Willingness – Wade H. Recovery Net

In Recovery Remember “MY WAY IS THE GET HIGH WAY!!!”

In Recovery Remember “MY WAY IS THE GET HIGH WAY!!!”

Last Touches on the Mussle — (Photo credit: goodnight_photography)

Thus we grow. And so can you, though you be but one man with this book in your hand. We believe and hope it contains all you will need to begin. (Alcoholics Anonymous pgs. 162 – 163)

You may be just one man or one woman with this book, but that is at least enough to begin. The reason that is the case is because all things Twelve Step have their beginnings in the Alcoholics Anonymous book.

It will probably require the help of others who know what is in the book to really get beyond just beginning.

The key to all of this is the Alcoholics Anonymous book. The writers of the book intended it to have all the information needed to do whatever it took for them to get the miracle of recovery that was supposed to be impossible for them.

Those of us who live in large cities are overcome by the reflection that close by hundreds are dropping into oblivion every day. Many could recover if they had the opportunity we have enjoyed. How then shall we present that which has been so freely given us?

We have concluded to publish an anonymous volume setting forth the problem as we see it. We shall bring to the task our combined experience and knowledge. This should suggest a useful program for anyone concerned with a drinking problem. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 19)

To show other alcoholics PRECISELY HOW WE HAVE RECOVERED is the main purpose of this book. For them, we hope these pages will prove so convincing that no further authentication will be necessary. (Alcoholics Anonymous – Forward to the First Edition)

Let me get take a slight detour then get to the real point here:

One of the biggest problems that these writers thought we have is the need to have things our own way.

Whatever our protestations, are not most of us concerned with ourselves, our resentments, or our self-pity?

Selfishness – self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 62)

People who are at the worst level of alcoholism/addiction like to do things their own way in spite of what others around them tell them to do. That is one of the major aspects of our sickness. We do crazy stuff that causes all sorts of problems simply because we want to and in spite of what anybody says, proves and even in spite of past terrible results.

This brings us to why there was the need for a book in the first place. There was a need for a standard of information that showed the course for recovery instead of letting people just do whatever they thought would work. Most people who are starting recovery have already tried a few of their own ideas and failed miserably and that is exactly why he or she is in recovery to begin with.

Here are some of the methods we have tried: Drinking beer only, limiting the number of drinks, never drinking alone, never drinking in the morning, drinking only at home, never having it in the house, never drinking during business hours, drinking only at parties, switching from scotch to brandy, drinking only natural wines, agreeing to resign if ever drunk on the job, taking a trip, not taking a trip, swearing off forever (with and without a solemn oath), taking more physical exercise, reading inspirational books, going to health farms and sanitariums, accepting voluntary commitment to asylums – we could increase the list ad infinitum. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 31)

I mention this to clarify the idea that recovery is strongly based on not doing what we want to do or what we think is right but that it hinges on being so desperate to get better that we are willing to do things that we absolutely do not want to do or that we find terribly uncomfortable.

Keeping all of that in mind; I finally get to my point. People in recovery are by nature drawn to cutting corners and doing things incorrectly to keep themselves from being uncomfortable.

If we go through recovery just listening to this person’s and that person’s ideas and concepts of recovery we each will find what we believe is the best way by picking the parts of what each person tells us that we are each most comfortable with. In other words we will use the commentary of others in recovery to search out our own ways to cut corners and do things incorrectly to keep ourselves comfortable.

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 pg. 58)

The fact that people in recovery are usually looking for “easier” ways is not the exception to the rule, it is the rule and must be the rule for getting recovery advice from other individuals.

The only concept that could be used to combat such a universal problem is to come up with a standard of information that could be used both guide a person through recovery and to judge if the information one is getting in recovery is correct or not. There has to be a standard of information that is both the source and measure of all related information.

That is precisely why the alcoholics book was written and why it is a must for all persons pursuing Twelve Step recovery of any kind.

I am regularly astonished by the number of people who I encounter who are either brought to my attention as experts or are self-proclaimed experts that know very little about what is in the Alcoholics Anonymous book.

