The Toolkit was Seemingly Empty...

Some time ago, I wrote a blog about one of the unique characteristics about the AA "kit of spiritual tools" or what is oftentimes referred to as the AA toolkit: what's unique about this toolkit is that most recovering alcoholics will go through their sobriety adding new and different tools to that kit and over time, they find that they freqently have to dig through the toolkit to find just the right tool for the challenge or problem facing them any one particular day.  But, at least according to the oldtimer I was listening to awhile ago, there will always come a day in every recovering alcoholic's life when he or she reaches into their toolkit only to discover that the kit is completely empty and all that seems to remain is the idea or thought of "just one drink."  Luckily for us, the AA toolkit is designed for such a day because in the bottom of every toolkit is a note.  And the note says, "You need more tools!"

Well, last week I was driving to work and I was doing my typical routine of reciting some stuff that I'd memorized as a part of my 11th step work (it was David Richo's 156 Fear Affirmations).  I'd only recited a few of them when I began thinking about a guy that I had been trying to help out for the last couple of weeks.  He'd been in recovery for several months and had a few relapses over the last year or so.  After the last relapse, he'd decided to make a change in sponsors and had asked me to be his new sponsor.  I was honored and began meeting with him once every week or so, had created a private recovery blog for him and had him posting a daily plan each night for maintaining his sobriety on the coming day.  After a few weeks, he simply disappeared: he stopped coming to meetings, didn't answer my calls or emails, stopped blogging.  Others in the program also reported that he'd stopped communicating with him and we all feared that he'd either relapsed or was in a dangerous period of isolation.

The non-responsiveness of this guy had gone on more than a week or so and I was growing more and more concerned.  Then, I'd hear from someone that he'd returned their call and that he was alive.  Drinking, but alive.  I tried various attempts at communicating with him and tried to balance that with some level of detachment.  I almost resorted to going to an Alanon meeting.  ;-}

Then this Friday on my way to work, I thought I'd try calling him another time.  I did and the call went straight to voicemail.  I tried to say something kind, hopeful, slightly funny....and then wished him well.  Asking him to let me know if there was anything I could do to help him get sober again.  Anything.

When I got off the phone, I noticed something surprising to me:  I felt better.  Prior to the call, I'd had a lingering sense of sadness, helpless, powerlessness in terms of my own abilility or inability to help this guy at this point in his recovery.  I'd often said that I have the philosphy as a sponsor to let the disease do all the hard work and then when the alcoholic is desperate enough to "stop stopping" and start trying to get or stay sober, then I reach out my hand to help in whatever way I can.

Hmmm, the phone call made me feel better!  Know that I've never been one who used the "tool" of calling other recoverying alcoholics as a part of my daily routine: I don't like the phone, I don't like talking to people who I can't see --- actually, I'm not sure I like talking to people even when I can see them!  But this day, I found out that calling another struggling alcoholic and trying to offer some sort of help in that manner, made me feel better!  I'd found a new tool at the most surprising time in my sobriety.

So, I did what I oftentimes do when I find something that works: I decided to try it again!  I thought of another guy I had been thinking about recently: he was what I refer to as an "inactive sponsee" of mine: these are guys who I had actively sponsored for some time, but for some reason or another had disconnected from me and yet still considered me to be their sponsor.  I sometimes joke that these guys had stolen my name and used it to get annoying folks off their backs in terms of "do you have a sponsor?" sorts of questions.  Sure, they would say, I've got a sponsor -- a great sponsor!  His name is Mike.  All in the hopes that that answer would make these AA pests leave them alone. 

Anyway, I began thinking of this one particular inactive sponsee: he'd met with me once about six months ago (after about a six month period of disappearing off of the horizon...) and asked me to continue being his sponsor.  We had a nice talk over coffee and then he disappeared again.  I tried a couple of times to call him, calls all went to unanswered voicemail hell.  A few weeks ago, someone had told me that they'd seen this guy the day before: that he was homeless (his wife had kicked him out of the house some weeks ago...) and drunk.  So, last Friday, I thought I'd give this "calling another suffering alcoholic" tool another test:  I called him and it went immediately to voicemail.  I wasn't really surprised, wasn't even sure he still had cell phone service, but I left of message anyway saying that I was thinking of him, that I hoped that he was sober and well, and that if there was anything I could do to help him in his recovery, please give me a call.  After leaving the message, I noticed the same consequence as the first call: I felt even better!

So, I tried it again: this time I called a guy that I knew from one of the early morning meetings that I've gone to for almost eight years:  he had been a regular at that meeting, really dove into the program, got a sponsor, worked the steps, made coffee, became a secretary, did various types of service.  A really nice guy and I loved how he simply added color and life and vitality to the meeting as his sobriety matured.  I'd not seen him around for awhile and a few weeks after Halloween this year, I'd heard from a mutual friend that this guy had had a relapse, short in duration but devastating in effect.  I'd called him a few weeks ago and he was encouraged by that call.  So this last Friday, I made a call to him as my 3rd test of this newfangled tool. 

Amazingly, he answered my call!  My first thought was, "Oh my God, now what do I do!"  I'd fully expected to get another voicemail and now he goes and screws it up by answering my call!  Anyway, after my initial shock, we had a great conversation lasting almost 30 minutes.  During that call, I even got a call back from the homeless sponsee -- I let that call go to voicemail and felt some Alanon pride coming back for doing that -- and finished up my call with the third guy.  We agreed to meet up for a noon meeting in San Francisco the coming week and then maybe lunch or coffee afterward.  Got off the phone, noticed that I felt even better after this third test and then checked my voicemail from #2.

The voicemail was amazing: he was sober and temporarily living in a homeless shelter run by some Christian missionary sect.  Not all that happy about their rules and routines, but it was a safe place to live until he could get into a nearby VA recovery program.  We had a nice talk and agreed that I'd try to stop by to see him before he moved on to the VA recovery program...it was actually in a town on my way to/from work.

I made one more call to a 4th guy before getting to work.  It was a short and sweet checkin call with a former sponsee who'd moved to the East coast over a year prior:  he'd had a relapse after his move East, had almost died just a few months ago: but was now several months sober and actively rebuilding his life and working a reinvigorated recovery program.

The wonderful ending of this day came when I was leaving a Friday night meeting that same day:  I'd had a call during the meeting that went to voicemail.  It was from my missing sponsee who for whatever reason: had heard something in my voicemail earlier that morning that helped him call me back, just to let me know that he appreciated all my calls and attempts to reach out to him.  But that he was simply unable to stop drinking.  He asked me not to give up on him and that he was going to try again to stop -- that hopefully he'd see me soon.  I called him right back: and surprisingly, he answered the phone.  We had a short but encouraging conversation and I assured him that I'd never give up on him and that I hoped he'd redirect his energies/efforts away from "stopping" toward "getting/staying sober for just one day".  He said that he'd try: but I knew the truth of that was not yet sinking in or making sense to him. 

My day ended with a sense of wonder and awe.  Who'd a thunk that a couple of phone calls could transform my world in such powerful ways!  And now, I have the sense again that my toolbox is overflowing again.  It was never really empty.  It was just full of tools that weren't the right fit for what was ailing me that day.  Guess that the tools show up when the right nut appears.

Take care!

Mike L.

Grandpa L!

Taking Advantage of Richo's "Fear Affirmations"

I'm sitting here at the hospital while my eldest daughter is having her first child in a nearby room.  My wife and son-in-law are there with her.  I'm sitting here alone in the waiting room, dealing with various fears as I wait for my first grandchild to be born.

As I drove here, just as Thanksgiving Day was coming to a close, I took advantage of the 1/2 hour drive to to the hospital to recite a series of fear affirmations that I found at the end of David Richo's wonderful book, When Love Meets Fear.  I'd memorized all 156 of these affirmations several weeks ago because I knew as soon as I read through them the first time that they were going to become another tool of mine to deal with life's ups and downs, and in particular, fear.  Reciting them aloud when I was in the car by myself helped put all sorts of fears in a place where they didn't seem to overwhelm me or take me out of the moment that I'm in right now.

When I got to the hospital, I decided that rather than watch TV or read, I would use my laptop to type out these 156 affirmations related to fear.  Again, I found that going through these affirmations again helped me stay centered and calm.  Certain affirmations seemed to strike me as right on target this morning.

