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.

Dealing with Death

At last night's meeting, the chairperson talked through some grief he was feeling overwhelmed by...  Apparently, his first sponsor from years back had died this week. He said that this guy had saved his ass many years ago when he was working as a counselor in the treatment facility the chairperson had gone to when he began getting sober. He paused and with tears leaking out of his eyes, shared with us that he had come to love this man and missed him greatly now.

Everyone became reverent in the presence of this gut wrenching emotional experience. When he finished telling his story, he asked us to talk about how--in sobriety--we had dealt with the death of a loved one.

I shared how I too had been helped by such a man when I got sober. It was a man that had gotten sober two days before I was born and who had died some 14 months after I had gotten sober. I spent a lot of time with this man, particularly in the last five months of his life.  Regularly, for three hour periods of time in the early mornings, two to three times a week. When I was with him those mornings, we didn't talk much then even though he would wake while I was there for short periods of time. Usually, he'd ask me how I was doing, how my wife and I were doing, how my son was doing in his recovery. I'd help him pee into a bottle. I would call the nurse if he pooped.  I would hold his hand when his body would some times shake with seemingly unbearable pain.  Once, I thought he was going to break my hand.  When that particular spell was over, I asked Earle if he was OK.  He looked at me with one of his patented smiles and said, "Well, for awhile there I was in a lot of pain.  But it's gone now."

I was holding his right hand the night he died. His daughter was holding the other. They were gnarly old arthritic hands.  None of the fingers could straighten out.  I think they were both molded into the shape of his hands grabbing onto the hands of newcomers.  His hands would always drift over to the newcomer's hands: welcoming them, giving them hope that it was indeed possible to stay sober.

I wasn't scheduled to be with him that night. But through a series of mishaps and tardiness, I went over to see Earle that night because there was absolutely nothing working for me that night and I knew being with him, if only for a few minutes, would make everything right. And it was.

I often say that I have three sponsors, two of them are alive and I talk to the dead one more than the live ones. People think I'm joking. I'm not. Earle exists in some sort of virtualized form within and without me. Most of my life struggles and subsequent awakenings are influenced greatly by what comes from his virtualized presence. Suppose it may be just a memory, but it seems far more.

I then shared that I used to watch a TV show called The Twilight Zone where the stories always involved the writer taking a human fantasy/hope that we all seem to have at times which are basically rooted in the belief that "if only such and such" would happen, then everything would be right for us in our world. If only everyone were like me.... If only people would just tell the truth... If only people didn't die.... The storyline would then live out that fantasy and demonstrate the falseness of our dream. The truth was always that our world would be Hell if we got our wishes.

What would life be without death? Ultimately, I think that life would then be devoid of all meaning and of all beauty and of all love and of all true joy. There is no such thing as life without death. Thank God.  Earle taught me that before, during and after his own death.  I encouraged the chair not to run from this experience.  To grieve.  To love.  To remember.  To share.  To cry.  To laugh.  Most especially, to listen within.

Take care!

Mike L.

The Habit of Making a Gratitude List: Advanced Version

I know many in AA who have found benefit by routinely making list of things in their life for which they feel grateful. It seems to help overcome a natural tendency many recovering alcoholics have toward self-pity and poor poor me attitudes, particularly when we're still beset with cravings for outside solutions to inside problems.

Writing down the good things in our lives helps us keep the so-called bad things in perspective and right-sized. I remember sharing this conventional AA wisdom with Dr. Earle sometime in my first couple of months of sobriety. I'd already learned to cherish this old man's unconventional views on what seemed to being pitched by many as the "right way" to do AA. At the time, I wasn't yet comfortable or confident in my own sometime dissonant views of recovery or of AA and listening to this particular old man, who'd taken his last drink two days before I was born (6/15/1953), was something I could never get enough of....

I'd expected Earle to poo-poo the idea of making gratitude lists, but he surprised me. I thought he'd downplay the practice because it seemed to me to be yet another subtle attempt by AAs to change their feelings because they were 'bad' and/or to artificially bring about the experience of so-called 'good' feelings.

While he nodded in agreement with these concerns of mine, it didn't deter him from finding potential benefit in the practice or exercise of making gratitude lists. He simply said that many people in AA had found great benefit in that routine practice. That seemed enough for him, but I suspected there was more to it.

Though he's long gone now (he died in January 2003 when I was almost 14 months sober...), I've been thinking about him recently and how what I learned from him might help me develop a new version or method in writing a gratitude list. One that might avoid the suspect path of trying to be or feel something other than was we are or what we feel. I'm confident Earle would like this new way of making a gratitude list, so I will dedicate it to him now and assume his blessing.

The basic idea is to make two lists: the first is the typical gratitude list of things for which was are grateful: things like being sober, being in relationships that are nurturing, having a job, having a friend, being alive, being healthy, etc. These are all things that we "feel" grateful for, things that we see good in. Things that we are thankful for. For our ability to love, to be kind, to be honest, to be forgiving, to be compassionate.