Many A.A. meetings I have been to have been have been filled with people who are either empty handed or who have brand new, pristine copies of the Alcoholics Anonymous book on their lap (which means they own it, but have never read it).

Often there are one or two people with well worn books who are sitting in these same rooms shaking their heads or rolling their eyes at some of the things people are saying, but politely trying to be supportive of whoever because at least he or she is there and trying.

All of us need to stop it and get back to whatever the standard is supposed to be. Owning an Alcoholics Anonymous book is not enough; we need to read it and learn it (and pass what is in it on to others). We cannot grow in environments where everyone is creating his or her own “softer, easier way” of recovery and expect anything but foolishness.

Let me share a word of warning before you go on however. IN THE LAND OF THE INSANE THE SANE PERSON LOOKS LIKE THE IDIOT!!!!

If you begin to learn what the Alcoholics Anonymous book actually says recovery is, do not suddenly become this angry crusader for truth yelling out page numbers over speakers at meetings. The truth is that many you encounter will not want anything to do with what you have to say simply because it challenges the softer easier path they are on no matter how nice or how rudely you express it to them.

Just share the facts and those who truly are desperate to follow the path that is actually laid out will seek more and will get what they are supposed to be getting. Those that do not care to hear it may be on the path to failure. The bottom line is it is either the Twelve Steps as outlined in the Alcoholics Anonymous book or it is not. Doing whatever you want because it is comfortable to you is not.

Many of us live by the rule “It’s my way or the highway” which means things either go the way I want or something is wrong and has to go. I am proposing almost the dead opposite. Just think of this small statement as the bottom line: MY WAY IS THE GET HIGH WAY!!!

Stay sober my friends,

Wade H.

Normal Drinkers (themiracleisaroundthecorner.wordpress.com)

What Do I Do One Day At a Time?

Picture Collage Maker 2013 Calendar (Photo credit: Squidooer)

When we retire at night, we constructively review our day. Were we resentful, selfish, dishonest or afraid? Do we owe an apology? Have we kept something to ourselves which should be discussed with another person at once? Were we kind and loving toward all? What could we have done better? Were we thinking of ourselves most of the time? (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 86)

In recovery circles, people often throw around the idea of living “one day at a time”. This passage is one of the descriptions of what you do one day at a time and hopefully at some point what you do all of the time. The passage is specifically describing Step 11 and is tied to Step 10, but is way more important than just that. Recovery is not about being able to check twelve boxes that indicate you have completed twelve magic steps and then living happily ever after. Recovery is a process of gaining much more than that:

Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path. Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program, usually men and women who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such unfortunates. They are not at fault; they seem to have been born that way. They are naturally incapable of grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 58)

Recovery is not a matter of just doing a bunch of things; recovery is about “grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty.” The things you do in recovery have been designed to guide you to that end.

Working the Steps is designed to help each of us understand and to develop a way of living your life and that way of living is centered on being brutally honest.

The passage we started with gives us a key example of some of the things we are to be brutally honest about and by being brutally honest about these things on a daily basis we are working on making this the way we live our lives.

According to that passage on page 86, we are learning to live a life:

free of being resentful, selfish, dishonest or afraid
where whenever you have done any of these things or anything that may have hurt another person you apologize to them
where you are open and honest with others about even the deepest and darkest areas of your life and you cease to have those secret destructive areas in your life
where you are kind and loving towards all people
where you not only live positively, but you are always looking for how you can improve
where you no longer focus on how comfortable you are or are not and live a truly unselfish life
where you check on these things in the morning, in the evening and throughout each day to quickly catch when you are messing up in one of these areas and fix the problem immediately.

