Oops!

Mistakes!  We all know how it feels to make them.  Many of us feel that our entire lives have been a mistake.  We often regard our mistakes with shame or guilt -- at the very least, with frustration and impatience.  We tend to see mistakes as evidence that we are still sick, crazy, stupid, or too damaged to recover.
In truth, mistakes are a very vital and important part of being human.  For particularly stubborn people (such as ourselves) mistakes are often our best teachers.  There is no shame in making mistakes.  In fact, making new mistakes often shows our willingness to take risks and grow.
It's helpful, though, if we learn from our mistakes; repeating the same ones may be a sign that we're stuck.  And expecting different results from the same old mistakes -- well, that's what we call "insanity."  It just doesn't work.

Just For Today:  Mistakes aren't tragedies.  But please, help me learn from them.

Property Lines

A helpful tool of our recovery, especially in the behavior we call detachment, is learning to identify who owns what.  Then we let each person own and possess his or her rightful property.
If another person has an addiction, a problem, a feeling, or a self-defeating behavior, that is their property, not ours.  If someone is a martyr, immersed in negativity, controlling, or manipulative, that is their issue, not ours.
If someone has acted and experienced a particular consequence, both the behavior and the consequence belong to that person.
If someone is in denial or cannot think clearly on a particular issue, that confusion belongs to him or her.
If someone has a limited or impaired ability to love or care, that is his or her property, not ours.  If someone has no approval or nurturing to give away, that is that person's property.
People's lies deceptions, tricks, manipulations, abusive behaviors, inappropriate behaviors, cheating behaviors, and tack behaviors belong to them too.  Not us.
People's hopes and dreams are their property.  Their guilt belongs to them too.  Their happiness or misery is also theirs.  So are their beliefs and messages.
If some people don't like themselves, that is their choice.  Other people's choices are their property, not ours.
What people choose to say and do is their business.
What is our property?  Our property includes our behaviors, problems, feelings, happiness, misery, choices, and messages; our ability to love, care, and nurture; our thoughts, our denial, our hopes and dreams for ourselves.  Whether we allow ourselves to be controlled, manipulated, deceived, or mistreated is our business.
In recovery, we learn an appropriate sense of ownership.  If something isn't ours, we don't take it.  If we take it, we learn to give it back.  Let other people have their property, and learn to own and take good care of what's ours.

Today, I will work at developing a clear sense of what belongs to me and what doesn't.  If it's not mine, I won't keep it.  I will deal with myself, my issues, and my responsibilities.  I will take my hands off what is not mine.

Intimacy

We can let ourselves be close to people.
Many of us have deeply ingrained patterns for sabotaging relationships.  Some of us may instinctively terminate a relationship once it moves to a certain level of closeness and intimacy.
When we start to feel close to someone, we may zero in on one of the person's character defects, then make it so big it's all we can see.  We may withdraw, or push the person away to create distance.  We may start criticizing the other person, a behavior sure to create distance.
We may start trying to control the person, a behavior that prevents intimacy.
We may tell ourselves we don't want or need another person, or smother the person with our needs.
Sometimes, we defeat ourselves by trying to be close to people who aren't available for intimacy -- people with active addictions, or people who don't choose to be close to us.  Sometimes, we choose people with particular faults so that when it comes time to be close, we have an escape hatch.
We're afraid, and we fear losing ourselves.  We're afraid that closeness means we won't be able to own our power to take care of ourselves.
In recovery, we're learning that it's okay to let ourselves to close to people.  We're choosing to relate to safe, healthy people, so closeness is a possibility.  Closeness doesn't mean we have to lose ourselves, or our life.  As one man said, we're learning that we can own our power with people, even when we're close, even when the other person has something we need.

Today, I will be available for closeness and intimacy with people, when that's appropriate.  Whenever possible, I will let myself be who I am, let others be who they are, and enjoy the bond and good feelings between us.

It Comes in Waves

I've grown accustomed to your absence at this point, but you never leave my thoughts, not completely; you're always in the back of my mind at the least.
I've come into acceptance of me ever seeing you again are slim, and the ache from that new fact of my reality fluctuates back and forth:  sometimes it's a dull, barely detectable soreness.

But other times, like tonight, I'm completely consumed by the fact that I miss you so much that there is no possible way to even come close to describing the extent to which I feel like I've lost a vital limb that I need to live.  I don't know where you are, I don't know what you're doing or if you're okay or if you're happy....all I know is I wish you were here.

At the very least, I wish for your happiness and triumph over whatever life has thrown at you, as I have every confidence that there really isn't anything life can throw at you that you would let beat you.  I know you, and you don't give up fighting, ever.

So at the very least:  wherever you are, whatever you're doing, whoever you're with:  I hope you are okay, and I hope you are happy and I hope that you are safe.  I want nothing but the best for you.

Goodnight

Vision Trouble

Yesterday I met with the man I chose to be my new sponsor in the wake of Bruce's death.  While we sat outside Starbucks we went over a brief recap of the tornado that's been my life the last few months.  We also went over my understanding of the first 2 steps as well as what type of program I'm working in the sense of what actions I take and what behaviors I'm engaging in every day.

After reviewing my understanding of acceptance, powerlessness, honesty, open-mindedness, willingness to do the next right thing, having faith, trust, and the courage it takes to look at oneself and the courage to face the emotions and feelings that comes along with the process, he said "you're doin' a good job man, you're doing a lot more than most do and it sounds like you really get it."