When that list is as long as you can make it, then start a second list of all the things that you don't feel grateful for, that you resent, that you regret, that make you sad. Things you grieve over. Things you wish hadn't happened in the past or things that you wish weren't happening now. For example, some alcoholics wish that they weren't alcoholics. If that's one of your regrets, write it down. It's ok, no one's looking. It's your list. Other regrets might be things that you might have said or done in the past which might have hurt you or others. Things which no amends seem to wipe from your memory. Memories of actions or deeds which make us wince now. The death of someone you loved (or hated). Let loose! Give yourself permission to remember (remember means to put the pieces of a human being back together: to re-member one whose had their members removed) back to all those "bad" things in our past or in our current experience. You might be without a job right now. You might have just ended a special relationship. If you don't have true gratitude for it, write it down. Think of the most annoying flaws in the person you love the most in the world: things you've been wanting them to change since the very beginning of your relationship.

The next step to the process takes time and is going to be different for each person. The next task is to become aware of the fact that nothing in our first list would be possible were it not for each of the things in the second list. In my experience, there are direct links between each of the items in my "bad" regrets list and each of the items in my "good" things list. The fact that I'm sober, which means everything to me now, would mean nothing were it not for the fact that I was a drunk and that I did every stupid and shameful act that I did when I was drinking or when I was "dry".

The sadness that I have over the fact that my father died of alcoholism years before I got sober, was the very foundation of the joy I felt when I sat across from my son and told him that while he had been getting clean and sober for the last year, I had been drinking on a daily basis and that I finally understood that I was an alcoholic and that I was going to try and do what my son had been doing successfully for five months: try to stay sober one day at a time. The joy when he smiled back at me and said, "Gee, Dad, that's great! We're BOTH addicts!" --- would simply not have been there were it not grounded in the knowledge of my own father's addiction and ultimate death due to this disease. His death wasn't a failure, it was a consequence. And one other consequence from his death was that I knew in my heart what laid before me if I continued doing what I was doing.

My wife's overly critical eye has been the bane of my existence since shortly after we got married over 28 years ago. It's only recently (by means of this gratitude process...) that I've been able to see that part of what annoys me about her critical eye is that she has pretty damn good eye sight! That is, much of her criticism of me is right on the money. Part of what I don't always understand about her is that she most likely saves her most harsh criticism not for me, but for herself. She beats herself relentlessly, although quietly and to herself alone. In comparison, her criticism of me is mild and gentle. To be honest with myself, much that I have accomplished and improved in my life is a direct result of her assistance and guidance. I'm basically a slug.

For me, the benefit of this two step process in making a Gratitude List is that gradually the items in these separate lists begin to meld together into one list. All is Good. Everything is perfect, just they way it is, has been and will be.

One day when Earle and I were waiting for the meeting to begin, he asked me how I was doing. I was only a few months sober --- so I lied: I told him that I was doing fine. He laughed and said to me, "You wouldn't lie to an old man like me, would you?" I smiled and answered, "Well, apparently I would!" I told him that I was regretting the fact that it took me so long to get sober and that I'd caused a lot of harm and hurt along the way, in particular with my wife and kids.

He nodded with sympathy and then told me that "Were it not for every single drink that you took in your life, every single drunk, every single stupid and hurtful thing that you did while drunk or sober....you would not be sitting here right now. And, were it not for every single drink that I (Earle) took in my life, every single drunk, every single stupid and hurtful thing that I did while drunk or sober in my life....I would not be sitting here right now. So if all of that hadn't happened in each of our lives, neither of us would have come to be right here, right now. And if that's true, then how can any of what has happened to either of us be bad?"

The meeting then began and my life had changed once again.

Take care!

Mike L.

Powerlessness Is Not a Problem, Now or Then

The 6 year anniversary of Dr. Earle's death (1/13/2003) was last week and I've been thinking about him even more than usual.... One of the things Earle told me when I was early in sobriety was that all of the Twelve Steps could be condensed or summarized into one single word: Powerlessness. While the word powerless is clearly contained within the 1st Step, he felt that it was not a temporary or limited state of being and as a result, he found it important to remember this state of powerlessness in each of the remaining 11 steps. He said all this to me during a Thursday night meeting at the Lafayette Hut and he then began reciting the remaining 11 Steps and he prefaced each step with the phrase, "Out of our powerlessness...."

Step 2: Out of our powerlessness, we came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity....

Step 3: Out of our powerlessness, we made a decision to turn our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him....

etc. (FYI: I've found it very helpful and powerful to recite the Twelve Steps in this modified format!)

Between now and then, I've been struck at how many recovering alcoholics seem to portray "powerlessness" as a problem that needs to be overcome or solved. In the Big Book, when it says, "Lack of power! That was our dilemma. We needed to find a power greater than ourselves by which to live and that power had to be greater than ourselves. Obviously.

To be honest, the truth of that has never been 'obvious' to me. Seems like most people translate that claim to read, "Lack of power! That was our Problem. And to solve that problem, we needed to find a power greater than ourselves by which to live and that power had to be greater than ourselves." Personally, I don't see powerlessness as a problem or as something "wrong."