In other words: RECOVERY IS THE PROCESS OF CHANGE. THE AMOUNT OF RECOVERY YOU EXPERIENCE IS EQUAL TO THE AMOUNT OF POSITIVE CHANGING YOU DO. Areas in your life that you are not willing to change are areas in your life that are keeping you from recovery. UNWILLINGNESS TO CHANGE IS UNWILLINGNESS TO RECOVER. UNWILLINGNESS TO CHANGE IS A DETERMINATION TO STAY THE SAME. If you are determined to stay the same you can only expect the same results. If you stay the same, you will do the same and relapse is inevitable.

Change is an incredibly hard thing to do and few people have the desire to completely change the totality of how they think and act. Most people are willing to change a few particularly bad areas of their lives. Most people just want to change a few isolated areas and somehow live happily ever after somehow getting vastly different results while still living basically the same way they have been.

A key ingredient required for all of this is the “rigorous honesty” that is required for all of these things.

Not only do you need to be brutally honest with yourself about the all of these areas, but you need to regularly talk with others who are brutally honest with you. I don’t mean periodically either. That passage describes discussing these things with these people at once in an effort to gain their outside “rigorous honesty”.

A person who is incapable of this kind of rigorous honesty an particularly those incapable of being brutally honest with themselves are one of those unfortunates that will not experience recovery.

YOU CAN HAVE RECOVERY IF YOU CAN SEARCH FOR, FIND AND ACCEPT THE FACTS THEN DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO CHANGE ACCORDINGLY.

This describes one of the main struggles of recovery while at the same time describing the facts that are the hope for recovery. Recovery is change and change is hard yet can be achieved.

Think of how all of this is tied to “The Promises” you hear recited at many Twelve Step meetings:

We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us – sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 84)

The question is not: “Are these things possible?” The question is, are you willing to work for them. That means are you willing to be brutally honest and are you willing to be completely changed in the process?

Make this year, make each day, make each minute, make each interaction, make even each thought an experience of brutal honesty and an opportunity for significant change in your life. Live the new lifestyle “one day at a time” and one rigorously honest change at a time and have a rigorously honest, happy New Year.

Stay sober my friends,

Wade H.

The New Year’s Change (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Holiday Gatherings: Explain or Avoid (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Treated as an Alcoholic/Addict or Weirdo During the Holidays (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Jan. 9, 2013 – Just for Today (12thstepper.wordpress.com)
Nov. 10, 2012 – Just for Today (cmmacneil.wordpress.com)
Honesty: The Measure of Our Success (realtimerecovery.wordpress.com)
Honesty (marianne365days.wordpress.com)

Past Experience vs. Your Present Experience

Henry Ford once made a wise remark to the effect that experience is the thing of supreme value in life. That is true only if one is willing to turn the past to good account. We grow by our willingness to face and rectify errors and convert them into assets. The alcoholic’s past thus becomes the principal asset of the family and frequently it is almost the only one! (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 124)

Ghosts of Christmas Past (Photo credit: KM&G-Morris) DEAL WITH THE GHOSTS OF YOUR PAST!!!

Something that has to be a change in the way we think for all of this to work is how we see the past. It is astonishing how many people will skirt around truly working the steps as outlined simply to avoid having to look at the darkest areas of their past. The fear of looking at the past makes it clear that what we are calling the “past” is still the present. If it was not a problem in the present, there could be long detailed discussion and the angry, deeply saddened or seriously uncomfortable feelings would not come up.

In other words the things in your past are either resolved or they are not. If they still create some kind of negative emotions, these are still problems. If you find yourself having to manipulate the way you work your steps to avoid even talking about this and that from your past, then those things are some of your deepest unresolved problems in the here and now.

We cannot remain afraid of our past and hide that fact by saying things like: “Nothing can be done about that, why bring it back up” or “I’m over that, I just don’t feel like talking about it” or “Why do I need to talk about that, I’m not the person who did something wrong there” etc.

Then there are those who think that all of this is right and that the people working them through recovery and the people who wrote the Twelve Steps didn’t really understand this particular situation so I just won’t say anything to these people and will not put it on my Fourth or Eighth Steps and ignore it.

