Daily Reprieve

From Today’s Daily Reflections;

Under very trying conditions I have had, again and again, to forgive others – also myself.  (As Bill Sees It, page 268)

Forgiveness of self and forgiveness of others are just two currents in the same river, both hindered or shut off completely by the dam of resentment. Once that dam is lifted, both currents can flow. The Steps of A.A. allow me to see how resentment has built up and subsequently blocked off this flow in my life. The Steps provide a way by which my resentments may – by the grace of God as I understand Him – be lifted. It is as a result of this solution that I can find the necessary grace which enables me to forgive myself and others.

END OF QUOTE

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I feel very hopeful today.  I suspect that a life flowing with forgiveness might be more powerful than one bound by judgment, condemnation, and resentment.  I want discipline in my life that comes from a trust for God, myself, and those who dwell in my intimate sphere.  I am tired of the sad discipline that is gained from the harsh whip of an internal judge, that feeds me a steady diet of self-loathing and dreams of escape.

I promised in my last post that if I found a way out of my dilemma, that I would share it.  So here we go.

I decided that I could not stay in the dark place I found myself this morning, and so I got ready to attend a meeting in town.  My daughter showed up looking for instruction on how to get to a certain place.  It happened to be on the way to the meeting, so I told her to just follow me.  She stayed right on me until she was in familiar territory and then waved bye with her sweet smiling face and we parted.

“Death is not a permanent separation.”   It still hurts, though.

I got in the meeting and listened to a topic on self-will and how easily it deceives, and can use even what we perceive to be noble motives.

I said nothing.  I held onto my chair and kept myself as present as possible.  I stayed.

Someone arrived late, whisperd a greeting to a friend, and sat down right in front of me, leaning back so that I felt her back approaching my face.  I sit up and see that she is wearing scrubs and her top is on inside out.  The tag says “Children’s Hospital.”

“I do care.  I want you to care with Me.”

I wanted to leave, because of the periodic tears, but  I stayed.  Suddenly I knew I had something to share in the meeting.  I was being given an opportunity to connect.  This meeting was not just about my pain.  The room was filled with others who wanted to live.  I shared in spite of my darkness.  Someone thanked me after the meeting.

Once I was willing to give, I received these words;  “Grieving is not just a way of saying good-bye, it is a way of forgiving Me.”

I need to grieve.  I could not truly weep because I have been so furious with the God who allowed it all to happen.  I need to grieve.

My fourth step is not God’s moral inventory, it is mine.

So I must add the fourth column to my resentment.

WHAT WAS MY PART (Page 67 of Big Book)

“Referring to our list again.  Putting out of our minds the wrongs others had done, we resolutely looked for our own mistakes.  Where had we been

selfish,

dishonest,

self-seeking,

and frightened?

Though a situation had not been entirely our fault, we tried to disregard the other person involved entirely.  Where were we to blame?”

I have had the experience of hearing how alcoholics who have been abused as little children work through this.  They did nothing wrong in the situation but were definitely impacted by the traumatic events of their childhood.  The question for them became, “How did I react and continue to react to the situation that is unuseful and destructive?”  I think it applies in this situation.  Regardless of whether God did or did not abuse me as His child, I perceived it as such.

As a result, I was frightened – petrified really.  I define selfishness as Isolated Self Concern and Reliance.  Most certainly I disconnected from God and others and attempted to gain control over those in my environment.  I developed a self-seeking approach to life.  I define self-seeking as scheming for Isolated Fantasy Production and Enforcement.  I suspect that I developed a habit of dishonesty with myself about what I expected in my relationship with God.

I am at a better place and can continue the moral inventory.  I look forward to finishing and doing the fifth step.  I do want to finally, truly grieve the loss of my sons, and forgive God.  I am not there yet, but I think I am closer.

I covet your thoughts and prayers in my behalf.

My paraphrase of the 3rd step prayer;

God, I offer myself to You – to build with me according to Your will.

Relieve me of the bondage of my isolated lower self so that I may better do Your will.

In the care of my life, take away my difficulties so that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help by drawing from Your power, Your love, and Your way of Life.

From Today’s Daily Reflections;

Often it was while working on this Step with our sponsors or spiritual advisers that we first felt truly able to forgive others, no matter how deeply we felt they had wronged us. Our moral inventory had persuaded us that all-round forgiveness was desirable, but it was only when we resolutely tackled Step Five that we inwardly knew we’d be able to receive forgiveness and give it, too.  (Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, page 58)

What a great feeling forgiveness is! What a revelation about my emotional, psychological and spiritual nature. All it takes is willingness to forgive; God will do the rest.