When I say that I am powerless over alcohol, I no longer look at this in terms of what I can't "do". I see it more in terms of who I am. My body is different from non-alcoholics not in terms of what I can't do, but in terms of how it processes alcohol and other mind-altering drugs. That physical condition is not something I have any power over. It's just the way I am. Although I've only been sober a little over 7 years, I've had this physical condition for many years.

Is that a problem? Not really. The "condition" isn't really the problem. My problem was that I was trying to figure out a way whereby I could "act" as though I didn't have this condition. That is, I tried to act "non-alcoholically" when I drank.

I thought that I was quite successful at this for many years, but I always experienced "incidents" where I failed miserably: I would start drinking just like every other time, but I would reach that Perfect Moment when all the stars in the universe aligned with me....and then I would forget to stop drinking. Next thing I would know, I'd wake up, sick and having vomited all over myself, not remembering what I'd done or said (no problem: my wife would remember!) and feel all sorts of guilt and shame for having done exactly what I didn't want to do. These incidents started off rather sporadic and gradual....but over the years, they seemed to increase in frequency and severity. As it says in "More About Alcoholism": I was in the grip of a progressive illness. Over any considerable period of time, it got worse.

What I'm trying to say though that my problem wasn't with these "incidents" --- my problem was that I was drinking and my body was alcoholic. When I woke up the morning of October 21, 2001 and realized for the first time ever that my inability to stop drinking was simply a disease called "alcoholism" and that I just happened to have that disease....then I was free. The solution to this problem (trying not to be who I was trying to be: a drinking non-alcoholic...) was to accept who I really was: a recovering alcoholic.

The solution was not just "not-drinking" as that would have just postponed the inevitable pain and suffering. The solution had to be a program of recovery and I found that in AA. My problem wasn't Powerlessness (if so, I'd still be screwed!). My problem was the ongoing attempts to ignore the fact of who I am as an alcoholic.

Suppose that's why I've never been all that motivated to develop definite belief/understanding of God.... It isn't really something I need to do, at least in terms of my recovery. Why create a solution for something that's not a problem?

Take care!

Mike L.

p.s. Note to Self: I need to write another blog on the topic of "God is Powerless Too! (and how that's not a problem for God either!)

You Are Perfect, Just the Way You Are...

This is what Earle, my first real sponsor--grandsponsor to be more accurate--used to repeat me me and others again and again and again. He would phrase it differently and sometimes, it would simply be hidden in one of his stories... Much of what Earle tried to pass on related to this one simple truth: there was simply nothing wrong with me. I was perfect just as I was. I didn't need to change anything. Period.

Truthfully, I didn't believe him for a minute. There was much wrong with me, both now and all through my past. How could a disease be present in a perfect flawless person? A disease was "wrong" -- things weren't right when someone was sick. I tried to ignore Earle and there was much being said in meetings that seemed to support my strong suspicion that Earle was simply delusional and off on some well intentioned philosophical tangent. Seemed like many in AA were saying there was much wrong with us alcoholics and that these flaws all led to our drinking and were the underlying cause of our illness. We were, doesn't it say oftentimes in the Big Book, selfish and selfseeking and these were at the root of our drinking and our alcoholism. And, surely, if we didn't combat such flaws with all our might and willpower, we'd surely drink again. I mean weren't the Steps specifically designed to change us into something better than we were before we worked them?

But he was a stubborn old man and didn't seem to have any qualms about telling such folks that they were wrong --in fact, perfectly wrong! -- about believing that we were flawed and/or defective. We were perfect and if we'd just accept that truth, we'd find peace. And if we didn't find peace, well, that was just perfectly OK too.

Step 1 didn't pinpoint a defect in me when I acknowledged my powerlessness of alcohol: there's nothing wrong with being powerless over alcohol. It's simply just the way we alcoholics are. It's not a flaw, it's a condition. A fact. True, many of us learned to be ashamed and/or guilty about the growing suspicion that we were alcoholics...but we've all learned things that were simply not true.

Step 2 didn't say there was anything wrong with our hopelessness and insanity, it showed a way out of such hopelessness. Were it not for such hopelessness, we simply couldn't ever have achieved or experienced hope!

Step 3 did not say that we were less or bad before we placed our trust in something greater than ourselves. We did then what we knew how to do....when we knew better, we did better (thanks Maya Angelou!).

Step 4 did not say that we should do an "immoral" inventory, it said a moral inventory: inclusive of all that was. Nothing more than an honest appraisal of everything, so-called good and so-called bad. Were it not for all of it, we'd not be were we were now: and now was simply just the perfect place to be!

Step 5 didn't encourage us to disclose this moral inventory to another so that the other could confirm how wrong we were, quite the opposite: the sharing of the inventory was clearly intended as a mechanism where we could experience the full acceptance and love of another human being. They were there to listen without judgment or condemnation. We would hopefully walk away from that experience feeling that we were no longer alone, isolated...in self -constructed prisons.