For those who are familiar with what are called the Promises, this is the first part of these “Promises.” Did you notice the “We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it.” Part? If you are trying to ignore parts of your past of just act like these major events did not happen, you are heading in the wrong direction. You are choosing to stay in bondage to alcohol/drugs and to painfully limp along to a slow and dragged out, miserable death with nothing but insanity and pain along the way.

A few might be strong enough to get many years of sobriety with this same misery only to eventually find that nothing satisfies your life and eventually relapsing. These may seem like sweeping generalizations, but they do happen to be my observations and also happen to be the point the authors of the Alcoholics Anonymous book are making here.

If you are even beginning to think that you should just not talk about or deal with some things from your past, freak out and begin trying to deal with those specific things with a sponsor right then and there. The freaking out is warranted if you actually grasp the seriousness of the consequences if you do not deal with these things.

THE PAST IS ONLY THE PAST IF THESE THINGS DO NOT AFFECT YOU NEGATIVELY IN THE PRESENT AND WILL NOT IN THE FUTURE!!!

If you need to avoid just talking about something because the feelings that arise are too uncomfortable, then not only are you imprisoned by this thing from your past, but you have left a time bomb in your life that can go off at any moment and destroy you. It will eventually come up and you will probably not be in an environment where you are working through those sorts of things when it does.

Leave no stone unturned, leave no incident from your past off of your inventories and leave no past issue in your life unresolved.

If you deal with all of these things and resolve them to the point where they can come up without those destructive or fearful feelings then the rest of this “Promises” stuff will apply to you (the promises appear at the end of Step Nine in the Alcoholics Anonymous book). You are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. You will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace; and so on.

To set up a better future you will have to deal with those things from the past that are waiting to subtly destroy that future.

A final note to consider about the first passage here is that the passage is speaking of the entire family, not just the alcoholic/addict. If there is to be any healthy growth in the family, all will have to deal with the past until all things are resolved in this manner.

The excuses that “He/she is the alcoholic/addict, I shouldn’t have to do this” is a cop out. You are protecting your own self destroying time bomb that will destroy your family, the person working recovery and possibly you too.

The bottom line:

DEAL WITH IT BEFORE IT DEALS WITH YOU!!!

Stay sober my friends;

Wade H.

The “No Matter What The Consequences” “Go To Any Length” Promises (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
“In The Face Of Expert Opinion To The Contrary, We Have Recovered” (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)

The “No Matter What The Consequences” “Go To Any Length” Promises

The “No Matter What The Consequences” “Go To Any Length” Promises

Simply we tell him that we will never get over drinking until we have done our utmost to straighten out the past. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 77)

I have discussed this before a few times in various ways (see Relapse and Recovery & Change The Past In The Present To Change Your Future. & “In The Face Of Expert Opinion To The Contrary, We Have Recovered”), but it seems to be a never-ending debate (especially with those who are supposed to be working Steps Eight and Nine).

It is always amusing to me how many people ask me, doesn’t the Big Book tell you to, “make amends unless making it will harm you or them?” They always have this look as if I have suddenly had my mind wiped clear of all recovery knowledge when I firmly answer them with a flat-out “NO!” Then they always want to convince me that it does say that. Then I casually refer them to page 79 in the Alcoholics Anonymous book and read:

Reminding ourselves that we have decided to go to any lengths to find a spiritual experience, we ask that we be given strength and direction to do the right thing, no matter what the personal consequences may be. We may lose our position or reputation or face jail, but we are willing. We have to be. We must not shrink at anything. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 79)

Then to page 59 which is the step they are terribly (and possibly fatally) misquoting:

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 59)

The correct quote is “except when to do so would injure THEM or OTHERS. The Step and the book say absolutely nothing about avoiding the making of an amends because it might harm you. As a matter of fact, the passage we looked at from page 79, we are to make all emends, “no matter what the personal consequences may be.”

The conversation itself is an attempt to convince me of a path to recovery that is completely opposite to we are being told.

All those “Promises” that we are all taught through repetition to use as the carrot on our recovery stick. These “Promises” are waved around as the big happy ending for us. The point in our story where we got to the “and he/she lived happily ever after” part.