While this might violate some copyright of David Richo's I'll beg forgiveness from him should that be necessary:  Here are my recollections of Richo's fear affirmations (I've bracketed [] any modifications or additions to his words -- I oftentimes modify the words of something I've memorized just to make it a little more "mine" or more personal):

1. I trust my true fears to give me signals of danger.

2. I admit that I also have false fears and worries.

3. I feel compassion toward myself for all the years I’ve been afraid.

4. I forgive those who hypnotized me into unreal fears.

5. I suggest now to myself, over and over, that I am freeing myself from fear.

6. I have fearlessness to match my fear.

7. I trust my powers and resourcefulness as a man.

8. I trust my abundant creativity.

9. I trust the strength that opens and blooms in me when I face a threat.

10. I believe in myself as a man who handles what comes his way…today.

11. I know how to rise to a challenge.

12. I am more and more aware of how I hold fear in my body.

13. I stop storing fear in my body.

14. Now I relax those holding places.

15. I open my body to joy and serenity.

16. I release my body from the clench of fear.

17. I relax those parts of me that hold on to fear the most.

18. I let go of the stresses and tensions that come from fear.

19. I let go of fear based thoughts.

20. I let go of basing my decisions on fear.

21. I stop listening to those who want to [export] their fears into me.

22. I let go of finding something to fear in everything.

23. I let go of fear and fearing and believing that everything is fearsome.

24. I let go of the primitive ways I have of catastrophizing: e.g., the fear belief: it will always be this way!

25. I am more and more aware of my instant reflex fear reactions.

26. I accept that I have habituated myself to a certain level of adrenaline.

27. I admit that I oftentimes choose the adrenaline rush that comes with the dramas of fear and desire.

28. I forgo this stressful excitement and choose sane and serene liveliness.

29. I let go of the obsessive thoughts about how the worst may happen.

30. I trust myself always to have an alternative.

31. I see the humor in my fears.

32. I see the humor in my exaggerated responses to unreal dangers.

33. I find a humorous dimension in every fear.

34. I find a humorous response to every fear.

35. I play with the pain of fear. 

36. I smile at my scared ego with tough love.

37. I am convinced of my abilities to handle situations and people that scare me.

38. I am more and more aware of how what happens or has happened is being faced, integrated or released.

39. I have self-healing power AND I seek and find support from outside sources.

40. I have an enormous capacity for rebuilding, restoring and transcending.

41. I am more and more sure of my abilities.

42. I am less and less scared by what happens, by what has happened, by what will happen.

43. I trust myself.

44. I trust the uncanny timing that I keep noticing in my life.

45. I love how I awake, or change, or resolve, or complete at just the right moment.

46. Nothing forces me; nothing stops me.

47. I let go of any fear of nature.

48. I let go of my fear of natural disasters.

49. I let go of my fears of sickness, accident, old age and death.

50. I cease being afraid of knowing, having or showing my feelings.

51. I let go of the fear of failure and of success.

52. I let go of the fears behind my guilt and shame.

53. I let go of the fear of aloneness or of having time on my hands.

54. I let go of the fear of abandonment.

55. I let go of the fear of engulfment.

56. I let go of the fear of closeness.

57. I let go of the fear of commitment.

58. I let go of the fear of being betrayed.

59. I let go of the fear of being cheated or robbed.

60. I let go of the fear of giving, receiving; beginnings, endings; comings, goings; scarcity, abundance; saying no, saying yes.

61. I let go of the fear of any person.

62. I let go of the fear of loving.

63. I let go of the fear of being loved.

64. I let go of the fear of losing: losing money, losing face, losing freedom, losing friends, losing family members, losing respect, losing status, losing my job, losing out!

65. I let go of the fear of having to grieve.

66. I keep letting go; I keep going on.

67. I let go of my paranoia.

68. I give up my phobic rituals.

69. I let go of my performance fears.

70. I let go of my sexual fears.

71. I let go of my fears about my adequacy as a parent or child; worker or manager; partner, [lover] or friend; [sponsor or sponsee].

72. I let go of the need for control.

73. I acknowledge control as a mask for my fear.

74. I let go of the need to be right, to be first, to be perfect.

75. I let go of the belief that I am entitled to be taken care of.

76. I let go of the fears about the 5 conditions of existence:

a. I accept that I may sometimes lose.

b. I accept that things change and end.

c. I accept that pain is part of human growth.

d. I accept that things are not always fair.

e. I accept that people will lie to me, betray me, or not be loyal to me.

77. I am flexible enough to accept life as it is, forgiving enough to accept life as it has been, [open enough to welcome life as it happens].

78. I drop the need for or the belief in a personal exemption from the conditions of my existence.

79. I acknowledge my present predicament as a path.

80. I trust a design in spite of the display.

81. I let go of more than fate can take.

82. I appreciate how everything works out for me.

83. I appreciate the graces that everywhere surround and enrich my life.

84. I find an alternative always exists behind the apparent dead end of fear.

85. I open myself to love, to people, to events.

86. I accept the love that awaits me everywhere.

87. I feel deeply loved by people near and far, living and dead.

88. I feel loved and watched over by my higher power.

89. I believe I have an important destiny, that I am living in accord with it, that I will survive to fulfill it.

90. I let myself feel the full measure of the joy I was meant to feel: the joy of living without fear.

91. I let fear go, I let joy in.

92. I let fear go, I let love in.

93. I let fears go and I expand my sensibilities.

94. I am more and more aware of others fears, more and more sensitive to them, more and more compassionate toward them.

95. I am more and more acceptant of all kinds of people

96. I enlarge my circle of love to include every living being and I show them love.

97. I am more and more courageous in my program of dealing with fear:

a. I let go of the need for control

b. I let the chips fall where they may

c. I admit my fears

d. I feel my fears by letting them flow through me

e. I act as if I were free from fear

f. I see the humor in my fears

g. I expand my circle of love to include myself and everyone

98. I have pluck and wit!

99. I let go of my defenses.

100. I defend myself.

101. I am non-violent.

102. I am intrepid under fire.

103. I am a hero: I feel pain in my life and am transformed by it.

104. I am undaunted by situations and people that threaten me.

105. I let people’s attempts to menace me fall flat.

106. I give up running from a threat.

107. I give up shrinking from a fight.

108. I show grace under pressure.

109. I stop running; I stop hiding.

110. More and more of my fears are becoming healthy excitement.

111. I meet danger face to face.

112. I stand up for a fight.

113. I take the bull by the horns.

114. I walk the gauntlet.

115. I put my head in the lion’s mouth.

116. I stick to my guns and hold my fire.

117. An automatic courage arises in me when I face a threat.

118. I dare to show myself as I am: afraid and courageous.

119. I hereby release the courage that has lain hidden within me.

120. I am thankful for the gift of fortitude.

121. I let go of hesitation and self-doubt.

122. I am hardy in the face of fear.

123. I have grit, stamina and toughness.

124. I take risks and always act with responsibility and grace.

125. I let go of the need to be different.

126. I let go of the fear of others expectations.

127. I cease being intimidated by others anger.

128. I let go of the fear of what might happen if others do not like me.

129. I let go of the fear of false accusation.

130. I let go of the fear of doing it his, her or their way.

131. I acknowledge that behind my excessive sense of obligation is the fear of my own freedom.

132. I let go of the horror about disapproval, ridicule or rejection.

133. I dare to stop auditioning for people’s approval.

134. I dare to give up my act.

135. I give up all my poses, pretences and posturings.

136. I dare to be myself.

137. I acknowledge that behind my fear of self-disclosure is a fear of freedom.

138. I dare to show my hand, to show my inclinations, to show my enthusiasms.

139. I let my every word, feeling and deed reflect me, as I truly am.

140. I love being found out: that is, caught in the act of being my authentic self.

141. I explore the farthest reaches of my identity.

142. I live my life according to my deepest needs and wishes.

143. I let go of the need to correct people’s impressions of me.

144. I stop being afraid of my own power.

145. I am irrepressible.

146. I draw upon the ever renewing sources of lively energy within me.

147. I am great hearted and bold spirited.

148. I dare to give of myself unconditionally, and…

149. I dare to be unconditionally committed to maintaining my own boundaries.

150. I open myself to the grace to know the difference.

151. I fling open the gates of my soul.

152. I set free joy, till now imprisoned by fear.

153. I set free love, till now imprisoned by fear.

154. I honor and evoke my animal powers, my human powers, my divine powers.

155. I let true love cast out all fear.

156. I face fear like the Buddha; I am the Buddha in the face of fear.

Nine Years...

With the exception of regular blogging, I've been pretty consistent in continuing to do what has helped me not only stay sober for over nine years now (my sobriety birthday is October 20, 2001) but also fashion a way of living that really is beyond my wildest imagination:  lots of meetings, working with others, reading and meditation (memorizing/reciting mostly...). 

The main reason behind my falling away from the regular blogging is that some life issues have arisen in the last month or two and they have been occupying a significant amount of my time and that time had to come from somewhere: blogging was it.  The biggest thing that I've been dealing with is my mother's development of a progressive form of dementia over the last year or so.  It's gotten to the point where someone had to step up and help her deal with the various aspects of this disease and to get help with getting it diagnosed and developing a plan of action.  In terms of my recovery, I should note that before I got sober, I had not talked to my mother for almost 10 years!  But in the process of working through the steps, I was able to eventually reach out to her and rebuild a relationship with her that has become quite strong over the last five or six years.  I've been there for her as she's experienced some strokes, a heart attack and five way heart bypass surgery and now with this gradual loss of memory at 81 years old.

What surprises me is that I've really come to enjoy my times with my mother.  That has never been true in our relationship: ever.  She trusts me, enjoys spending time with me and always thanks me for all my help and assistance.  What a blessing made possible by my recovery work!

As I've been going through all this with my mom, I've been consistent with my meetings, kept my commitments to my sponsees, checked in with my sponsors to keep them in the loop, and made time each day for maintaining my spiritual practices.  I've even taken up some new things, like calling people I haven't seen in awhile and just checking in or calling people who I know are struggling with the "not drinking part of the program" and just offering to help in any way I can --- or just to talk if they feel like doing that.  I've never been much of a phone person: but I decided to try something different and it's been paying off huge dividends.

Tonight I'm able to blog because my wife and youngest daughter are at the hospital waiting for my wife's sister to have her first baby.  I'll head over sometime later this evening, but for now, I have time to just check in with this blog.  Within the next month or so, I'll be joining my wife and eldest daughter and her husband for another trip to the hospital: that time to be there for the birth of our first grandchild.  I don't like projecting out that far, but I can't help it.  And I know I need to stay grounded in today:  I can look toward the future and back at the past, but I have to be careful not to stare.  It's staring at the past/future that throws me off kilter.