Step 6 encouraged us to let go of the false idea that there was anything truly wrong with us. We should let go of such ideas and let them drift away with or without anyone's involvement. They'd served their purpose and we were done with them. Or, they'd not yet served their purpose and we weren't done with them. Or there was really no "purpose" to them at all. They'd helped us be more compassionate, loving, forgiving, tender, kind. Or they would.

Step 7 requires an attitude of humility: an attitude of openness to learning. "One is humble when one is willing to learn" Earle would often say. For me, the humility in this step involved being open to learning the full value and goodness of all that was part of me, without exception. If I'd ever characterize some part of me as "bad" or unacceptable, Earle would ask me, "Mike, what's wrong with that?" I'd try to answer as clearly and as honestly as I could, but he'd simply repeat the question again, "Well, what's wrong with that?" The more years I'm sober, the more I understand that the ultimate answer to that question is simply, there's nothing wrong with that. It's perfect.

Step 8 helped us acknowledge and list the harms we'd done others over the course of our lives and to become willing to go about mending what we'd broken or harmed in our relationships with others. We'd grown tired of loneliness and wanted to reconnect with others.

Step 9 was simply the beginning of a never ending process of reconnecting with others and rebuilding a full and vibrant human life. A new way of life.

Steps 10 thru 12 were a daily and ongoing process of transforming and growing as human beings.... "We are human be_ngs, not human was_ings" I heard someone say once in a meeting. We were rejoining the human race after a painful bout of self-hatred and denial about who we were. We found freedom by sharing what we'd been given with others who suffer from the same dis-ease that we have.


Since Earle's death, I've come across many wise words from others who seemed to believe just as Earle did....

You are perfect just the way you are. With all your flaws and
problems, there is no need to change anything. The only thing you need
to change is the thought that you have to change! (Zen saying)

Watch the catepillar become a butterfly! Does it not transform? Why then do we think that we're responsible for changing ourselves? (Zen saying)

Put this program into action a thousand times: 1. Identify the negative feelings in you; 2. Realize that these feelings are in you, not in the world, not a part of external reality; 3. Know that these feelings are not an essential part of “I”, these things come and go; 4. Realize that when you change, everything changes! [Note: in the next chapter he goes on to say that by these statements, he does not mean to say that we have to change anything!] (Anthony DeMello, Awakening)

Change? Don't worry! It's simply not an option! (me)

Knowing how to end a story...

Someone (Ernest Kurtz I believe...) once wrote that there are two parts to recovery: the story telling part and the story listening part....and the only reason alcoholics are willing to sit and listen to someone else's story is that they know that one day they are going to get to tell their story.

Today I've been doing a little unpublicized AA marathon... My wife's away for about a week and I've used this time to go to some extra meetings and just today I've heard four different stories. Three of them filled my heart with hope and the fourth made my stomach ache and blood pressure almost pop a vein (once I calm down over that share, I might post more about that one!)

Today, I also had the blessing of an AA friend giving me a copy of a short story that he'd spent months crafting and I was touched that trusted me with reading it. He was quite proud of the work he'd done and had received some very positive reviews of it by some close friends. I waited until all my chores were done this afternoon and then I took the short story out to my hammock in the back yard and devoted myself to my friend's story telling.

The story was powerfully and artfully written but it's ending was one of those that make some people --including me--quite angry because it didn't end with all the loose ends tied up and all the details neatly concluded. For the remainder of the day, I tried to figure out if I really liked the story even with the ending as he chose to tell it. Most of the time I thought there was something missing from the ending and that I just needed to figure out how he could fix it.

But then the way home from the meeting tonight, I began to think back to several stories told to me by two of my sponsors over the last six years and I began to realize that they too ended their stories in a way very very (annoyingly!) similar to my friend's short story. And trust me, my sponsor's are all great storytellers! Tonight, I realized that what made all three of them great storytellers is that they knew when and how to end the story.

I heard Earle tell the story of his last drink so often that I felt as though I was there. Toward the end of a long Saturday of drinking a huge amount of alcohol, he was preparing to barbecue steaks out in the back of his house and as he was walking up the steps to his barbecue, he looked down at the half empty glass in his hand and realized that he should go back and refill the glass before continuing up the steps. As he was turning around, he heard a voice saying "That's your last drink."

That was the end of the story of his last drink and the beginning of his sobriety story, which by the way, happened on June 15, 1953--two days before I was born. I didn't realize until after Earle was dead that the story ended without some important details. That is, his "last drink" story didn't explain whether he finished that "last" drink! I mean, did he just put it down and/or throw it away and stay sober for the next 49 years of his life? Did he finish it off? Either way, it still would have been the last drink! Enquiring minds want to know things like this!

I'm so glad that he was dead before these stupid questions floated to the surface of my consciousness! I really don't need to know the answer to questions like that. Which is why I think that particular story was so effective and powerful. He knew when to stop his storytelling and let the story have the power it had without needless embellishment or distraction.