I am not saying these promises are not true or that they are not a good goal to shoot for. These are the truth and definitely an awesome goal to shoot for. The problem is that people miss the fine print. The disclaimer like the mumbling at the end of a commercial that tells you what is really going on with this contest, free gift or potential side effects of this medication.

The fine print that so easily slips by particularly clear in the first sentence of the paragraph containing these “Promises”.

If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 83)

For some of you that are reading this, it is not the first time you hear me discussing this, but it is important to ask yourself; “Which phase of my development is the “this phase” that is described here?” That is because the promises are only for those who are painstaking about that “this phase”.

But before we get to that lets look at another passage that many of us may be familiar with, but often miss what it is really saying. The paragraph after the paragraph containing the promises:

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us – sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 84)

Notice the “work for them” part. If there is a “this phase of our development” then that is really the focus of what we are working hard at to get these “Promises”.

The next two sentences are a change of thought but also a continuation of the same thought.

This thought brings us to Step Ten, which suggests we continue to take personal inventory and continue to set right any new mistakes as we go along. We vigorously commenced this way of living as we cleaned up the past. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 84)

The change of thought is that we are transitioning from a discussion about Step Nine and moving into a discussion about Step Ten. The continuation of the same thought is the fact that it states that you started to really work on your Step Ten as you were working on your Step Nine.

Making your amends is not just a step you check a box for, it is a major part of starting your new “way of living”. If you only do a partial job of making amends, you only do a partial job of starting your new way of living. That means that the amends you leave out has left behind some of the old you and that is the old you that will drive you to do what the old you does. That means a relapse or other fits of stupid.

IF YOU ARE PAINSTAKING ABOUT STEP NINE – NO MATTER WHAT THE PERSONAL CONSEQUENCES MAY BE – THEN THE PROMISES ARE WHAT ARE BEING PROMISED TO YOU! That does not mean however that not getting beat-up, not getting yelled at, not getting spit on, not going to jail etc. are promised to you. Those are contained on the promises. Freedom that comes from being an entirely new you is what is promised unless you only do a partial job of starting your new way of living.

So, to answer that question once-and-for-all (yeah right, someone will read this and immediately try to tell me I am not reading it right): There is no passage that says to make amends unless it might hurt you or make you uncomfortable.

In fact the amends that will have the most effect in your life are the ones that are the most uncomfortable and the most risky.

That whole concept that you don’t do it if it is somehow uncomfortable or risky is a lie from the darkness of your root problem:

Selfishness – self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 62)

Not making amends to someone you did something to is totally about protecting yourself from physical harm or from being emotionally hurt in some way. It is a completely selfish act. If you have so latched on to the root of your problem you are locked on to the very thing which is destroying you, but you don’t want to let go.

There are awesome promises for you, but only if you are painstaking bout making ALL OF YOUR AMENDS!!!

If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us – sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them.

Stay Sober My Friends,

Wade H.

Getting The Right Glasses on the Right Way (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
“In The Face Of Expert Opinion To The Contrary, We Have Recovered” (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)

Are You Ready (Do You Know You Are Drowning?)???

Are You Ready (Do You Know You Are Drowning?)??????

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. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 58)

If you are trying to get or hoping to get recovery, then you absolutely need to ponder these two thoughts.

Do you want what we have and if so
Are you willing to do anything, including some things you absolutely do not want to do, to get the lifestyle of freedom we have.

These questions are vital to any hope of recovery.

Over the past few weeks I have encountered an inordinate amount of people that are trying to begin recovery who are court ordered or otherwise brought to recovery by another individual. When I see people like this I usually wonder what their answer to these two questions is.

I heard one fellow, when asked if he considered himself desperate say that he didn’t know. My immediate first thoughts were, “If you do not know if you’re desperate or not; you probably are not.” A desperate person usually knows that he/she is desperate.

