“With great power, comes great responsibility.”

That line was uttered by Peter Parker’s dying uncle in the movie Spiderman.  It could have been from somewhere else, but that’s where I know it from.  If that’s true, couldn’t the flipside be true?  By assuming great responsibility couldn’t one become super powerful?  By taking responsibility for your existence rather than blaming your circumstances, couldn’t you begin to create your reality and find yourself living the life of your choice?  

The harsh truth is, you’re always living the life you choose.  Sometimes this is not a harsh reminder, but a compliment.  For us in recovery, when we face the hardest things about ourselves, the most embarrassing and mortifying, and then we admit them to another person, we get the chance to go out from there and take those defects to a higher power with whom we barely have a nodding acquaintance with, to remove those defects so that we can be of better service to more people.  After that we take the list and become open to righting all the wrongs we’ve ever done to others, unless contacting them would just be another wrong we’ve done. 

We do this stuff and from here on out, it’s smooth sailing.  I heard somebody say the other day that he was taught early on, to do the stuff you have to first, then do the stuff you want to do.  Young entrepreneur types are known for saying “I’ll live how they won’t now, so I can live how they can’t later”.  They being the ones who don’t put in the extra effort now.  We get the hardest stuff out of the way, because we have to.  If we don’t, we’ll get just comfortable enough, and for us, to be comfortable with being stagnant, well that is almost certainly walking towards a drink, and thus death.  We have the privilege of a chance.  If you’re not drunk right now, right this very second, the window of opportunity is open.  How sad it is that some of us, after suffocating in that dark room with our disease, will delight to see the window has been flung open.  We will put our faces near the fresh air, but we won’t jump out.  You MUST jump out.  If you are to survive, you need to jump out of that window while the obsession has been removed, while you still have a chance.  Because once that obsession kicks back in, most of us are toast.  I don’t know anybody who’s been able to fight it without a sufficient reprieve.

Do what you have to now, so you won’t have to do something you’ll regret later.  Be pre-emptive and proactive about your sobriety.   

There are certain things about myself that I have come to know as truths over the past couple of years. Relatively recently, I have let myself become who I am.  I don’t mean that I’ve gotten lazy or undisciplined about lust or overeating, and I didn’t start spending every penny I had on frivolous items.  But there are a couple of things about me that I’ve allowed to take hold and get a firm grip on my life. 

1. I like to plan for things. 
2. I do much better with structure.

Now, as a work in progress, with the delusion of looming perfection, I fought against these characteristics because I thought I wasn’t supposed to enjoy looking forward to things, and I thought that by now, I should be able to function without structure.

Well you know what?  I like structure.  And I like planning.  Fuck it.  It is what it is.  I like to make reservations for dinner a couple of weeks in advance with other people.  It’s fun to text your future dinner mate about what you’re going to eat, or whether or not you want to do anything before or after.  Should you drive or take the train?  Should we get dressed up or just take it easy in case we wanna go to the park after?  These are all things I like thinking about.  I like to think.  I’m a thinker.  I’ve tried to turn my brain off, and it doesn’t work.  

The best I can do is act like the guy that pulls the switch to determine which direction the train is going in.  He would never dare try to stop it, and he certainly won’t throw it at a right angle while it’s doing 80 mph, but he can pull a switch that makes it careen ever so slightly to the north, giving it an entirely different trajectory than it would have had had he just left it the way it was.

This is how I operate my structure and my plans.  These two concepts are basically the same thing.  I like to be prepared for life, as much as humanly possible. Of course there are things that come up.  People cancel, or somebody gets sick, the car breaks down, etc.  But it’s nice to have a guideline of life to live off of, and then be flexible.  I decided that if I allowed myself to make plans, I would also allow myself to be flexible.  Rather than never planning anything and being totally non-committal about life, I’ll plan with you and then if something comes up, we’ll deal with it then.  Until then, PLAN ON!!