Another one of my sponsors, a sponsee of Earle's who was like a son to Earle for many years, once told me a story about one day when he was a couple of years sober: Dave was a lawyer and had some sort of brief or pleading that needed to be drafted and filed with the court by the end of the week. For some reason, this particular task was something that he just couldn't bring himself to complete. He put the file on his guest chair at the beginning of the week so as to keep reminding himself that it had to be done by the end of the week. But he just didn't want to do it. And it just sat there. Waiting.

As the end of the week was quickly approaching and the task still undone, he called Earle and explained his dilemma: he had to do this brief but he didn't want to do it! Earle's reply was, "So you have to do the brief before Friday?" Dave responded, "Yes!" Earle then advised, "Well, then do it!" And then Dave explained that the problem was that he didn't want to write this brief! And then Earle responded, "Well, then don't do it!" To which an exasperated Dave responded, "But it has to be done by the end of the day Friday! Tomorrow!"

Earle paused while Dave almost exploded with frustration over this old man's total incapacity to actually listen to the facts as presented (here I'm sympathetic because both Earle and Dave have brought about the same level of extreme frustration in me with their question/answer techniques from Hell...) and then said to Dave, "Well, then do it!" I honestly can't remember where this back and forth ended because I stopped listening well before the expected "ending" because I already knew the point of the story. [No, I'm not going to tell you!]

It was only tonight that I realized that I never learned if Dave did or didn't write the god damned brief! And I realized tonight that the story was great because Dave knew when to stop the storytelling and let the story take a life of its own.

My friend Doug has joined the ranks of some truly great storytellers. He's learned how to end a story in time.

Mike L.

Will AA ever come to mean "Addicts Anonymous"?

Dr. Earle once wrote that he believed that some day, not sure how far off in the future he was thinking, but that one day AA would come to mean "Addicts Anonymous" instead of Alcoholics Anonymous. Knowing both the author of that statement and the context of this statement, I know that this prediction was one of hope rather than regret or disappointment. He thought that not only was it an inevitable evolution, it was a desirable one.

FYI: If you'd like to express your opinion via a "Poll", I've set one up over to the right side of this blog... You've got four options: Yes (and it's good or bad) and No (and it's good or bad). You're also free to express your comments on this topic by clicking on the, that's right, the "Comments" link at the bottom of the post....

Personally (and everything thing here is personally!), I agree with this sentiment or view.

While I am one of the few AAs I know with 6 years sobriety who "only" abused alcohol and not other drugs, I have no question that my disease is one that applies to any mind altering substance.

I suspect that while some members of AA have the desire to keep AA "pure" and separate from NA, I strongly suspect that all of them would not like to have a member of AA secretarying or chairing a meeting of AA while admitting that they actively use and abuse pot, heroin or some other drug. By the way, when I say "other drug" I do that consciously to indicate that alcohol "is" a drug. In that regard, I like NA literature's declaration that alcohol is a drug and that they don't particularly care what drug an addict uses or is addicted to, a drug is a drug.

Around here where I go to meetings, it appears by people's talk and their non-reaction to people expressing the reality of those "other" (not alcohol) drugs in their stories or shares, but I suspect most would try to "toe the line" if forced to give an opinion about how AA should evolve on this issue. There'd be immediate references to "singleness of purpose" (dealing with addiction is good for me) and/or "primary purpose" (which always makes me wonder what AA's secondary purpose is....and why can't it be the broader scope of "addiction" rather than just the single and narrow scope of alcoholic addiction?) and it would eventually degenerate into a never ending argument.

Which is why I think we're just in the initial and necessary stage of this inevitable evolution of this disorganized organization.

Anyway, I was feeling a little bored and thought this post might generate some thinking...

Take care.

Mike

Importance of Humilty in the Recovery Process

The topic of humility has been coming up in meetings recently and today I just heard a great chair by a guy who I've watched getting sober over the last couple of years. While he started off his chair (what some people refer to a lead...he told his story, whatever you call it) today, he said that he didn't feel like he had much to say because he had only a relatively short time continuously sober. He closed his chair by saying that he didn't really know what, if anything, he was doing differently this time in his sobriety, but whatever it was, it seemed to be working.

After the meeting, I went up and told him that I did notice something different in his demeanor today that I hadn't seen before. And that was a deep sense of humility.

A couple of years ago, I was reading a biography of Sr. Ignatia, who was a Catholic nun and early friend to Dr. Bob Smith and Bill Wilson. She was working in an Akron hospital, I think where Dr. Bob had some sort of privileges and where he and Bill started making early attempts to find other drunks to help. Sr. Ignatia, while not an alcoholic, saw something in what these two men were doing and it became her mission in life to help them out. She surrepticiously began redirecting incoming patients who displayed symptoms of alcoholism to special rooms in the hospital and then helped Dr. Bob and other early AAers approach these folks and attempt to help them if that was their wish.