Anyway, I thought I would check in tonight with a quick blog before I head to the hospital. 

Take care!

Mike L.

Prerequisites to Critical Moments

As I've mentioned several times recently, I've been chewing on something I read recently and I just can't let it go:  The one obstacle to grace is control.  Ever since I read that line in David Richo's book, When Love Meets Fear, I've seemed to have this truth front and center in my consciousness most of the days since I first read it.  As I've been doing this "fear work" that I also mentioned in my last blog entry, the connection between the felt need to control things in my life and fearfulness is so close as to make them indistinguishable.

This morning as I was thinking about three of my sponsees who are all seemingly stuck in a very early recovery, I had a series of thoughts that sort of came pouring out: 

• the prerequisite of grace is letting go of control
• the prerequisite of letting go of control is willingness
• the prerequisite of willingness is not wanting to do something
• the prerequisite to doing something that you don't want to do is hopelessness or despair.

It's very hard to watch people holding on to control as though their life depended on their holding on to what they are holding on to.  It's especially hard when you know that the solution is not in holding on, but in letting go.

I just left a men's meeting at Old St. Mary's Church in downtown San Francisco.  The man who led the meeting read something from page 164 in the Big Book, including the most humble of all lines in our Big Book: "Our book is meant to be suggestive only.  We realize we know only a little."  I am truly aware of my own ignorance when it comes to what will work for another person.  I barely know what works for me and oftentimes I only learn that after thousands of failures and deadends and lots of pain.

So what do I know when I suggest to another suffering alcoholic that they consider trying what worked for me?  Nothin.  If anyone had suggested that I "let go" a moment before I did on the morning of October 20, 2001, I would have told them to go to hell and I would have stomped off without a clue as to what else I might try.  I let go only when there was no energy left to hold on and no other options.

I suppose that will happen with these guys also.  Or at least, I hope so.  There's always the other alternatives of jails, institutions and death.  Once again, I have to let the disease do the hard work of sponsoring the guys dumb enough to ask me to sponsor them.

Take care!

Mike L.

Commitment to Fear Work

As I mentioned in my last blog, I've been reading another book by David Richo called "When Love Meets Fear: Becoming Defense-less and Resource-full".  Great book.  It's where I got the line about the one obstacle to grace being control.  Boy, has that line been turning over my life as a gardner would turn over garden soil at the end/beginning of a growing season!

Further into the book, Richo (who is not a recovering alcoholic, but who has psychotherapy clients who are...) writes down a long list of affirmations all having to do with fear.  He refers to the list as an inventory.  This week, I committed to memorizing this list of affirmations (all 156 of them...) over the next several weeks.  Memorization and recitation is a huge, albeit strange and ongoing part of my recovery work.  It has been almost from the beginning and for the last couple of months I've been waiting to come across something new and beautiful to memorize. 

This list of fear affirmations jumped out at me and after getting over the initial block of "there's way too many of these to memorize!" negative thoughts, I quickly responded to the fearful self with a kind reminder that I don't have to memorize all 156 at once.  I can do them, like many other things I've memorized or committed to in the past, one line, one day at a time.

Here are the first twenty affirmations to give you a sense of this different type of fear inventory:  (FYI: I've found that when memorizing a long list like this it works best when I go one line at a time and then progress forward in groups of five --once I have five lines down pat, I move on to the next group of five, one line at a time):

I trust my true fears to give me signals of danger.
I admit that I also have false fears and worries.
I feel compassion toward myself for all the years I have been afraid.
I forgive those who hypnotized me into unreal fears.
I suggest now to myself, over and over, that I am freeing myself from fear.

I have fearlessness to match my fear.
I trust my powers and resourcefulness as a man.
I trust my abundant creativity.
I trust the strength that opens and blossoms in me when I have to face something.
I believe in myself as a man/woman who handles what comes his way today.

I know how to rise to a challenge.
I am more and more aware of how I hold fear in my body.
I stop storing fear in my body.
Now I relax those holding places.
I open my body to joy and serenity.

I release my body from the clench of fear.
I relax the parts of me that hold fear the most.
I let go of the stress and tension that come from fear.
I let go of fear based thoughts.
I let go of basing my decisions on fear.

As I have been doing this memory work, I think that it's having a real impact on what is happening in my life.  In the last week since I've been doing this work, I've encountered four different people, three of them sponsees in very early recovery and another person who writes a blog recommended to me by a recovery blogger who thought I might be of help to this person she'd encountered in the blogosphere.  All four of them are going through their own dark nights of the soul.  Each is dancing close to a level of hopelessness and despair that almost leads me to call 911 and have them taken into protective 72 hour mental health hold.  And in fact, one of them was hospitalized on Monday night for just that reason: his friends thought that he was in danger of hurting himself or committing suicide.

With each, I've attempted to be with them in their despair.  I'm not at all confident that I am saying the "right thing", helping or hurting.  I strongly suggested that one go into a 30 day treatment center or detox unit, but he refused because he doesn't want to be a "loser who goes into rehab."  When I heard him say that, I paused briefly to consider how to best respond and ended up blurting out, "Well, too bad!  Go anyway!"  After a brief silence and just as I was thinking that he was going to hang up on me, he began to laugh from his gut, almost hysterically for several minutes.  He thanked me for making him laugh for the first time in 9 months (he'd had some years sober but had fallen away from meetings, got involved with a younger woman and when she broke up with him and learned of his alcoholism, he drank.   He's not been able to get sober for the last 9 months...   Later that same night I got a short text message from him letting me know that his friends had had him hospitalized.   He's out now and I believe still sober...but still resisting the rehab. 

All four of these people have reminded me of the importance of hopelessness and despair.  Dr.Earle used to say, "Thank God for Despair!" (in fact, he wrote an article in the AA Grapevine years ago with that title).  The reason for his gratitude for such an unlikely candidate as Despair was that he'd learned over the years that while despair was quite painful and unpleasant, if only he would be willing to walk or sit through it, inevitably on the other side of despair would come some form of enlightenment or awakening.  Always.  I've begrudgingly come to agree with this insight.  I sent him a text yesterday saying that the prerequisite to willingness was not wanting to do something.  And in that since, he was in a really good place!

I've watched fear up close this week.  I feel more alive.  I feel more, period.  I think I'm going to keep doing this fear work.  Even though it frightens me somewhat.  ;-)

Take care!

Mike L.

The One Obstacle to Grace

This morning, the chairperson at the meeting was telling her beautiful recovery story when she got to the moment where for some strange reason she too was able to stop drinking.  It happened one morning in January 1999.  It was seemingly no different from any of the mornings over the last few years since she really started trying to get and stay sober.  During those two years, she'd started going to AA and she kept going back even after she would drink again.  Then came this one morning where she woke up and something different happened.  Something changed.

As she talked more about this particular morning, she wondered aloud,"I don't know what was different on that morning."  Nothing, as far as she could tell, had changed.  It was a morning like many many others that followed another attempt to drink like a normal person.  That history notwithstanding, that morning she was struck by a new resolve born of desperation:  she was going to do "whatever it took" to stay sober that day.  Now, 11 years later, she still really doesn't have any idea what really changed that morning to allow her sobriety to take hold and to last--at the very least--until this day.

As soon as she talked about that special morning -- I became entranced with my own memories of my special morning almost 9 years ago.  You see, I had that same identical experience of having many months of waking up confronted by the same idea: "I can't stop drinking!!"   And like her, on my special morning something changed and I knew it as soon as it happened.  For some reason, that morning I had a second thought follow the first: "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism.  And alcoholism is a disease."  Wow.  Or rather, Duh!  A 1st Step moment.

What's a little strange is that I had already known the fact about alcoholism being a disease for many years--at least at a head level, but it had never sunk to heart level until that special morning.  I suppose that in the past, I'd always thought I could either overcome that inability with even greater willpower or I could just give up trying and just do my best to not get caught.  It was a disease that would or could go away.  Not one that would always be a part of me.

Today, when the chairperson wondered aloud that she didn't have a clue as to what happened that morning, I realized that something I had read last night that seemed to hold the answer to this question, at least for me.  Last night before going to bed, I was reading another book by David Richo, this one called When Love Meets Fear. In it, he said something along the lines of this:

The one obstacle to grace is control.

That's what happened to me that special morning of October 20, 2001!  On that day I gave up trying to control my drinking.  I realize now that trying to stop drinking is yet another attempt to to control not alcohol, but to control alcoholism.  Prior to that morning, I was trying to stop drinking only as a means to avoid being an alcoholic.  And in my insane mind, stopping drinking was the only way to avoid being or becoming an alcoholic.  And I just did not want to be an alcoholic like my dad (or even my son!). 

The thought or desire to be someone other than who you are is insane.  And that's why I'd never been able to stop drinking: because as soon as I'd convince myself that I had stopped, then I'd say to myself, "Well, you've stopped!  Therefore, you're not really an alcoholic!"  And inevitably, like most alcoholics who finally convince themselves that they are really not an alcoholic: I'd celebrate by drinking!

What happened to me that special morning was that I unknowingly (but willingly) gave up my control over my alcoholism and my never-ending problem with stopping drinking.  And as result, I think, grace was able to step into the process.  Grace: an unmerited gift.  As a result of grace, I was able to stop stopping.  As a result of grace, I was able to start trying to stay sober, as an alcoholic, one day at a time.