I have discussed this previously, but desperation is key to being willing to do all of the uncomfortable, unpleasant and sometimes outright scary things that are asked of you in recovery. For example:

People who are not desperate will not be thorough and honest about their Fourth Steps. There will always be some things that are left off of it, minimized, softened or only partially described on it.
People who are not desperate will not have the strength or desire to make amends to the people that are hardest to make amends to.
People who are not desperate will not take a brutally honest look at themselves as it is too painful.

Desperation is the motivation to go towards and fight through the most uncomfortable parts of working through recovery.

We, in our turn, sought the same escape with all the desperation of drowning men. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 28)

That is desperation: The desperation a drowning person for oxygen. In light of this example, the idea of being desperate and not realizing you are desperate is a completely foolish idea. If a drowning person was somehow completely unaware of how desperate the situation is, that person would have no motivation to seek air.

“I probably need air, but I can probably wait.”
“Yeah I know I need air and could drown, but I’m just not ready yet.”
“I wish I could be desperate for air like other drowning people, but I just can’t see it like them.”
“Yeah, I know I need air, but I’m not like those other drowning people”

All of that sounds really silly. Well that is how the idea of recovery without understanding the concept of how desperate you are sounds. This understanding of desperation is a big part of working Step One and is necessary to even begin the Twelve Steps.

For those of us who sponsor others or are looking to sponsor others, this is an extremely important concept. It is how you are to know if somebody is even ready for you to work with them. Look at this passage explaining how to get sponsees:

Do not be discouraged if your prospect does not respond at once. Search out another alcoholic and try again. You are sure to find someone desperate enough to accept with eagerness what you offer. We find it a waste of time to keep chasing a man who cannot or will not work with you. If you leave such a person alone, he may soon become convinced that he cannot recover by himself. To spend too much time on any one situation is to deny some other alcoholic an opportunity to live and be happy. One of our Fellowship failed entirely with his first half dozen prospects. He often says that if he had continued to work on them, he might have deprived many others, who have since recovered, of their chance. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 96)

The implications of this passage are that if a person is not desperate there is no sense in working with that person. That person is better off being released to discover how desperate his or her situation is.

On a deeper level, if you are willing to give of your time, your life and your knowledge to someone why invest all that effort on a person who is not ready. What about the people who are ready that cannot find someone to help them while you are off wasting time with someone who is not truly ready. It’s literally letting a desperate person who could be saved die slowly while you are trying to save a person who doesn’t want to be saved.

If you are a sponsor or otherwise work with people in recovery, this must be a major consideration. If a person does not have this level of desperation for recovery you have to try to get that person to understand how desperate his/her situation is. If that person cannot reach that level of desperation, you have to be strong enough to let that person go and hopefully get that understanding through life experience.

If you are a friend or loved one who is trying to help a person who needs recovery then trying to make that person work recovery in a way that he/she is not interested in is expecting that person to succeed in recovery without that desperation. That person has to realize how desperate he/she already is and you can try to explain it to him/her. If you cannot talk that person into that understanding then you may have to use what many people call “tough love” to help that person understand. That does not mean punishing that person, but that does mean letting the person suffer from the natural consequences of his/her actions.

If that person get’s locked up, he/she needs to find bail elsewhere. If you told that person that, “Next time you are out” then the next time you have to put that person out. If every time you give that person money for something responsible that money disappears, you are going to have to stop giving him/her money etc. all of that in the hope that he/she will realize that he/she desperately needs recovery at all costs.

That is what people are describing when they use the term “hitting bottom”. The understanding that the pain of staying the same is greater than the pain of going through recovery.

If you are the person that is starting recovery or even if you have been working recovery, you need to look at your own desperation and ask yourself are you this kind of “ready” for recovery. That requires some deep honesty and searching and if you cannot say a definitive “yes”, that means some deep changing of your entire mindset is necessary.

It may seem like we are telling you that complete misery must be a part of someone’s life before recovery is possible and that only the miserable recover. In some ways that is true, but it is not the misery that is key; it is the desperation which in many cases can only be realized when miserable. That misery can force a person to realize that he/she wants change and more importantly make that person desperate to get it. Then that person is ready to take the steps.