Anyway, as to humility, Sr. Ignatia was transferred away from this hospital at some point (apparently, her religious superiors didn't like the idea of a nun hanging around a bunch of drunks, Doctors or not). Well, she ended up keeping contact with Dr. Bob and continued to help alcoholics connect up with other alcoholics.

Before his death, Dr. Bob gave Sr. Ignatia a little plaque which she kept on her desk for the remainder of her life. The plaque was entitled, "Humility" and Dr. Bob inscribed it something along the lines of "any alcoholic who acquired this sort of humility would do well in their sobriety."

Humility is perpetual quietness of heart.

It is to have no trouble.

It is never to be fretted or vexed, irritable or sure.
To wonder at nothing done to me;

to feel nothing done against me.

It is to be at rest when no one praises me.

And when I am blamed or despised,

it is to have a blessed home in myself

where I can go in a shut the door

and kneel to my father in secret

and be at peace.

As in a deep sea of calmness

where all around and about me

there is seeming trouble.

Dr. Earle once told me that in his mind, humility wasn't a thing to be possessed once and for all. It was more like a moment in time where we became willing to learn. I used to wonder what the difference was between "humility" and "humiliation" and in terms of what Earle said, I eventually came to believe that humiliation happened at those times in our life where we simply couldn't pretend anymore about who we were or what we had become and we fell flat on our face in the ground of our truth. They both have their root in the Greek (?) word "humus" the ground from which human beings were supposedly fashioned.

For many, humility comes about subsequent to humiliation. Whatever. Both can lead to a better understanding of ourselves and what we have become.

Humility is what I heard in Jeremy's story today. I heard a man who was willing to learn more about who he was, both as a alcoholic and as a man. I pray that he doesn't forget what he's been lucky to learn.

Mike L.

Gratitude and Resentment: Not Feelings

I sometimes notice that in meetings there are times that certain topics for discussion begin floating from one meeting to another. Sort of cross-pollination. In the last couple of weeks, the topic that's floating around here, both in the Contra Costa county area where I live, but also in Sacramento where I work, is the topic of Gratitude.

When I first got sober in October 2001, I remember that during the month of November the topic was often Gratitude. While I was glad to have had the obsession and the actual act of drinking leave me the month earlier (two days before my first AA meeting...), I wouldn't characterize myself as grateful. In fact, those that described themselves as "grateful alcoholics" sort of bothered me. What was there to be grateful about? Sure, I was sober----but I wasn't able to drink and for some strange reason I missed that. I missed what was clearly a miserable way of life. Strange.

By the time my second sober November came around, the topic of Gratitude started being bantered about and I think I started harboring something of a resentment for this unofficial AA tradition of focusing on the Thanksgiving-like theme of Gratitude during the month of November. That's when I learned an important truth about both Gratitude and Resentment. Neither were feelings.

When I was newly sober, my feelings were all over the map and I was, to say the least, quite uncomfortable with them. All of them. Good (sense of peace, calm, joy, happiness, love, affection, etc.) and Bad (anger, fear, jealousy, hatred, anger, depression, anger, etc.). None of them were the way they "should" be: if they were "good" they weren't good enough or they didn't last long enough. If they were "bad" they were too bad and lasted waaaaay too long.

Within a short time, I met Dr. Earle who'd gotten sober two days before I was born. He'd gotten sober on June 15, 1953 and I was born June 17, 1953. When I met him, I was 48 years old and two months sober; he was 48 years and five months sober. One of the first things I learned from Earle was that there was nothing good or bad about feelings: they just were. Actually, I don't think I learned this from Earle. He certainly tried to teach me this truth of his, but I wasn't buying any of it. Learning took some time.

Earle would some times come into a meeting and gently put his gnarly old hand on my shoulder and ask, "How are you doing, Mike?" I'd respond as I thought one should in public, "Fine." He'd then look at me with a knowing smile and say, "You wouldn't lie to an old man like me, would you?" and then he'd sit down next to me and we'd chat before the meeting. I can't tell you how much I miss those chats. Especially today as tomorrow will be the 5th anniversary of his death.

When I eventually became comfortable enough sharing some of the truth about my feelings with this old man, we would sometimes get into a back and forth routine along the lines of the following: What are you feeling? A little depressed I suppose. What's wrong with that? Well, I don't like feeling depressed. What's wrong with that? It's depressing! What's wrong with that? I start to feel sad. What's wrong with that? It hurts. What's wrong with that? I start to get angry. What's wrong with that? I don't like being angry. What's wrong with that? It's uncomfortable! What's wrong with that?

Now, that would go on and on until I'd get so frustrated that this absolutely stupid old man who, in addition to being 48 years sober was also a licensed psychiatrist and surgeon, seemed to be fixated on asking me the same question again and again and again. What's wrong with that feeling? Ultimately, I'd lose all patience and respect for this man and let loose with what I hoped to be the "Final Answer" with him and I told him that "what was wrong" with all these feelings was that if I kept having them, I was surely going to start feeling like drinking again! God dammit! I thought that would finally shut him up, but, you guessed it: his only response was to ask with that irritating smile, "Well, Mike, what's wrong with that?"