I’ll tell you a quick story about how I came to this realization by telling a story from my high school years that finally sunk in.

My teacher, Mr. Gerhardt, told a story once about a child that he grew up.  Not raised, but grew up, in one shot.  Mr. G was an English teacher and he had a student that was not doing so well.  He offered him a chance to pull himself up by his bootstraps to get a passing grade so he could graduate.  The kid was not too eager to take Mr. G up on his offer to stay after school tomorrow so they could work on some things to get his grades up to snuff.  His excuse was “I don’t know what will happen between today and tomorrow. I could get hit by a bus for all I know”.  Obviously the student thought he was being smart and philosophical, but Mr. G saw right through this.  He said “Do you want to pass this class or not?”  And the student replied in the affirmative.  ”Okay then” Mr. G said “What we’re going to do, is we’re going to commit to each other.  You understand?  Because I don’t have to be here tomorrow after school any more than you do, but as a teacher, I want to give you every opportunity to pass this class.  So what you’re going to do, is you’re going to grow up, right now.  Right this instant.  You’re going to commit to being here tomorrow afternoon, and IF (emphasis on if) you die, or get hit by a bus, or anything happens that would render you unable to show up, then you don’t have to come and we can reschedule.  But until then, you’re committed and you will be here.  Do you understand?”  

The student understood, and so do I.  You don’t live a life based on what ifs.  You live life based on what is.

Just when I thought there was nothing more that I wanted, that there was nothing left for me to be jealous of; I turned my attention to nature.  I thought about how unfair it is that the Earth gets all the oxygen it needs to sustain life and bear food to support all the various creatures that live on it.  From the fish in the sea to the blades of grass.  Even lightning has thunder to let it know that it exists.  Everything is provided for it seems, except for me.  

I need and want and long for. I never have enough and I’m never going to have enough for as long as I live.  Then I read this buddhist author, Thich Nhat Hanh, and he was talking about what he sees when he looks at a piece of paper.  He doesn’t see something to write on, or something to burn.  He doesn’t see a vehicle to bring joy to a child perhaps through the art of origami, which would have been nice, poetic, and probably enough to satisfy me.  Nay, it was so much deeper than that (yes I just said nay, and not ironically).  He saw the ocean, evaporation, clouds, sun, the inevitable rain, the nutrients in the soil, the time that passed as the tree grew, the animals that may have taken shelter in it, the children that may have climbed it, the lumberjacks that cut it down as a service to their employers and families, etc.  He saw all of that and I thought “Holy shit”.  I’m missing everything.  

I have no reason to be jealous of a flower, because although the flower does get everything it wants, the only reason this is possible is because it’s wants are very simple.  And you know what else?  A lot of flowers don’t get what they want, and they die.  Plain and simple.  And so do humans.  And that’s okay.  What’s not okay is being so insatiable that you send yourself into an early grave from use and abuse of drugs and alcohol, and food, and cigarettes, and sex which can result in killer STD’s, and lack of discipline which can result in unchecked depression and subsequently, suicide.  There’s a million different ways to be a dying flower, but there’s only one way to be a vibrant human and to be full of life.  Unfortunately you are the only one who can determine what that is, but thankfully, we’re here to help you begin to figure it out.

For a lot of people, just being of service to the next sick and suffering alcoholic is enough of a purpose, for others (like myself) we feel the need to keep that as our foundation, but branch out and see what else we’re made of.  That’s why I’m here.

Why are you here?

Most of us would LOVE to be judged by our intentions rather than our actions, but due to the laws of nature, that’s just not the way it works, and it never will.  No matter how much you wish and hope, your wishes and desires will always have to be manifested into action and expressed through physical movement to become reality.  I can’t get into the myriad of ways this proves true, but trust me on this.  That’s how it works.  And yes, I know I said myriad OF.  It just doesn’t make sense to me when I write it without the of, so that’s that.