What I'm focusing on today is the fact that control has many forms and manifestations in my life today.  Control will lead me to believe that a particular feeling, say anxiety, depression, sadness, or loneliness, should be allowed to be or to surface.  And as a result of that decision of control, I then choose to seek some alternative or escape to the undesirable or unwanted feeling.  I run.  I go to a meeting.  I get up and do anything other than just sit.  I try to use some AA tool, like writing a gratitude list, as a surefire means of avoiding the feelings that want to see the light of day.  True, these are all better choices to drinking!  But they are similar ways of controlling life as life is.  Not something I want to do.  [I know, grace is not retroactive -- it's always right here, right now--so I don't need to waste time beating myself up for all my past attempts to avoid reality or to run from feelings.]

Over the next week, I'm going to try and become more aware of these moments which tend to lead me to unskilled attempts to control what's coming up naturally from within.  I'm going to try and let those feelings be just as they are for at least one minute more than I would habitually do previously.  I'm going to try and be open to moments of grace.

And I'm apparently going to do that while I'm in Las Vegas, Nevada where I'm heading now for a five day business conference!  There's something hilarious in this plan to be sure.

Take care!

Mike L.

Raising Our Hand

Every once and awhile I hear someone say that one of their motives for staying sober is that they don't want to have to raise their hand again.  Raising our hands and declaring that we are in our first 30 days of recovery seems, for many of us, to involve some amount of guilt and/or shame.  And even more so when we're doing that "again" (or again and again...).

This week, I was blessed to see a friend of mine raise his hand again and declare himself to be back in his first thirty days of recovery.  In fact, it was day three for him.  He'd not raised his hand at the beginning of the meeting when the secretary had asked if there was anyone in their first thirty days.   He'd actually been to several meetings since his relapse over the weekend, but he'd just been unable to raise his hand and let people know.  I think it was his second relapse since first beginning his recovery several years ago.  Before he used and drank this last weekend, he'd had just gotten to two years of sobriety a few weeks before.  He was having a hard time disclosing the fact that he'd relapsed, but for some reason, he kept coming to meetings.

On Wednesday, he was unable to raise his hand when the secretary had asked.  But then what happened was that while "How It Works" was being read, he was struck by the repeated use of "honest" in the first paragraph of that reading.  Somehow, he realized that keeping his relapse a secret from us was going to get him drunk and he needed to fess up.  So he raised his hand shortly thereafter and said, "I'm Mike and I'm an alcoholic.  And I've been lying to you.  I even lied to my sponsor as I walked into this meeting today.  I drank this weekend and this is Day Three for me."

He briefly explained what had happened.  It'd happened so fast.  He'd taken a week's vacation with his daughter and had a wonderful time.  And then when he came back, he dropped his daughter off with her mother and he went to house sit a friend's house for a couple of days.  Something about being alone in that house triggered some pains from the past and before he knew it he was going through the friend's medicene cabinet looking for drugs.  He found them and took them.  And the next thing he knew, he was getting drunk.  That was a Saturday. 

On Sunday, he awakened to waves of guilt and shame.  And then he went to a meeting.  While he didn't raise his hand, he kept going to meetings for the next three days and he didn't drink.  Ultimately, the secret became too much of a burden and he spilled it all out for us on Wednesday.  I thanked him for what he disclosed because, among other things, he showed me that it's possible to come back and raise your hand again --- and that everyone welcomes you.  No one judges you (at least out loud) or condemns you.  How could we???  We'd be condemning ourselves!

I understand why people talk about not wanting to raise their hand again, but for me, I think it's a misplaced fear.  For me, the day I first raised my hand and disclosed, "I'm Mike and I'm an alcoholic!" was the best day in my life to date.  I haven't had a better day since.  I've had lots of great days since that first disclosure of who I was as an alcoholic, but none better than that day.  As I've mentioned before, the first time I really raised my hand to disclose this truth was the morning of October 20, 2001: I was in bed next to my still sleeping wife.  I'd awakened to the same thought I'd had every day the last ten months: "I can't stop drinking!"  And then a new thought followed, "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism.  And alcoholism is just a disease!"  And then I saw myself sitting in a circle of people at my son's rehab and instead of lying like I had for the last ten months, I shared with them the truth: My name is Mike and I'm an alcoholic!" 

When I did that, even though the people and situation were all in my head, I experienced a freedom I'd been seeking for years.  A freedom from the compulsion or obsession to drink.  A freedom from the need to put effort into "not drinking".  A freedom to be me.

I don't fear raising my hand again.  If I drink again, I know what I'll need to do to get back into the mode of recovery.  I'll need to return to the rooms and let my friends know what happened and that I'm back to begin again.

It's funny, a few nights ago (after this guy raised his hand on Wednesday) I had my first drinking dream in several years.  I was sitting at a table and there was a pitcher of lemon aide and Vodka sitting in front of me.  I poured a glass from the pitcher knowing that it was full of lemon aide and Vodka, but it didn't dawn on me that Vodka was alcohol.  Strange, huh.  Anyway, I poured myself a glass and then began drinking it.  It's the first time that I've had a drinking dream where I actually remember the act of drinking!  Anyway, I was drinking this and then I started feeling a slight buzz.  And then the idea came to me, I'm getting a buzz because this has alcohol in it!  Fuck!

I woke with a start and my heart beating rapidly.  Feeling as though this had actually happened, I was disappointed that I had drank, but the very first thought was that I needed to get up and go to the Concord Fellowship 6:30am meeting and raise my hand!  Now!  Within a few seconds, it became clear that it was just a dream and that I didn't need to raise my hand as being in my first 30 days.  But I knew that that would be what I'd need to do if I did drink.

I've been thinking a lot about how much weight or importance we put on long term sobriety --- I wonder if we go a little too far in that regard because it seems to set an unrealistic goal for most of us alcoholics.  Takes us a little off the more secure path of One Day At a Time mantra of AA.  I don't possess 8.5 years of sobriety.  It's not something I own.  I can't sell it.  I really can't lose it.  I cherish it.  I feel tremendously grateful for it.  But my focus needs to remain with today.  I can be sober only one day: today.  I can't be sober tomorrow (that can only be a hope or a dream).  I can't be sober yesterday (that is only a memory).  I can stay sober today.

Take care!

Mike L.

A Change in Perception

On Friday morning I attended a memorial for an oldtimer from around here who'd died with 39 years of sobriety.  A great man.  His name was Wayne Smith from Walnut Creek.  He'd sometimes begin his shares with, "Hi, I'm Wayne S. from Walnut C."  He was a master storyteller and will be greatly missed.  At the reception, someone had placed a bunch of CDs of a speaker meeting talk that Wayne had given years ago and on the way home from the memorial I listened to Wayne's pitch.  It was wonderful, but it was even more wonderful to hear his voice again, full of life.  He mentioned in it that he'd loved AA from the very beginning and it was the longest love affair of his whole life.

In his story though, he said something about The Steps that I'd never heard before and that was that the Steps were all about perception, or more accurately, changing our perception on a variety of important things in our lives.  Each step was, according to Wayne, all about changing our perspective from what was unhealthy and/or untrue to a new perspective that was more healthy and true.  He then gave examples from his own life to explain what he meant.  He said that the 1st Step was, for him, all about changing his perception about who he was in terms of his relationship with alcohol: for years, he had thought that alcohol was something that he could control and manage....  And that the 1st Step was about changing that misperception to something more accurate and true: that alcohol was not something he could control and that with alcohol in him, his life had become totally unmanageable.

I knew exactly what he meant, I only wish that he had gone through with more examples from his life to show how each of the remaining 11 steps helped him change his perspective to become more healthy and true.  And since yesterday, I have been mulling over how each of the 12 steps have helped me change my perspective on my life and on myself.

For me, the 1st step didn't involve changing my perception of alcohol.  Rather, it changed my perception of me as an alcoholic.  In the past, I'd thought that it was possible to avoid becoming an alcoholic (like my dad, I must add) by controlling my drinking, by proving to myself (when necessary) that I could stop drinking or by drinking like a non-alcoholic.  What happened in my 1st step was waking up to the reality that I was an alcoholic and that being an alcoholic wasn't my problem!  My problem was my 30 year attempt NOT to be an alcoholic. Thirty years of trying to drink "like" a non-alcoholic!  That delusion changed the morning I woke up on October 20, 2001 and realized that I couldn't stop drinking and that "not being able to stop drinking" was called "alcoholism" and that I was, like it or not!, an alcoholic.  That morning, being an alcoholic was perfectly OK.  It was just a disease and I just happened to have it.  Everything in my past life immediately became understandable.  It all made sense!  That's why I did what I did!  Ahhhh.  That was two days before my first meeting of AA.