By that time, I'd learned enough to know that it was useless to follow up with the only remaining retort which was, if I kept feeling like this any longer, I might not only "feel" like drinking, I might actually drink! I never asked him that question. For years, I've thought that his response might have been, "what's wrong with that?" but recently, I've decided that he would have said that all of these feelings, including the fear of drinking again, were all just feelings. Not good or bad. Just feelings. For years I'd attempted to manage feelings by means of alcohol and other techniques and aides. None of them really worked because they were all premised on the idea that particular feelings were unacceptable. I don't think that Earle would have flippantly said that the actual "act of drinking" again would be good, he was talking about feelings within me. Come to think of it, he pretty much only talked about feelings and emotions. Even when he was talking about seemingly "spiritual" things, he was really talking about emotions. I think for him, emotions and spirituality were synonymous.

Anyway, it was about this time that I started to try to reconcile Earle's teaching on feelings with some things I was hearing in AA, including the importance of Gratitude in the recovery process and the ultimate dangers of Resentment. When I listened to recovering alcoholics talk about either of these topics, I thought most people were talking about "feelings" (grateful and resentful) and if so, I began to wonder "Why were they talking about Gratitude as something 'good' and Resentment as something 'bad'?" Given that Earle was something of an AA icon (his story was in the Big Book and he had known Bill Wilson), I thought I'd finally found his Achilles Heal: were all these folks wrong to talk goodly about Gratitude and badly about Resentment?

When I challenged Earle about this apparent widespread heresy, he laughed and explained to me that neither Gratitude or Resentment were feelings. They were both attitudes. Or better, decisions. Gratitude was a attitude or habit one could develop over time to appreciate all that one had received in life, so-called good and so-called bad. He said that for some time, recovering alcoholics had discovered the value of developing such a habit or attitude of gratitude. It seemed to help many people stay sober and, more importantly, develop a joyful and contented way of life...without need for chemical enhancement.

Resentment too was not a feeling: it was a decision. Resentment means to "re-feel" and while resentment is often mis-talked about as though it were a feeling in itself, it wasn't. Earle believed that resentment wasn't a feeling, it was a decision (sometimes a well-entrenched habit) to hold on to a particular feeling well beyond it's natural life span. Resentment isn't "anger", it's a decision to hold onto anger (or any other negative feeling) well beyond it's normal shelf life.

After six years of sobriety, I'm no longer resentful about the topic of Gratitude. I actually appreciate it and enjoy the opportunity it gives me to share this story with others. January's become a time for me to reflect of the gifts of my sobriety, and one of the most important gifts given me in my life was the fourteen months I had spending some time with Dr. Earle Marsh. The night he died, I was holding his hand. He wasn't alone. He'd waited for me.

And that's another story.

Mike L.

Is AA a Cult?

When I began this blog, I forgot that I was publishing this log of thoughts and opinions to the wild of the Internet and foolishly allowed "Comments" to my blog. Within a few days, I was inundated with almost a dozen comments, all from a guy named 'MICKY'. Apparently, he does not share my love for the program/organization called AA and he's welcome to his own experience. I'm not sure how to accurately characterize his experience and while it's far different from my own, there were parts of his rantings that stirred up memories of my own and I couldn't help but feel some empathy for him.

When I first got sober a little over six years ago, I'd quickly gotten a sponsor who began taking me through the Big Book a page/chapter at a time, just like had been done with him by his sponsor. I didn't mind this approach at all, at least for the first two steps. But as we approached the third step, he started talking about what his sponsor had done with him and I got the distinct impression that he was fully expecting to do the same thing with me when my turn came to work this step: "Made a decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God, as I understood him."

What his sponsor had done with him was to take him up to a hill in Pleasant Hill, California and on top of that pleasant hill, they each knelt in front of a bench and recited the so-called "Third Step Prayer" together: God, I offer myself to Thee, to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt....etc." When they were done, the 3rd step was completed and they then immediately moved on to the next step.

Well, unbeknownst to my sponsor, there just wasn't a chance in hell that I was going up to any such hill, pleasant or not, to kneel down and pray this or any other prayer with him. No fucking way.

When I got sober, I was 48 years old. The disease had been very slow, but progressively worse nonetheless. Earlier in my life, I'd been a Lutheran---had even been the President of the goddamned Luther League! I converted to Catholicism when I was in my early 20's and entered the Jesuits shortly thereafter with the full intent of becoming a Jesuit priest... I had a bachelor's degree in Catholic theology and had thought long and hard about the issues surrounding the questions of God's existence or non-existence. Ultimately, I left the Jesuits: in part, because I got tired of trying to fit my experience of God into an acceptable framework of the Catholic Church or some local manifestation of that organization, but in larger part, due to my certainty that if I were to stay much longer in this celibate religious order, I would certainly become an alcoholic! I have a long history of reaching this exact same crisis point again and again and again: if I stay here doing "this", I will certainly become an alcoholic.