On the flip side, it’s a wonderful gift that we are NOT judged by our thoughts or intentions, a la Minority Report, because most of us would be in jail, dead, sick, drunk, STD infested, broke, etc.  It would be a torrid state of affairs.

After the drink is put down, the battle to quell character defects begins.  The perception is that these are to be removed so that YOU suffer less, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg.  The best motive for having your character defects removed is so that you can hurt less people and be of better service to more and more people.  I’ve found that motive to also produce the best results and the most relief.   

As I sat the other day in a battle with one of my “character” defects, I heard my sponsor in my head explaining what these little devils are.  Basically character defects are instincts that have exceeded their intended purpose, so they will never be fully removed.  If this were to happen there would be no reproduction, everybody would starve, there would be no ambition, etc.  You get the point.  I wasn’t battling with character defects.  I was battling with defects of intention, or impure thoughts.

“Nobody knows where thoughts come from.  They just…appear.”  Empire Records

That line in that movie made me feel SO much better in early sobriety because for a while, I thought I was sick and bad for thinking bad and sick things.  As I sat the other day 10 years later, I still feel bad for having bad thoughts.  But like I’ve also heard it said, as long as you don’t let it turn into an infomercial, you’ll be just fine.  See the thought, observe it, and get rid of it if need be.  You are not the originator of your thoughts but you are most certainly the authority.

This brings us to the line between character defects and impure thoughts.  I’m not saying that fantasizing about lust is good, but if it doesn’t ever turn into action, you’ll be just fine.  Just like homicidal thoughts can’t land you in jail, thinking of a cake won’t make you fat.

The fear to think comes from the obsession for alcohol as it relates to alcoholism.  If this is the case for you and you can’t think of lust or food without acting out, then this post is not addressing you or your other addictive tendencies.  You may need some extra help, but for the majority of us in AA for whom alcohol was the main problem, those other thoughts are going to come and go.  As a matter of fact, they tend to stick around longer when we beat ourselves up for even having them.  Be hard on yourself, but don’t forget what you are.  You are a work in progress, and for some of us, that’s as good as it’s gonna get.

How many times, after a short of long period of sobriety, have we heard somebody say “I wanted to congratulate myself for not drinking for 30 days, 1 year, 10 years, etc. so I drank”.  I’m sure that rationale made perfect sense to them at the time, but to an outsider or to somebody elbow deep in recovery, it sounds like a made up fairy tale to support the fact that they let up on their program and their alcoholism flared up. 

Let’s get one thing straight.  Drinking is not a reward for not drinking for a long time.  Drinking is a punishment for letting up on your program, period.  

Drinking happens when the untreated alcoholism becomes so unbearable that not even the sharpest shooter of sobriety tactics can take out the culprit.  It’s a sad state of affairs, but it happens all too often.  It can happen to somebody with 10 days, zero days, 10 years or 28 years.  It doesn’t matter.  Once you think you’ve got it, and you no longer need to practice the principles in all your affairs and grow, you begin to die.  The clock is ticking.  

Usually the last thing that happens is you take a drink, while the second to last thing that happens, is you stop going to meetings. That’s why everybody thinks “meeting makers make it”.  Meeting makers make meetings, but that’s not the whole truth either.  Alcoholics who give enough of a shit about themselves to go sit in a room with a bunch of other people trying not to drink for an hour a day, and hopefully to find somebody else to help have a spiritual awakening; those people make it.  But they only make it while they’re doing it because just like any of us, the clock starts ticking once they think they’re impervious to their own selves. 

Sobriety is it’s own reward.  Kindness is it’s own reward.  Practice of spiritual principles is it’s own reward.  Forgiveness is it’s own reward.  If you do anything with the expectation of recouping your efforts in one way or another, you’re gonna have a bad time.  Just do and enjoy the “done” part of your action.  Try not to let the done become a waiting.  If you do that, you’ll never be done. 