The 2nd step then changed how I was going to move forward with the remainder of my life.  It wasn't so much about believing in a particular concept of God.  It was more about my own letting go of the idea that I was God or God-like.  And my drinking was an essential part of me being God-like: that is, I could change people (me and others), places and things all by means of a drink.  And another.  And another.  People, places and things all had one thing in common: they were not the way I thought they should be!  And if God wasn't going to fix that problem, I would help Him out.  And when I couldn't do that on my own, I resorted to the use of alcohol.  Once I got sober, my perspective changed in relatively short fashion:  I began to realize that I wasn't God and that I didn't need to do that God Act any more.  Everyone, everything and every situation was perfect just the way it was at that moment in time and I didn't need to get back into the battle of making the universe conform to the way I thought it should be.  For me, the return to sanity didn't involve some sort of return to mental health.  My alcoholic insanity wasn't mental illness.  It was the deeply ingrained belief that there was something wrong with me and that I needed to be or to become someone different than who I was.  Trying to be someone I wasn't is my definition of insanity.  Sanity then was the gradual awareness that I was perfect just the way I am and that this perfection includes the fact that my body processes alcohol and other mind-altering drugs differently than non-alcoholics and non-addicts.

The 3rd step continued that change in perspective from the inside out.  My 3rd step did not involve kneeling down to some Higher Power or even a decision to do so.  My 3rd step involved letting go of my death grip on life and letting things be just the way they were.  I no longer needed to play God.

The 4th thru the 9th steps all changed my perception of myself in that I had deeply held beliefs that there was something very wrong with me.  I came into the rooms carrying quite a heavy sack of shit: an invisible but still heavy sack of guilt (for things I had done) and shame (for who I thought I was).  In the 4th step, I began this change from the inside: with who I was and with what I had done, both the so-called good and the so-called bad.  I wrote down all the things from my past that "made me wince".  With the help of my sponsors, I wrote without judgment or condemnation.  

In my 5th step, I shared my secrets and ultimately, I shared the "exact nature of my wrongs."  For me, that process changed me in the most profound of ways.  I was no longer a bad person trying to become good; I was a sick person trying to become well.  And I still am.  I began to look at myself with eyes of compassion and understanding and I was able to do that by first seeing that compassion and understanding reflected in the eyes of my sponsors as they looked at me.

The 6th and 7th steps were a continuation of 4 and 5: they were all about changing how I saw myself.  The change has not been so much one of identifying or changing what's supposedly wrong with me (i.e., shortcomings or defects of character) but rather, coming to see things that I thought were wrong with me and now seeing them more as being just perfect!  The greatest example of that truth is my alcoholism.  I'd thought for 30 years that being an alcoholic was the worst possible thing I could become: it turns out that it was the best thing that could ever happen to me!  Having alcoholism is not a shortcoming or a defect.  My shortcoming, if you want me to have one, was trying to be someone I wasn't.  The 6th and 7th steps have been extremely helpful in identifying other aspects of who I am that I once thought to be "wrong" and changing that perception to become more healthy and accurate.  More compassionate.  More loving.

The 8th and 9th steps started me on a journey more to the outside of me: to my actions and behaviors and how they impacted or harmed others.  Both in the past and now.  These steps allowed me to take my newfound perspectives and apply them to my relationships with others.  While all my past actions were needed for me to become who I am now, the fact is that much of my past acts harmed others in some significant ways and the damage to those relationships continued into the present.  These steps gave me a mechanism to go back to these people and begin a process of healing and forgiveness.  Only in a few instances did this amends process involve saying the words, "I'm sorry."  Most of the time, it involved my sharing my story and what was going on with me back when...  I hadn't meant to hurt them as I clearly did and I was now wanting to clean up those messes and harms as best I could.  My sack of shit got lighter and lighter as a result.

The last three steps have given me a regular daily routine whereby I can continue the basic "inside out" work I did in the previous nines steps.  The 10th step gives me a daily process where I can refocus my view of myself and my actions.  Where have I done harm and what can I do to repair the damage I may have done?  How can I do that with compassion and loving-kindness, both for others and for myself? 

The 11th step gives me a daily practice where I can be quiet and know that I am not God.  I am Mike and I'm an alcoholic.  And that's perfectly OK!  It gives me breathing room.

The 12th step has totally turned my life upside down and it happens again and again as I try to share what I have been given with others who struggle with this disease.  Each one of my sponsees, as well as many others in my life, have changed me by the fact that they trust me with their secrets and struggles.  I really don't think I give them much other than an ear and a few stories of what happened to me in similar circumstances.  I inevitably walk away from our time together with a totally different perspective on my day and myself.  I am blessed.

Wayne was right: The Steps and this whole recovery process are all about changing our preception and our perspectives.  I'll miss you my friend!!

Take care!

Mike L.

"I Just Can't Stop Drinking!"

I suppose that since I've always gone to many meetings (over 1 a day average over 8 years) that there are few things that can be said in an AA meeting that really bother me.  That said, there are a couple of statements that always have a visceral impact on me when I hear people say them in an AA meeting.  One is when a newcomer comes in to the rooms and says something along the lines of "I realize now that I need to stop drinking... for the rest of my life."   It's the "rest of my life" comment that makes my stomach twist and tighten.  Another comment is when people describe their moment of clarity as the point in time when the were finally able to stop drinking and they say something like, "I stopped drinking...".  In that phrase it's the "I" that ends up causing an immediate visceral reaction in me.  I not only don't relate to people's plan to never drink again for the rest of their lives or to alcoholic's claim to have stopped, I get concerned, if not outright nervous, that such approaches to sobriety are shaky foundations to longer term sobriety.

Yesterday I was at the 6:30am Concord Fellowship meeting and at the time when the secretary asked if there were any newcomers, a guy raised his hand and said that he was an alcoholic and had only a few days.  He wasn't sure how many days, but he looked pretty beaten down.  I'd seen this guy come in and go out of the meetings many times in the last 3-4 years.  Everytime he came back in, his life situation got worse and worse.  He would get a sponsor and begin the steps, but it seemed that he'd always disappear again within 3-6 months.  Yesterday seemed no different except for the fact that his life situation was even worse after this last relapse: ex-wife was dying of cancer and older son was facing 25 to life for abusing his son -- the newcomer's grandson.

After the chair had shared his story, he eventually called on this newcomer and asked him if he'd like to share.  The man told us of his worsening life situation and ended with a heartfelt admission that he "just can't stop drinking!"   As the meeting went on to other shares, I couldn't stop thinking about that comment, "I can't stop drinking!"  It was the one thing that I most related to in the whole meeting that day.  While I suspected that the newcomer felt he was the only one in that room that couldn't stop drinking -- I knew in my core that that was really the one thing that this guy had most in common with everyone in that room --- or at least, I knew that he and I both shared the same basic inability to stop drinking.  I eventually shared that view with the group, in a subtle form of crosstalk directed at this newcomer, and told him that I thought the idea that we are the only ones in the room who "can't stop drinking" is a mistaken belief.  In my view, the one thing I most have in common with other alcoholics, most particularly those in recovery, is the inability to stop drinking.

In fact, I think that's the good news of the AA program from the beginning.  In AA we discover that we can't stop drinking because we are powerless over alcohol.  We are powerless over alcohol in the sense that our bodies process alcohol differently than non-alcoholics and because of the nature of that particular disease, we are unable to change or alter that fact.  Our only solution then is to give up trying to stop drinking (as that's impossible for us) and to begin trying to stay sober today.  Just for today.  Not tomorrow.  Not for the rest of our lives.  Just for today.  And if today's too much for us, we can narrow the scope down even further: Just for this hour.  Just for this minute.  Just for now.  And now, just for now.

As I was talking, I glanced over at the newcomer and tears were falling down his cheeks.  And I knew that I'd touched something in him.  And then I stopped.  To go further would be to lecture. 

After the newcomer had originally raised his hand at the beginning of the meeting, the secretary had asked for members of the group who were willing and able to sponsor men to raise their hands.  Because I already have at least a dozen active sponsees, I didn't think I could take on another sponsee at this time in my life.  I was tremendously proud though when I looked across the room and see one of my sponsee's raise his hand and offer his service in this regard.  I've always thought that he would make a great sponsor despite my poor example.

At the end of the meeting, I did go over and hug the newcomer and tell him to hang in there.  Things were going to get better (and worse) if he found a way to stay sober today.  That said, it goes without question that if he's unable to stay sober today, things would continue to get worse and worse and that that progression downward would pickup more and more steam the longer it took him to get and stay sober, one day at a time.  I also suggested to him (and to my sponsee) that it might be a good idea for him to get into a detox facility sooner rather than later (he was addicted not only to the drug alcohol, but to some other very powerful drugs that make his situation all the more tragic/urgent).

I wish him well.  This is not a pretty disease.

Take care!

Mike L.

Three Stories About Hopelessness

For some time now, I've been a firm believer in the synchronisticy of life events.  Some people refer to them as coincidences.  This last week, I knew that I was going to be chairing a meeting on Friday and during the week, I was on the lookout for a topic or a direction for that chair to take.  By the time I was sitting in the chair at noon on Friday, I knew that the topic had to be hopelessness.

On the previous Wednesday, I been in San Francisco for the day and was able to go to an afternoon meeting at Old St. Mary's Church.  The meeting format was for a woman who had just reached her 6 month sobriety milestone to tell her story for the first time, for her to pick a topic and then for people to share.  The chair would pick one person to begin the sharing and then it would just go around the room until everyone got a chance to share briefly on that topic.

The woman was so relieved by the time she finished her chair that she couldn't think of any topic, so she made the topic, whatever you'd like to talk about.  I didn't really have anything going on, so I just listened to each person share about what was going on with them.  After each person shared, I felt a connection with each one of them and I also came up with something relevant to that person's comment and that relieved me of the temptation to think about what I was going to share and thereby not listen to the next person who shared.  Anyway, that happened each time that someone shared.  I identified with them and I remembered a story from my own life that related to what each person was struggling with in their lives.