Anyway, back to my 3rd step issue: after getting sober, one of the things that made me feel most comfortable and safe in AA was the language scattered throughout the book and literature which seemed to say that within this organization, each individual was absolutely free to come up with their own understanding of God or a Higher Power. In fact, if the individual's understanding of God was that God did not exist, they were still a full member of AA in good standing. No better, no less than someone whose understanding was more theistic. I love the fact that the third chapter of the Big Book was called "We Agnostics" rather than "Those Agnostics" or "We Former Agnostics."

But I had already started to have this sense of safety become challenged by certain practices and language within the rooms of AA that seemed inconsistent with this fundamental principle of AA. Not only was there the talk of a 3rd step that involved reciting a very specific prayer with another person....which seemed to me to imply that these two folks were acting as though they had a common understanding of God, else why would they be saying the same prayer together. And if everyone in AA accomplished their 3rd step by reciting this same exact prayer together with another, was the talk of a God of my own understanding really a joke or ruse?

There was also the practice of opening and closing most AA meetings that I had attended to that point with either the Serenity Prayer or the Lord's Prayer. Both prayers are Christian prayers or at least "rooted" in the Christian tradition. If I didn't have an understanding of God that fit in with that tradition, was I some how "outside" of the fellowship if I did not hold hands with other members at the end of meetings and participate in this apparently Christianized AA ritual? Could I stay in AA if in fact it was a Christian cult or required belief in God as a condition of membership or a condition of longer term sobriety?

Luckily, at this time in my sobriety, I met Dr. Earle Marsh (deceased 1/13/03). Earle had gotten sober June 15, 1953, two days before I was born. His story, Physician Heal Thyself, was published in the 2nd edition of the Big Book and he was something of an icon around here where I was getting sober. Anyway, my first sponsor unwittingly directed me to have my path intersect with Earle's. This sponsor had encouraged me to go to a big men's meeting because they really did things right at this meeting. Well, I hated it. While the chairs (what some places refer to a "leads" where you tell your story...) were usually very good, they did not ask for volunteers to talk/share---the chair would only call on people he knew and none of them knew me. The fellowship was very strong in this meeting and there was a lot of positive energy flowing before, during and after the meeting. But I still hated it. I started to get the impression that they were all members of a AA cult and they were trying to draw me into the fold. If only I'd do what I was told....and that included getting down on my knees and praying the 3rd step prayer with my sponsor. No fucking way.

Anyway, one night---I'd already decided that it was my last visit to this meeting---toward the end of the meeting, this little man I had only known as an oldtimer who had his story in the book (when talking to others after the meeting, I referred to him as the Joker, because while he rarely got called on to talk, when he did talk, he had a wonderful way of telling stories and to make me laugh)....this little old man raised his hand and didn't wait to be called on, and simply said, "My name is Earle and I'm an alcoholic." Everyone welcomed him with a roar, "Hi Earle!". He then continued, "I've heard everything that you men have said tonight and to be honest with you, I think it's all a bunch of bullshit!" At first, there was complete silence in the room of 100+ men. And then everyone broke into laughter.... Earle looked at them with a half-smile and then said, "No, I'm serious! I think what's been said tonight is a bunch of bullshit." Well, this time, they didn't laugh so hard.

Earle then went on to tell a brief version of his story and it dawned on me that he'd gotten sober two days before I was born. He'd been sober every moment of my entire life. More importantly, this iconic figure with 48+ years of sobriety, friend of Bill Wilson himself and writer of one of the stories in the Big Book, had told an entire room of AA members that they were full of shit. And he didn't get kicked out. Now, he may very well have pissed off a few or a bunch of folks, but nonetheless, he was still allowed to have his say and to return the following week!

That's when I learned that while there are "cultish" aspects to this weird organization called Alcoholics Anonymous, that given our freedom to believe and do as we wish and remain full members in good standing, it's not a cult. At least for me. It's also where I learned that my third step didn't have to involve praying any prayer with another person. In fact, it didn't have to involve prayer at all. For me, the third step involved me coming to an understanding that much of my life had been spent "playing God" --- and, in particular, by using alcohol as a means of playing this role of God: He (me) who could change reality to fit His (my) wants and desires. My third step didn't involve a commitment to any sort of god, it was more of a resignation on my part from playing the role of God. It meant letting go and just being me. And being me, involved among other things, being an alcoholic who simply couldn't "stop" drinking...but who could stay sober, one day at a time.

This is all not to say that Micky's experience is wrong or that his opinions are bunk. His experience is apparently far different than mine and he's apparently taken it upon himself to teach everyone the "truth" about AA, Bill Wilson, etc. That's fine with me. I don't particularly find his arguments persuasive and I'm not going to become a hostage to his voluminous (clearly "cut and paste" from a library of anti-AA messages and writings....) comments and diatribes.

For that reason, I've removed the "Comments" from my blog. I am looking for other alternatives to allowing people to respond/comment on what I share here, which do not subject me or others to abusive rantings. Until then, this will be a one-way communication tool. Sorry folks!

Mike L.