At that point I just went blank and asked in complete confusion "Really?"  What's more, is lately I've been having more and more people saying that they were proud of me, which leaves me in utter disbelief.  Personally, I feel like I'm either not doing enough, or I'm lacking in certain areas, or I'm not as far along in my growth process as everyone is saying I am. 

But taking into account all this recent feedback, I'm starting to wonder if maybe what I see isn't the same as what everyone else is seeing and that maybe the lense at which I'm looking at myself through is smudged and tainted with all the self-hate, self-loathing, lack of any self-worth issues that I struggle with.
 Maybe I am doing a lot better than I think I am. 
Maybe I don't suck at life as much as I think I do. 
I'm not quite sure what to think.  But what I do know is I need to rely on the feedback I get from those I trust around me and not form my opinions of reality based solely on my thinking and viewpoint, because when I'm relying solely on myself and my self-will and the skewed-reality thoughts that come out of my head, I can form opinions and viewpoints of myself that are so off kilter and false that I end up self-sabotaging myself and my growth process completely stops.  At least I've learned THAT much:  my own thoughts can't be trusted; my perception of reality is not accurate; and I need guidance and support.

Becoming Entirely Ready

Becoming entirely ready to have our defects of character removed can be a long process, often taking place over the course of a lifetime.  Our state of readiness grows in direct proportion to our awareness of these defects and the destruction they cause.
We may have trouble seeing the devastation our defects are inflicting on our lives and the lives of those around us.  If this is the case, we would do well to ask our Higher Power to reveal those flaws which stand in the way of our progress.
As we let go of our shortcomings and find their influence waning, we'll notice that those defects are replaced with quality attributes.  Where we were fearful, we find courage.  Where we were selfish, we find generosity.  Our delusions about ourselves will disappear to be replaced by self-honest and self-acceptance.
Yes, becoming entirely ready means we will change.  Each new level of readiness brings new gifts.  Our basic nature changes, and we soon find our readiness is no longer sparked only by pain but by a desire to grow spiritually.

Just for Today:  I will increase my state of readiness by becoming more aware of my shortcomings.

If We See Only Ourselves.....

 If we see only ourselves, it's a very lonely world.

We can learn the difference between taking care of ourselves positively and being so negatively self-centered that we are forced into solitary confinement, where we dry up for lack of genuine interchange.

We should know who we are. But we should also know who our neighbor is, and our friend, sister, boss, or child. To know other people and see beneath the exterior they present, we need to be comfortable enough with ourselves so we can relax and look and listen. We also need to be humble enough to realize we can learn from someone else and benefit from the gifts she or he brings to the relationship.

With recovery comes new empathy and sensitivity. As self-will loosens its grip, we are open to the intuitive knowledge that enhances our interactions with those around us. Since our vision is less clouded by the problems of addiction, we can see others more clearly and understand them better. Recovery offers us a way out of loneliness into companionship and community.

I will use my empathy to deepen my understanding of those who cross my path today.

Letting Go of Fear

Fear is at the core of codependency.  It can motivate us to control situations or neglect ourselves.
Many of us have been afraid for so long that we don't label our feelings fear.  We're used to feeling upset and anxious.  It feels normal.
Peace and serenity may be uncomfortable.
At one time, fear may have been appropriate and useful.
We may have relied on fear to protect ourselves, much the way soldiers in a war rely on fear to help them survive.  But now, we're living life differently.
It's time to thank our old fears for helping us survive, then wave good-bye to them.  Welcome peace, trust, acceptance, and safety.  We don't need that much fear anymore.  We can listen to our healthy fears, and let go of the rest.
We can create a feeling of safety for ourselves, now.  We are safe, now.  We've made a commitment to take care of ourselves.  We can trust and love ourselves.

Today, help me let go of my need to be afraid.  Replace it with a need to be at peace.  Help me listen to my healthy fears and relinquish the rest.

CONTROL

Many of us have been trying to keep the whole world in orbit with sheer and forceful application of mental energy.
What happens if we let go, if we stop trying to keep the world orbiting and just let it whirl?  It'll keep right on whirling.  It'll stay right on track with no help from us.  And we'll be free and relaxed enough to enjoy our place in it.
Control is an illusion, especially the kind of control we've been trying to exert.  In fact, controlling gives other people, events, and diseases... control over us.
Whatever we try to control does have control over us and our life.
I have given this control to many things and people in my life.  I have never gotten the results I wanted from controlling or trying to control people.  What I received for my efforts is an unmanageable life, whether that unmanageability was inside me or in external events.
In recovery, we make a trade-off.  We trade a life that we have tried to control, and we receive in return something better -- a life that is manageable.

Today, I will exchange a controlled life for one that is manageable.

Faith Without Works is Dead

They say "faith without works is dead."  In other words, if you say or declare or commit yourself to something, and then don't follow through with the appropriate matching actions and behaviors, then your words and the commitment you made previously is meaningless, without merit, and might as well have not been said at all.

Today I realized I've entered a stage in my life that has me acutely aware that changes need to be made in several areas of my life.  And that the only one that is capable of implementing and making these changes is me.  Which brings us to back to the quote above.  I refuse to allow myself and my life to "die" as a result of not taking action and the initiative to back up things I say or commit to accomplishing.  The time for action is now.  I can say I'm going to do this, that, and the other thing until I'm blue in the face, but if no action follows those words, I feel I'd be failing myself and my own potential of what I'm capable of achieving.

In other words...lights, camera...ACTION