By the time it was almost my time to talk, I had no idea which of my stories I wanted to share.  So many stories, so little time.  I'm not a short story sorta guy.  In fact, I'm realizing now, that I wanted to tell three stories about Hopelessness and I'm not even done with the first story and I've gone on too long already for one blog.  Oh, well.

Anyway, the time came for the woman two seats to my right to share and I could tell she was very troubled.  She'd come into the meeting a little late, shortly after the time had come and gone for newcomers to raise their hands so that we could begin to get to know them and be of help.  She shared with us her name and said that this was her first day back in meetings.  She'd relapsed and it was horrible.  She cried.  She couldn't say anything more.  She looked around the room quickly and then shrugged her shoulders and said, "I'm hopeless!".

Well, now I had a story to tell.  I didn't even try to listen to the man's share next to me.  I just began trying to piece together my own hopelessness story in the hope I could tell it well enough to be helpful to the woman to my right.  I knew instinctively that she believed that her hopelessness was bad and a clear sign for all of us to see of her failed attempts at life and sobriety.  I wanted to gently let her know that things were not so bad, in fact, she was experiencing the most important event of her life.  A new beginning possible only from a moment of hopelessness.

I shared my moment of hopelessness which came after ten months of being unable to stop drinking.  The ten months had begun when my 15 year old son reached his own moment of hopelessness and began his own journey of recovery from addiction.  My moment of hopelessness came the morning of October 21, 2001 --- the night before my son had almost caught me drinking.  I'd successfully lied my way out of his discovery, but I'd gone to bed the night before feeling like shit.  Pat was 5 months and 10 days sober: how come I couldn't stop drinking and support him in his recovery?

Anyway, my moment of hopelessness occurred the following morning.  I woke up at 6am with the clearest of ideas greeting me:  "I just can't stop drinking!"  It was a thought that I had had most mornings for the last couple of years of my life.  What was different that morning though was that this first thought of hopelessness was followed by a second thought: "Not being able to stop drinking is called alcoholism and alcoholism is a disease."  For the first time in my life, it was perfectly OK to be an alcoholic.

I then looked at the woman to my right and said that some years ago I heard the greatest line I'd ever heard.  It was at a meeting when the chair shared what she considered her favorite line -- she'd stolen it from her sponsor years ago.  Her sponsor had said that she'd gotten sober "at the corner of Grace and Willingness."  I loved that line from the get go.  I went up to the chair woman after the meeting, thanked her and let her know that I too was going to steal her sponsor's line about the corner of Grace and Willingness.  She laughed.  I asked her to chair a meeting for me in two weeks at the Lafayette Hut and she graciously accepted.

As soon as I left the meeting, I realized that while it was a great line, it didn't describe where I'd gotten sober.  I had surely gotten sober as a result of Grace: my sober moment was not the result of my effort or thought process.  My sober moment was a gift from something or someone outside of myself.  It took me about two weeks of chewing on this question.  Eventually it came to me two weeks later, just as the chair woman walked into the Lafayette Hut.  She sat down next to me at the head of the table and I leaned over to thank her for coming out to chair this meeting.  And then I reminded her about her line about getting sober at the corner of Grace and Willingness.  She smiled and then I told her that while I loved the line, it was not where I got sober.   She smiled and asked, "Well, then, where did you get sober?"  "I got sober at the corner of Grace and Hopelessness!  It's about a half block down from the corner of Grace and Willingness!"

I then looked over at woman to my right in her first day of sobriety --- she was laughing and I think things were now becoming "right" in her world.

Thank God for Hopelessness!  It gives us the ability to accept things as they are without any need to change or pretend to be someone we're not. My problem wasn't that I was an alcoholic.  My problem was that I was an alcoholic who was trying (hopelessly!) to be a non-alcoholic!

Take care!  I will tell you my third story about hopelessness in a day or so.  My wife and I are getting on a cruise ship later today for a two week cruise to Alaska.  I'll try to get that blog published before she throws me overboard.

Mike L.

I'm not ready yet....

I read a great little story the other day that shed a lot of light on some uncertainty and doubt over my own ability to sponsor others.  Or at least do that well.

The story was about a therapist who was walking home one day when he was acosted by a guy who walked up to the therapist asking if he knew where a certain street was located.  The therapist replied, "Yes, just go down the street here and turn left at the first intersection."  The stranger seemed to understand the directions, so the therapist continued toward his home.  At one point, the therapist looked back and saw that the stranger was going in the opposite direction than he'd directed him.  The therapist called out, "Hey!  You're going in the wrong direction!"

The stranger turned around and yelled back, "Yes, I know!  I'm not ready to go there yet!"

So true!  I rarely (if ever) find myself in a position where I know, without uncertainty, what a sponsee or other friend in recovery may need to go or what they should do.  There are times where I sense that what might good, better or best for the other person and I will then share that as a suggestion which might be worth their consideration. 

That's all well and good.  I just need to learn how to let it go at that point and detach myself from whatever it is the other person chooses to do.  That's their issue and it has nothing to do with me.  Even the suggestion that the other should consider not drinking --- the truth of the matter is that some people are simply not ready to go there yet.

When they are ready, I can try to be there for them with my hand extended.

Take care!

Mike L.

AA Didn't Work for Him... Really?

I was listening to someone's chair/story the other day and he mentioned that before getting sober he once spent 5 years as a member of Synanon, founded by someone who'd once tried AA but found it didn't work for him.  During the discussion period afterward, someone shared that this Synanon founder eventually got drunk and died.  People laughed.  I admit that I joined them, chuckling by impulse, but something felt odd about laughing at someone's dying from this disease and also about their claim that AA didn't work for them.  The presumption seems to be that when people claim that AA didn't work for them, these people weren't ready or weren't willing to do what it takes for this program to work.  If AA doesn't work, it's not AA's fault.

I'm not sure that's always the case.  Does AA not work for some people?  Sure!  But why?  I've been mulling this over for awhile now and I want to share some of my thoughts on this topic. 

First, I don't think "AA" fails anyone.  AA is an organization and doesn't have some separate personal existence or identify that any one person can "experience" by walking into any particular meeting or by talking to any particular member of AA.  Whatever a meeting or member might do or say in terms of conveying the AA message (whatever that is...) to an interested non-member will never represent AA in it's entirety or completeness.  It will always fall short of the ideal that we each might have in mind when we think of AA in all its potential and beauty. 

To the extent that an incomplete or distorted message of recovery gets conveyed to the newcomer, that's not a failing of AA.  It's an unavoidable failing of that particular meeting or member of AA.  Unfortunately, far too many (one would be too many...) people experience such incomplete or poorly conveyed message of recovery by a group or individual.  We're not perfect, as a group or as individual members of AA.

Luckily for me, when I walked into my first meeting, I was just willing and desperate enough to overcome some of the defects/flaws in the messages being conveyed to me, intentionally or not, when I first started coming to AA meetings over 8 years ago.  And as I listen to or read stories from others, members or not, who had bad experiences when they first tried AA, I'm glad that I didn't face some of the intellectual hurdles others had to overcome in order to make it all the way into this weird organization called Alcoholics Anonymous. 

All that said, I don't want to become complacent and just trust that we're doing good enough for those who are willing and desperate enough to overcome all obstacles to giving AA a chance at providing a solution for suffering alcoholics.  It seems incumbant for us all to try to do everything we can to remove any obstacles to a suffering alcoholic's recovery as possible, to take care with our words and message so that we give as many people as possible an ability to find a solution like we have here in AA.  That's not to say that we try to become all things to all people: but it is to say that we should always strive to reach out to more people and to be more effective at conveying the AA message of recovery.

Secondly, I think that given the weirdness of this particular organization, where there is no Pope or ultimate authority or rigid structure/doctrine, the message conveyed to the newcomer will always include something of a mixed bag of fruit and nuts.  I personally think that there's as many ways to work this AA program as there are members of AA.  True, many might strongly disagree with that opinion of mine, but that really only proves my point because all of us who disagree and agree with that statement are still equal and full-fledged voting members of AA even though we have strong differences of opinions on pretty important inside issues.

These two points may appear contradictory: we need to do more and we will always fall short.  But that's not the only paradox I've found in my recovery or in the AA progam.  I'm sure it won't be the last either.  I'm grateful that AA has worked for me and has given me a framework through which I've been able to fashion a way of sober living that works just right for this alcoholic.

Take care!

Mike L.

Life Boring?

At my Wednesday night home group meeting last night, a guy who'd just passed the 30-day mark in his sobriety shared about how although he was glad to be sober 30 days, he was feeling somewhat bored with his life.  He felt that all he was doing was getting up, going to work, going to a meeting and then going to bed.  He was bored sick!  We all laughed, I suppose because we'd all been there -- and even those with years of sobriety were still capable of feeling such boredom even now.

Since at this meeting we allow others to give us feedback during the meeting, this guy got some feedback based on what others had done when they found themselves in similar situations:  try taking up a commitment in one of your meetings just so that you're "a part of" and not just a passive observer in your own recovery....  be patient, don't drink and these periods will pass... when these feelings come, talk about it with your sponsor or, like he had just done, with other alcoholics...  try making a gratitude list and if that's difficult, read pages 416-420 of the Big Book.