It’s been said that your level of expectation has an inverse, yet very accurate effect on your level of serenity.  Some people have taken this beautiful concept and totally fucked it up.  They take it to mean if you expect shit, at least you won’t be disappointed when you get shit.  What actually happens though when you expect shit, is you get shit, because you pick shit out of the ether to show up in your life.  You don’t see the beauty so you pass it by like it never even existed, when really it’s been all around you all along. 

Keeping expectations low doesn’t mean expect poor things to happen, it means expect nothing and handle everything.  The more you’re focused on what you should be getting, the less able you are to handle what’s actually on your plate.  When you can’t handle what’s on your plate it feels like it’s too much, even if it’s only a little.  It’s like putting a full plate of food in front of somebody who’s starving versus putting a tiny bit of food in front of somebody who’s stuffed to the rafters.  You get the point right?

Trust yourself to be able to handle life as it happens and when the going gets rough, get going.  Make a move. If your thoughts are the problem, the action MUST be the solution.  Einstein said that the same mind that created the problem can’t be the same one to fix it.  The problems of the world will not be solved by the world.  The problems that YOU have manufactured to feel interesting or have something to do, will not be solved by the same brain that created them. They can, however, be turned around by some right action. We all know what this is, yet we seldom engage in it because we think that will render us useless or boring.  Little do you realize how quickly life will bring you problems to solve all by itself without you creating your own.  The world is unpredictable though, and it brings different problems all the time, and that is why we’re attracted to creating issues to deal with that are, at the very least, familiar.

With this style of living, it’s easy to feel victimized and that we’re not getting our fair share of freedom to live how we want.  I heard a woman say recently “Live as good as you can, but don’t expect everything to always be easy just because you’re doing the right thing.  And when you find yourself in a pit, don’t decorate it.  Ask for a ladder.”

Ask for a ladder.  And use it. 

While working with somebody today, it became apparent to me just how wrong our approach to life is.  We want to be accepted, which is totally normal, but we go about it in a very weird way.  Rather than be who we are unconditionally, we allow ourselves to be told how to feel by how others treat us.  And then, as if that weren’t bad enough, when we act badly or inappropriately, we see ourselves through the perceived perception of other people.  We are mind readers and our own worst critics.  We accuse others of being judgmental when really, we are the ones who are judging ourselves, but it seems less painful because it’s through somebody else’s eyes.  

Let me tell you why this is more painful.  Because you’re combining thought and emotion. When the two are in sync and coming from the same entity, they have the ability to move mountains, however, when it’s our emotions and what we THINK are their thoughts, that’s when disastrous results occur.  

There is no way to safely combine my emotional experience with your thought pattern. I wind up as the loser every time.

The man in the mirror is not the man that stands in front of the mirror.  The man in the mirror is a 2 dimensional reflection of what is being presented to the world.  How the world receives the man is up to the world.  You exist in the body, mind, and heart of that man standing in the mirror.  Spend less time focusing on the reflection and more time manipulating the actions of the body and mind you live from.  (Or woman).  

It seems like everybody’s main goal is to keep their loved ones out of any pain in any form, in any capacity, and for any amount of time.  Yet this is where I did ALL of my growing and learning.  I did not say some.  I said all.  I have never had a great run of a couple of days and then looked back on it and wondered “What should I have done differently?” 

Pain is everything for us.  Self help “gurus” and parents alike all seem to have it all figured out, yet part of their pain is seeing us in pain, so if they haven’t learned how to deal with that pain, why are we listening to them about ours?

This is where it gets tricky.  You need to listen to yourself, and never hesitate.  ”You know what they say about he who hesitates in war.  What’s that? He who hesitates is lost” Jay-Z said that, and oh how true it is.  Now you don’t want to be jumpy and ruin your life in a state of confusion, but if you give yourself a couple of seconds to figure out where this impulse is coming from, you’ll have a good idea of how you should proceed.  