Stay sober my friends…

Wade H.

Darkness, Powerlessness, and the Dawn (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Tolerance, Patience and Good Will (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
How to Not Poison Your World In Bad Times (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Only Two Options – Sober or Not Sober! (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
May 4, 2012 – Just for Today (cmmacneil.wordpress.com)

Relapse and Recovery

Relapse and Recovery

Trembling, I stepped from the hospital a broken man. Fear sobered me for a bit. Then came the insidious insanity of that first drink, and on Armistice Day 1934, I was off again. Everyone became resigned to the certainty that I would have to be shut up somewhere, or would stumble along to a miserable end. How dark it is before the dawn! In reality that was the beginning of my last debauch. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 8)

Some time later, and just as he thought he was getting control of his liquor situation, he went on a roaring bender. For him, this was the spree that ended all sprees. He saw that he would have to face his problems squarely that God might give him mastery.

One morning he took the bull by the horns and set out to tell those he feared what his trouble had been. He found himself surprisingly well received, and learned that many knew of his drinking. Stepping into his car, he made the rounds of people he had hurt. He trembled as he went about, for this might mean ruin, particularly to a person in his line of business.

At midnight he came home exhausted, but very happy. He has not had a drink since. As we shall see, he now means a great deal to his community, and the major liabilities of thirty years of hard drinking have been repaired in four. (Alcoholics Anonymous pgs. 155 – 156)

These tidbits of recovery stories are from the story of Bill W. and Dr. Bob (founding members of Alcoholics Anonymous and the Twelve Steps) respectively. The point here is that a relapse in recovery is not a death sentence (not necessarily a death sentence, there are people who relapse and die).

I am not a fan of the idea that relapse is a part of recovery, because although the point is not to say that everyone has to relapse to recover, that is what most people hear. In other words, the idea that relapse is a part of recovery can be used as an opportunistic excuse to destroy your own recovery.

On the other hand, I think that there are cases (as the examples of Bill W. and Dr. Bob demonstrate) where a relapse clarifies how desperate and powerless you really are and forces a person to desperately seek recovery in way that was otherwise impossible. In other words the relapse forces the person to work recovery with enough seriousness for it to finally work.

That is not to say that you should relapse to make your recovery work better; that is like telling a suicidal person to shoot himself in the head to get over being suicidal. But a person who almost kills himself/herself and survives sometimes might finally realize how serious the problem is and desperately seek help.

Some of us have relapsed since starting recovery and a few of us may have just relapsed and be in the process of considering what to do now. Well, the relapse is a terrible stumble and fall in recovery, but that does not mean you have to lie there until you die. In the second example above, Dr. Bob was going through a bunch of recovery stuff and getting it. He felt better and was remaining sober, but then had a terrible relapse.

The key is what he did next: He finally “saw that he would have to face his problems squarely.” Dr. Bob had decided that he had to face a part of recovery that he had refused to do prior to this:

When our friend related his experience, the man agreed that no amount of will power he might muster could stop his drinking for long. A spiritual experience, he conceded, was absolutely necessary, but the price seemed high upon the basis suggested. He told how he lived in constant worry about those who might find out about his alcoholism. He had, of course, the familiar alcoholic obsession that few knew of his drinking. Why, he argued, should he lose the remainder of his business, only to bring still more suffering to his family by foolishly admitting his plight to people from whom he made his livelihood? He would do anything, he said, but that. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 155)

Dr. Bob was willing to do anything at all in recovery except for what is now known as Steps 8 and 9 which deal with making amends. Dr. Bob had gotten stuck on Step 8; he was not willing to make amends to them all.

Due to his relapse he suddenly realized that the pain of continuing to use until his world was completely annihilated was far greater than the pain he faced from making amends. He finally became desperate enough to do anything to get sobriety even though that is the idea we are supposed to be going into recovery with.