END OF QUOTE

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I do not know if I should share my truth with you today.  Maybe I should wait until I re-finish the fourth and fifth and sixth and seventh steps and hope that I have something better to say.

I AM RESENTFUL AT:  God

THE CAUSE:  The death of my infant son Josiah, and my grown son, Zach.  It personalized what I feel are crimes against humanity.

AFFECTS MY:  Everything; Self-Esteem, Pocket Book, Personal Relations, Ambition.  It affects my sobriety.  (FEAR)

There is a movie called God on Trial and I remember one quote in particular;  “God is not good, he has only been on our side.”

How do you trust God to help you forgive God?  My solution has been to use my imagination to hide this anguish away and embrace GOMU (God of my understanding).  I think this is why I feel the need to permanently remove my father-heart from my chest, get a transplant and become like the Sociopathic Deity who finds a benefit in the murder of his own son and the condemnation of all humanity to eventual death.

Maybe I am in a place where I can deal with this now.  I really don’t know.

I hope you will forgive me for not being able to stay quiet.  If I find a solution to this dilemma, I will be quick to share that as well.

From Today’s Daily Reflections;

It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. . . . But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave.   (Alcoholics Anonymous, page 66)

Know God;
Know peace.
No God;
No peace.

END OF QUOTE

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I have been working on filtering out the disguised voice of fear, that pretends to be my Higher Power.  I am getting better at this, but it takes practice.

My sponsor called me this morning and had me read the following from the 12 & 12, page 49;

“All these failings generate fear, a soul-sickness in its own right.  Then fear, in turn, generates more character defects.  Unreasonable fear that our instincts will not be satisfied drives us to covet the possessions of others, to lust for sex and power, to become angry when our instinctive demands are threatened, to be envious when the ambitions of others seem to be realized while ours are not.  We eat, drink, and grab for more of everything than we need, fearing we shall never have enough.  And with genuine alarm at he prospect of work, we stay lazy.  We loaf and procrastinate, or at best work grudgingly and under half steam.  These fears are the termites that ceaselessly devour the foundations of whatever sour of life we try to build.”

He then directed me to read the Daily Reflections for May 12th (Endigar 411).

He told me that he believes those readings would help with what is eating at my gut.  I share this with you as a follow-up to yesterday’s post on answered prayer and to be helpful to anyone else who may be on a similar path.

In reference to the request for prayer I sent out in Endigar 413, I may have gotten an answer.  I have been taking notes from the Big Book as I move along with the inventory.  I finished notes on the resentment section and then got the thought that it would be good to get notes from the 12 & 12 as well.  I came across the following;

“Instincts on rampage balk at investigation.  The minute we make a serious attempt to probe them, we are liable to suffer severe reactions”

I did not remember reading this before.  The next paragraph on page 45 really caught my attention:

“If temperamentally we are on the depressive side, we are apt to be swamped with guilt and self-loathing.  We wallow in this messy bog, often getting a misshapen and painful pleasure out of it.  As we morbidly pursue this melancholy activity, we may sink to such a point of despair that nothing but oblivion looks possible as a solution.  Here, of course, we have lost all perspective, and therefore all genuine humility.  For this is pride in reverse.  This is not a moral inventory at all; it is the very process by which the depressive has so often been led to the bottle and extinction.”

On page 46 it continues;

“At this stage of the inventory proceedings, our sponsors come to the rescue.  They can do this, for they are the carriers of A.A.’s tested experience with Step Four.  They comfort the melancholy one by first showing him that his case is not strange or different, that his character defects are probably no more numerous or worse than those of anyone else in A.A.  This the sponsor promptly proves by talking freely and easily, and without exhibitionism, about his own defects, past and present.  This calm, yet realistic, stock-taking is immensely reassuring.  The sponsor probably points out that the newcomer has some assets which can be noted along with his liabilities.  This tends to clear away morbidity and encourage balance.  As soon as he begins to be more objective, the newcomer can fearlessly, rather that fearfully, look at his own defects.”

After I read this, I looked down at my cell phone and saw that I had a text message from an intimate friend;  “my curiosity – have you told your sponsor exactly how this fourth step makes you feel and why?”

I had the recurring thought that I should call my sponsor and talk to him about this, but I had put it off because I wanted to be able to tell him that I am finished and ready to take the 5th.  (The 5th step, not the amendment).

So I called my sponsor and left a message on his voice mail.  I think it would probably be a good idea to include an asset list, but I am awaiting confirmation.  I am doing my best not to direct the show.