I shared with him that when I hear someone complaining about being bored with their life, I ask them to tell me more about what they are doing with their days over a week or month's time.  Invariably, what I discover is that the reason they are feeling bored is that they are leading a boring life!  The cause of boredom is oftentimes BEING boring!  The definition of boring is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting the SAME results! 

Doing the same thing today for my sobriety that I did yesterday or last week or last year will not keep me sober today.  Thank God!

I'm all for structure and routine.  In fact, I'm probably obsessively just that!  But I regularly shake things up in my schedule and routine.  I try to go to different meetings, new meetings that I've never been to before.  I will sometimes leave the house with the intention of going to a 6:30am meeting (like I did today) and realize that I really don't want to go to that meeting today.  I'd rather go to work early and spend an hour blogging about something, anything!  Even boredom!  Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.  I sometimes do something just because it's uncomfortable or different.

I love my life.  It's rich.  Multi-colored.  Curvy and zig zaggedy.  Full of different and oftentimes contradictory feelings, moods and attitudes.  My life often doesn't go according to plan and, in retrospect, that's what makes it so rich and full.  And when the rare time comes where I find my life becoming boring, I know from experience that the ball's in my court.  Life isn't waiting to live me.

Take care!

Mike L.

Why Communal Prayer Seems Inappropriate Within AA Meetings

I was at a meeting Saturday morning when someone announced to the group that at the request of one of the members, the group was going to go through a group conscience process concerning a request by one of the members to change the meeting format such that the customary closing of the meeting would no longer include praying the Lord's Prayer and that we would begin using the Serenity Prayer instead.  Although the meeting was a Step meeting (and that week we were reading the 8th Step from the 12x12...), several people during the meeting shared their thoughts and opinions about the issue of the Lord's Prayer, most seemed against changing the format and gave various rationales for keeping things as they were. 

I wasn't surprised by the trend given my sense that AAs don't like change and the only thing they dislike more than change is controversy or differences of opinion.  In fact, my only surprise was my ability to not talk about this issue until towards the end of the meeting.  I have strong feelings about this issue.  Not just about the Lord's Prayer, but any communal prayer in the context of an AA meeting.  I think it's wrong. 

I think it causes harm, most particularly with the newcomer who hears one thing in our literature and format, but another thing quite the contrary in our actions.  In the literature, we tell the newcomer that they don't have to believe in God to get or stay sober, that it's a purely personal decision for them to investigate for themselves and that they were completely free to define their "higher power" in any way they chose.   Blah, blah, blah.  And then, at the end of most meetings, the leader stands up and asks us to join him in closing the meeting with the Lord's Prayer.  The people then stand, join hands in apparent solidarity and say this Christian prayer together.  So much for a higher power of our own understanding.

To be clear, I am not against prayer.  I pray frequently.  I often use other people's prayers as a jumping off point for my own prayer.  I memorize many prayers that I've found to express some deep resonating truth to me and recite them aloud as I drive to/from work---eventually modifying those prayers so that they become more "my" prayer and less someone else's prayer.  Communal prayer though seems appropriate only in a religious community where there is a shared or common faith.  Stealing such a communal prayer from any community, which is a strong AA tradition by the way!, seems a bad idea for AA (at least when we only steal prayers from one of the available religious traditions in the world).

The use of sectarian prayers, which includes the AA favorites of The Lord's Prayer, The Serenity Prayer and St. Francis (or Eleventh Step) Prayer, in an AA meeting expresses the reasonable interpretation or mistaken belief that we "in the circle and holding hands" are a part of that Christian or Judeo-Christian sect and that all our words, spoken or written to the contrary, were just meaningless words.

Am I going to bring about change in AA's long practice?  I doubt it -- at least nothing substantial or quick.  I share my thoughts on this inside issue whenever I think that I can be helpful, especially for someone who is new to this weird organization called AA.  I do it with a sense of humor and, as best I can, with humility.  Sometimes, I speak loudest by simply doing what I've done consistently for the last six or seven years: when a group is going about doing a communal prayer, I stand and join in the circle and I do nothing other than listen.  Sometimes I pray silently.  Sometimes I just observe others in the circle. 

Sometimes, especially during the Serenity Prayer, I join the others by inserting my own silent words inbetween theirs:  When they say, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change..." -- I say to myself:  "That would be you and much else out there!"  Then, when they continue with, "Courage to change the things I can..." -- I say to myself, "That would be me and my attitudes!"  And as they close with "And the wisdom to know the difference." -- I say to myself, "Yes, please!"

If the secretary asks me to take the group out with a prayer of my choice, I say the word "God?" with a question mark and then stop.  The group usually doesn't notice that I just asked a question or plea toward God and they assume that the prayer of my choice is the Serenity Prayer.  It isn't.  The prayer of my choice is the word God followed by a question mark.  That's it.

I believe one of AA's strongest and longest held traditions is the tradition of stealing prayers from other traditions and making them their own.  We've taken great liberties with massaging these prayers of others to suit our own circumstance.  I love people who when the Lord's Prayer is being prayed, change the word "name" to "names" -- those folks are aware of everything I've been saying in this blog tonite.  Bless them! 

I also noticed this last weekend when I was at my favorite Step Meeting that at the end of the chapter on Step 12, it closes with a different version of the Serenity Prayer than the one I hear prayed in AA meetings or placed on placards in meeting rooms.  The version of the Serenity Prayer in the 12x12 is sometimes referred to as "The We Version of the Serenity Prayer" -- it isn't prayed in the 1st person.  It's prayed together with others:  God grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change..."

Someday, I'll make a motion at a business meeting that we take that version of the Serenity Prayer and, with  a few changes, begin to use it to begin and close that meeting:  the motion would be to begin using the new AA version of the Serenity Prayer:

Higher Power grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change; courage to change the things we can; wisdom to know the difference and love to do the next kind thing.

Higher Power gives everyone the ability to address this prayer to whatever they have come to hold as their higher power: whether that be some sort of personal, localized God, or not.  It could mean a door knob.  It could be Truth.  It could be Not God.  It could be the group itself.  And, of course, this closing prayer would be purely optional to those who would like to participate.  Anyone should feel perfectly free to not participate without separating themselves from the group or from AA.

Of course, for me to do that, I'd have to attend a business meeting.  Not sure I'm that sober yet!  ;-}

Take care!

Mike L.

What's Not a Blessing?

At today's meeting, the chair suggested the topic of blessings --- in our recovery, what sort of blessings had we received as a result of our sobriety.  I never got called on, so I got to practice listening.  Everyone who shared talked of a wide array of blessings that they received since getting sober, most commented at least in passing on the blessing of sobriety itself and that certainly resonated within me. 

OK, I have to admit my listening during the meeting was frequently interrupted by memories.  I couldn't help remembering was the many things in my life which I never saw as gift or blessing when they were being experienced by me at the time.  It was only in retrospect, after getting sober, that I began to see the blessing in these supposed unfortunate or unfair circumstances in my life.  Of course, the greatest misfortune in my life was all the issues related to alcoholism: my father's alcoholism, my fear of becoming an alcoholic "like him", my son's addiction and his unknowing struggle to be just like me: a son who was not an addict like his father.

It was only after getting sober that I started looking at all these "wrongs" in a different manner and that's in large part due to a man named Earle.  Earle had gotten sober two days after I'd been born and by the time I got sober, he'd been sober for over 48 years.  Although he taught me many important lessons during the short 14 months I knew him before his death in January 2003, the greatest lessons involved learning to see myself as perfect, just as I am.  This was a message that was difficult for me to accept or even to hear.  It was seemingly inconsistent that much of the message I was hearing in the rooms of AA in my early months of recovery: the message which I heard being preached by many was that there was something terribly wrong with us and that sobriety involved not just "not drinking" but also cleaning house, being rid of defects of character and doing the right thing.  At least, that was the message that I was hearing --- probably because of my own self-hatred, guilt over what I'd done over the years and shame over the alcoholic I had become despite my fears to the contrary.

Earle seemed to speak a different and discordant language.  "Mike, you're perfect just the way you are!  You don't have to change anything!"  He seemed to know how much I wanted to be anything and to feel anything other than who I actually was and what I was actually feeling.  He would elicit from me what I was feeling at any one time, but didn't want to feel and certainly didn't want to talk about with him or anyone else.  Feelings scared the shit out of me.  I was highly sensitive, in large part because I had been without my self-prescribed medication for too long and the feelings were sensing open season on assaulting me and paying me back for years of repression and denial.

He'd ask me how things were going.  I'd try to evade him, but he was persistent beyond belief.  I'd try to appease him with a tidbit of what was going on, "Oh, I'm doing fine, thanks."   But he'd smile and say, "You wouldn't lie to an old man like me, would you?"  I'd be disarmed by his smile and laugh back and say, "Well, yes, I guess I would."  He'd laugh, and begin his gentle assault, "No, really.  How are you doing?"  I'd look up at the clock, praying that the meeting would begin soon -- but no such luck.  "Well, I'm feeling a little down I guess."

He looked like he was really listening to me.  But that obviously wasn't true, because once I was finished telling him how I was feeling, he'd ask me, "Well, what's wrong with that?"  What's wrong with feeling down?  Come on!!!  Down is not a good feeling and I deserved to feel better!  I'd been sober for two months and my reward was feeling down?  Where's the happy, joyous and freedom experience I'd been reading about?  I knew enough not to say all this to him, because he was clearly dangerous.  But he was persistent and wouldn't let me off the hook: "What's wrong with feeling down?"