That’s another thing.  Most of the actions we take and decisions we make are designed to give us a detour from pain, yet every situation is different.  You are a different person and this is a different occasion. This doesn’t give you license to act like an asshole all day every day, but try trusting yourself to know that maybe things you thought were a good idea back then, maybe won’t seem like such a good idea now.  People get confused with this concept because what happens is they think “I had a bad idea last time.  This must be a bad idea now” even if it’s a totally different approach they’re taking.  People just don’t trust themselves, and so they hesitate.

The whole god is not a painkiller notion came from a friend of mine named Jack, who used to interject it into conversations all the time.  Its such a powerful statement.  Usually he would use it in reference to drugs and alcohol and the way people used god or the concept of a higher power as a pacifier, when really the relationship you have with any form of intellectual being is supposed to help you get to higher and higher levels of functioning and service day after day.  That’s using self will in the proper way, in my opinion.  How can I get better for those around me so that I become one less thing they have to worry about ruining their day. As if life isn’t hard enough, here comes I to make it a little tougher. 

So god is not a painkiller, because pain equals growth, and god is most certainly not a growthkiller.  Think about that next time you try avoid the slightest bit of discomfort by praying it away.  Maybe the discomfort hasn’t left yet because you haven’t changed or grown enough to make it dissipate.  Try something different.  Grow.  

May 19th for me marks an epoch in the annals of what will be the legacy of my former life.   I never thought I was going to make it out alive, and on a very superficial level, I had made peace with that.  

But deep down I knew I was destined for better. I knew that this part of my existence needed to be amputated permanently so that I could finally start living life the way I was supposed to.  Even if that meant venturing out into the world without my security blanket, which, at the end, was a double gin and tonic with a big straw… and start making another one when you see I’m almost done.  

That’s how I did it.  Like most alcoholics, I have a very strong will and I tend to get my way most of the time.  Part of this stems from the fact that I don’t think my demands are all that crazy, and part of it comes from the fact that I am stubborn como un burro when I decide I need something.

At this very point in time, I’m absolutely blown away by the comparison of the two lives I’ve led thus far.  One is bloated and hopeless, the other lean and full of promise.  Not just any promise though.  I’ve got some of the most authentic and useful promise in the world and like George Bailey running down the street once he re-enters his old life, I’m ready to let it all hang out.  My inner shine is bursting and I don’t care who knows it.  If you want to come along for the ride you are so much more than welcome.  If you think glory is not for you, please pay attention still.  I am going to detail at great length how I too once felt like you.  I thought my lot in life was accounted for and I had better figure out a way to win this game with a pair of deuces.  

Long story short, I got dealt a new hand, and it was literally a royal flush.  I wouldn’t trade places with anybody in the world.  I hope you feel the same way about the skin you’re in.

I’m not talking about sex, or drink.  I’m talking about relationship.  You never forget your first healthy relationship.  That the more you put into it, the more you got out of it.  It wasn’t tit for tat, and it was beyond reciprocal.  It was exponential.  I heard a woman say today that the first relationship she had like that was with her sponsor.  I think I agree.

For most people, this relationship is with their parents.  At some point they ween off their parents and they begin to depend on a higher power, all on their own, without having to be almost killed by alcohol and drugs.  Some people come to be fully self sufficient and lead really awesome lives fraught with knowledge and achievement.  

This was not my case.  My relationship with my parents was codependent and that’s how I treated everybody else.  I remember the first time I had this thought, “When I get off the phone with my sponsor and he tells me he just got home, I believe him.  Why don’t I believe my girlfriends?”  I always thought everybody was trying to fuck me, and not because they didn’t like me or wanted to hurt me, just because that’s what people did.  What I’ve learned, is that’s NOT what they do.  That’s what you expect when you’ve lived a life of emotional insatiability, but that’s not the norm.  

She shaped all of her relationships based on that model, and guess what happened.  She started to create healthier relationships with people as a result of it.  So just get that one healthy relationship going, and then base everything off that.  You did the opposite for so long.  Why not give it a shot?