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Sponsor: “Don’t get stuck in the paralysis of analysis.  Just get it down on paper and we will deal with it.”

From Today’s Daily Reflections;

Time after time newcomers have tried to keep to themselves certain facts about their lives. . . . they have turned to easier methods. . . . But they had not learned enough humility. . .  (Alcoholics Anonymous, page 72-73)

Humility sounds so much like humiliation, but it really is the ability to look at myself – and honestly accept what I find. I no longer need to be the “smartest” or “dumbest” or any other “est.” Finally, it is okay to be me. It is easier for me to accept myself if I share my whole life. If I cannot share in meetings, then I had better have a sponsor – someone with whom I can share those “certain facts” that could lead me back to a drunk, to death. I need to take all the Steps. I need the Fifth Step to learn true humility. Easier methods do not work.

END OF QUOTE

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I am working on my fourth 4th step.  I think there are members of AA who have really good 10th step habits that do not need a periodic return to the moral inventory.  I still find that I am my greatest resentment.  If you are so inclined, I would appreciate your prayers today.  I want to be thorough without becoming morbid.  I would really like to be okay with me.  For those of you who are also struggling with the writing out of your moral inventory in death-ink, I pray for you.  May we find each other free of the bondage of self.

From Today’s Daily Reflections;

If we skip this vital step, we may not overcome drinking.  (Alcoholics Anonymous, page 72)

I certainly didn’t leap at the opportunity to face who I was, especially when the pains of my drinking days hung over me like a dark cloud. But I soon heard at the meetings about the fellow member who just didn’t want to take Step Five and kept coming back to meetings, trembling from the horrors of reliving his past. The easier, softer way is to take these Steps to freedom from our fatal disease, and to put our faith in the Fellowship and our Higher Power.

END OF QUOTE

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“Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now. If you have decided you want what we have and are willing to go to any length to get it-then you are ready to take certain steps.

At some of these we balked. We thought we could find an easier, softer way. But we could not. With all the earnestness at our command, we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely.”  (Alcoholics Anonymous, page 58)

I had to find an alternative to the way I had been living.  I had to find a more sane approach to life.  The steps collectively and some in particular, such as the fifth step, I found challenging and difficult.  They escorted me through the hallways of internal haunted houses.  I tried to create a hybrid creature of my old ways of providing creative and intellectual  modifications forged to the simplicity and spirituality of the steps.  I kept producing a more complicated but self-justifying version of recovery.

Yesterday I heard someone say in a meeting that if he needed an intellectual answer to his recovery, he would have just taken the Big Book home and studied.  He continued that if he was to find the heart of this program, it had to be as he connected with others in the Fellowship.  The fifth step takes the mind of the moral inventory and gives it a heart.

Today, I am in agreement with the final statement of the contributor to the reflections; “The easier, softer way is to take these Steps to freedom from our fatal disease, and to put our faith in the Fellowship and our Higher Power.”

Heard in a meeting yesterday; “When I first came into these rooms, the fellowship told me recovery was an inside job, and that they would hold the light while I started digging.”

From Today’s Daily Reflections;

A.A. experience has taught us we cannot live alone with our pressing problems and the character defects which cause or aggravate them. If . . . Step Four . . .has revealed in stark relief those experiences we’d rather not remember . . . then the need to quit living by ourselves with those tormenting ghosts of yesterday gets more urgent than ever. We have to talk to somebody about them.   (Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, page 55)

Whatever is done is over. It cannot be changed. But my attitude about it can be changed through talking with those who have gone before and with sponsors. I can wish the past never was, but if I change my actions in regard to what I have done, my attitude will change. I won’t have to wish the past away. I can change my feelings and attitudes, but only through my actions and the help of my fellow alcoholics.

END OF QUOTE

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I was in a meeting yesterday, and someone who has watched me bounce around the rooms and struggle with the relapse rodeo told me, “You can’t do this thing alone.”

Today I understand that more than ever.  I still have to be reminded.  Sometimes my various fears present themselves as God, and pull me back to isolated self-reliance.  Then I lose ground.  This is when I have to reconnect to my actual Higher Power, and find my way back to into the fellowship of AA.  Spirituality is fed through connection.

I heard an interesting nugget from the fellowship  in my sunrise meeting this morning; “Coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous.”

I have decided that my sponsor is a very good sponsor and I may not be the best of sponsees.  I am working on it.  In talking to him he said;

“Besides that Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?”

Another bit of wit I heard in a meeting was; “I have been born again so many times my soul has stretch marks.”

Just thought I would share.