I'd try to give him a few more morsels, just to tide him over until the beginning of the meeting: "Well, when I'm feeling down, I start getting depressed."  I'd give him a little more detail than that, but he was relentless.  When I'd run out of breath explaining why depression wasn't a good thing to be experiencing, he'd look at me with uncomfortable kindness and ask me again, "Well, what's wrong with feeling depressed?"

This guy was a licensed psychiatrist and a surgeon, and he didn't know what was wrong with depression?  It's an illness, for god's sake!  People go to doctors when they are depressed and I had no business being depressed.  I needed to stay sober and I wasn't going to be able to do that if I kept feeling so damned depressed!  I know, I was sitting there with such a doctor and telling him about my depression certainly didn't seem to be helping.  He just didn't seem to understand.  Ultimately, I resorted to my own scare tactics as an attempt to get him off my frustrated back and said, "You know Earle, if I keep feeling all these feelings of saddness, anger, depression, remorse, etc. -- I'm going to start wanting to drink again!"  I mistakenly thought that would shut him up and put him back in his place and far away from me.

He only smiled again and countered my evasive maneuver with, "Well, what would be wrong with that?"  Earle died before the truth of his lesson really sunk down to the core of my being.  It took a long time before the habit of distrusting and manipulating feelings began to dissolve and to be replaced by a general attitude of acceptance for whatever feeling I happened to be feeling at any particular time.

So as I listened to people's stories of supposed "good" things that had happened to them since getting sober, I couldn't help but think of Earle and I silently began compiling a list of the hidden blessings in my life that were once seen as bad or wrong: 

• my alcoholism
• my feelings
• my body
• my past and present
• death
• pain
• suffering
• my wrongs
• my mistakes
• my ignorance
• my confusion
• my uncertainty

All blessings without exception.  And when something strikes me sideways, I may not see it as blessing right away.  But I am more likely as not to eventually hear Earle's voice asking, "Well, Mike, what's wrong with that?"  Sure, I can fence around with him trying once again to evade the master.  But I inevitably end up smiling and laughing with Earle as I let him know that there's simply nothing wrong with anything in my life.  It truly is perfect just as it is.  I don't need to change a single thing.  Including the desire to change...

Take care!

Mike L.

A Quick Check-in

It's been over a month since I've posted a blog here and now as I try to get back into the groove of writing, I'm facing some sort of writer's block as I try to dip my toe back into the water.  I've got two blogs that I've been drafting but neither seems ready for publishing.  One I'll probably never post as it was done more for personal chewing through of a difficult time I was having with my wife.  It turned into something I've never really done: a fourth step with a fourth column. 

Somehow in the writing process, I ended up understanding my need to see my part in what was going on and -- all of a sudden -- her part became irrelevant.  And then everything became clear to me in terms of why I had done what I had done --- and before moving forward to make an amends with her, I spent time having some compassion/forgiveness for myself.  I'm awfully hard on myself --- and it's not helpful to be unkind, even toward one's self.

I've had titles for interesting blogs float past my mind over the past couple of weeks, but I've just not had the time to sit down and write.  They were great titles --- wish I could remember them.

I've been struggling to find some balance in all the various aspects of my life, both in terms of recovery and family/work.  Overall, I think I'm doing well --- but the blog writing has taken a real hit in terms of consistent effort and action.  Someone once told me that balance isn't a state of being, but rather, it's a brief moment in time that we pass by as we swing from one extreme to another.  The swing has slowed down much in the past eight years --- but I still seem to drift back and forth.  Guess it's better than the alternative!

I will commit to writing more in the next week.  My wife's out of town for a couple of days beginning tomorrow, so I should be able to get something out.  I tend to binge on meetings when she's away, plus have time to be with friends/sponsees and just talk about whatever.  Plus my honey-do list.

Take care!

Mike L.

The Pre-Requisites of Willingness

I've been going through something of writer's block recently.  Felt that I had sort of said everything I had to say.  That everytime I sat down to write, there was an eery feeling that I'd already told that story.  I took a break I suppose so that I could come up with some new stories.

The other night the speaker asked us to talk about willingness because she was at a point in her life where she was unwilling to be willing.  And that frightened her.

Whenever willingness is the topic, I always remember a woman who was new to the area and had just been asked to chair a meeting at the last moment.  I was probably two years sober at the time.  During her chair, she said that her favorite quote in recovery was a line that she had stolen from her sponsor in Santa Cruz.  The sponsor had often said that "she got sober at the corner of Grace and Willingness."  I was immediately struck at how beautiful that line was.  I went up to her after the meeting and asked her to chair a meeting for me in several weeks.  She was glad to.  She was trying to get to as many different meetings as possible now that she was in this new area with no friends or connections.

Between that night and the day she was to chair for me, I kept going back over the line she'd stolen from her sponsor and while I really understood the beauty of that description of where her sponsor had gotten sober, I knew that I hadn't gotten sober on that same corner.  Grace was right on: when I got sober, it was pure gift.  I'd done nothing at all to achieve the sobriety I achieved the morning of October 20th in the year 2001.  The night before, I'd taken my son to one of his 12 Step meetings (he was 15 and had 5 months and 10 days sober...) and then hid myself away in a local bar to have what became, to date, my last two drinks.  Two goblet sized gin martinis.  When I left the bar, I didn't feel drunk but was probably over the legal limit.  I went to pickup my son after his meeting.  He smelled the liquor and asked me if I'd been drinking.  I lied.  He let it go.

I'd wanted to tell him the truth.  But had I done that, I would have had to stop drinking.  Or at least go through the public motions of trying to stop drinking, while knowing in my heart of hearts that it simply wasn't possible.  So I lied.  We went home.  Chatted about what the meeting had been like.  I went in the house, told my wife that I was very tired and was going straight to bed.  I was very tired.  I'd been hiding my drinking for over 10 months and it was horrible.  I was lonely, isolated.  Controlling my drinking was very draining!  Around people all day---but connecting with no one.

The following morning, I woke up at 6am with the clearest of all true thoughts: "I can't stop drinking."  A thought I'd woken up to many, many times before over the previous 30 years.  More and more frequently as the years and the disease progressed.  And then the miracle happened with another thought, "Not being able to stop drinking is called Alcoholism--and alcoholism is a disease that I just happened to have."  Within a nanosecond, a third thought followed: "That's OK -- I can do what Pat (my son) had been doing."  And then I saw myself sitting in a circle of folks and when my turn came to check-in (it was one of the weekly multi-family group sessions at my son's recovery treatment center), I saw myself raise my hand and say, "My name is Mike and I'm an alcoholic."  The obsession I'd been living under for years left me with that disclosure to non-existent people.

Well, that moment was certainly one of Grace.  Grace was surely one of the streets which intersected my moment of recovery.  But was that a moment of Willingness?  Not really.  It was something else and I just couldn't think of what else other than grace brought about my sobriety.  What was the other street.  I thought about that for several weeks and it didn't get resolved until the morning I woke up to go secretary the Sunday Step meeting at the Lafayette Hut, the meeting where the line thieving sponsee was going chair for me.  That morning I realized where I got sober and I was feeling like I was going to explode inside until I could share my truth with the woman chairing for me that morning.

When she walked into the meeting, she walked over to sit in what I sometimes call the most uncomfortable chair in an AA meeting.  When she sat down, I welcomed her to the Hut -- and then leaned over to tell her that for several weeks I had been trying to figure out "where" had I had gotten sober.  She looked puzzled (as people often do when I'm talking to them!) and I reminded her about her favorite line and told her that while I loved the line as much as she did, I knew that that was not where I got sober.  I didn't get sober at Grace and Willingness.  She smiled and asked me, "Well, where did you get sober?"

I got sober at the corner of Grace and Hopelessness, about a half block down from Grace and Willingness.  What happened that morning for me was a moment of grace which occurred only because I had reached a point of utter hopelessness in terms of my ability to stop drinking.  What happened that morning is I gave up on "my" attempt to stop drinking.  And I began a new approach at life.  I began trying to stay sober that day.  That is what I had seen my son do for over ten months --- and he'd done it "poorly" at first, not being able to stay clean for more than 5 to 10 days for several months.  But then, something clicked for him in May 2001 --- not sure what streets intersected at his moment of clarity -- and he's been clean for almost nine years now.  That morning I knew that the solution was in doing what he had been doing: going to meetings, raising my hand, steps, talking/listening with other addicts/alcoholics, getting up when we fell down, telling the truth.

So what then are the pre-requisites of Willingness?  There are at least three:

First, willingness only comes into play when we are confronted by something that we really don't want to do.  Willingness isn't necessary for me to eat a piece of chocolate cake!  Willingness is only required when there is unwillingness.

Second, willingness presents itself only when one is experiencing a certain level of pain or suffering.  Unwillingness is a pleasant place to be: pain is the only thing that pushes us out of that state of unwillingness.

Third, willingness --- at least for me --- came only when I came to believe that the Impossible was in fact Possible.  That morning, I discovered that sobriety, one day at a time, was possible.  No guarantees for life, but at least sobriety was possible for me that day.  Tomorrow?  I'd deal with that when it came.  That morning, I realized that Pat had done what I had considered impossible.  He'd gotten sober and his life was changing.  Since then, I have seen many others who were like me: people who simply couldn't get sober.  People who couldn't stop drinking.  That morning, I accepted that I couldn't stop---but I could stay sober.

A moment of Hopelessness transformed by Grace into Willingness.

Take care!

Mike L.