy ways (e.g., attitude of gratitude: which is an attitude, by the way, not a feeling...) and un-learning less healthy ways (e.g., resentment, hatred, etc.).

--then emotional sobriety (any emotion/feeling is perfectly OK, without moral weight or character, no emotions are good or bad, they just are; that in early sobriety especially, emotions are like riding a roller coaster and they can get like that in later sobriety also, especially if we neglect some basic physical care-taking of our body and mind...H(hungry)A(angry)L(lonely)T(tired) sorts of things...),

--then spiritual sobriety (for Earle, there was really no difference between emotional and spiritual sobriety....and I agree; spiritual has to do with non-physical reality which is, in some sense, above and beyond the more basic physical, mental (which is physical in that thinking occurs by means of a physical brain mechanism) and emotional (again, which is physical in that feelings are the result of our "perception" of reality and we perceive reality via physical eyes and the brain) recovery.

The basic concept is that human beings need to deal with these stages in order: first physical, then mental, then emotional, then spiritual. The more advanced stages generally cannot take place until their is some level of consistent and healthy physical recovery. That doesn't mean that a drunk can't have a spiritual awakening: They do! But the fullness of emotional/spiritual recovery can't really come about until the physical and mental healing has taken place to some extent.

To me, the 12 steps of AA are sort of arranged in a manner consistent with this view: the first step is physical in focus, the second step is dealing with the mental (return of sane ways of looking at reality) processes, the 3rd thru 10th steps are dealing with all various layers of our inner health, memories, perceptions of self, interactions and histories with others in the past and present) and the 11th dealing with widest meaning of spiritual. The 12th wraps it all up into a daily practice of recovery: being awake to who we are in all our glory and, as important, seeing and reaching out to others in all their glory: especially those others with the same dis-ease that we have.

So while the person I'm watching going through the pains associated with the physical withdrawal and healing that are part of the 1st step/early sobriety process, I'm excited for her. All of this is just part of the healing process. I encourage her to be patient and not to despair because she's not seeing the results of all or some the [9th step!!!) promises in her life.

Part of our suffering in life is not so much our present reality. Our suffering is more a result of our wanting things to be different from what they are. If we weren't so intent and obsessed with having things different than they are, we would not suffer. We would feel pain. But the suffering would be purely optional.

Take Care!

Mike L.