Now we go out to our fellows and repair the damage done in the past. We attempt to sweep away the debris which has accumulated out of our effort to live on self-will and run the show ourselves. If we haven’t the will to do this, we ask until it comes. Remember it was agreed at the beginning we would go to any lengths for victory over alcohol. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 76)

This passage (which is actually discussing Steps 8 & 9) reminds us that we start recovery with the idea that I am willing to do anything to get better. The idea that “I am desperate and do not have the power to stop myself and am desperate enough t do anything to get better.” This is the starting point of recovery.

If you do not start with this mindset, you are in deep trouble from the beginning. Recovery is going to require that you face and do things that are terribly uncomfortable. Some of these things both your conscious and unconscious mind are constantly trying to keep you from facing in any way. If you are not desperate, when the time comes to face these things you avoid these things and in actuality we often desperately run from these things at all costs.

If you start with this desperation mindset, there is a point for each of us where we reach something that seems to be too much to ask. This is really a test of the desperation that is the fuel that powers your recovery work. Some of us run from recovery at this point, some of us hide it and pretend (ex: Pretend to have listed all the people I need to make amends to, but leave off the ones I don’t want to do or lie and say I made an amends I did not really make etc.), some of us get stuck in some way or other.

A relapse can be a wakeup call to you. YOU CANNOT CUT CORNERS IN RECOVERY FOR ANY REASON.

If you have relapsed, let it be a reality check and do whatever it takes to get better no matter what.

My father used to always tell me that there are two ways people learn:

People learn from their own mistakes
People learn from the mistakes of others

If you are in recovery and have not relapsed, think of how many people (some stronger than you) thinking the same things you are thinking right now have relapsed. Consider those people and let their example help you understand your own desperation so that that can be the fuel to face the uncomfortable and sometimes painful process of recovery as if your very life depends upon it working. The truth is that your very life does depend upon it working.

Stay Sober My Friends…

Wade H.

Change The Past In The Present To Change Your Future.

Change The Past In The Present To Change Your Future.

Simply we tell him that we will never get over drinking until we have done our utmost to straighten out the past. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 77)

Dealing with “the past.” On hearing these words or pondering this concept many people immediately find resistance rise up from deep within themselves.

“Why do we have to talk about things that happened a long time ago?”

“I don’t think about those things, why bring them back up?”

“The past is not my problem; it’s the stuff going on now?”

..and on and on.

These kinds of thoughts and statements are common for those of us trying to get through recovery, but simply are another part of the problem that must be solved.

To start simply: If your “past” affects the way you act, interact with others, think etc. in the present then it is not really your past. It is your present!

You do not have to be in constant conscious thought about things from your past for these things to have a profound effect on your present. Something like an abusive first relationship can change the way you see the opposite sex, dating, relationships, marriage, and yourself even if you refuse to let yourself have any thoughts about that person or that relationship. Another example could be growing in a terribly abusive home with abusive parents. A person might refuse to spend any time pondering his or her childhood or parents but is completely misled if he or she thinks those things do not have a major influence on how he or she interacts with others. Every relationship and interaction this person has will have some influence from this sort of childhood and it is foolish to deal with major problems in this person’s life and not touch on the the root reasons behind the thoughts and behaviors.

On the other hand, camping out in the past is not a solution either. There is far more to recovery and in fact growth of any kind than just looking at the past, but to not deal with these things is to leave a huge hole in any recovery through which “crazy” can creep into our lives through.

The passage we are talking about here is not only talking about looking at the past, it describes doing everything that is humanly possible to fix these things. Step 4 is where we look at the more destructive things from our past (particularly those we prefer not to think about or deal with). Step five is where someone else helps us to take a deeper look at these things and admit the truth behind my problems in these situations.

Steps 8 and 9 are where we not only deal with these things from the standpoint of what is going on inside of each of us, bet we actually go to the people involved and undo our part in all of this.

For some hearing this or reading this the idea is unfathomable. How are you expected to take the craziness of the people that hurt you the most and turn it into your problem and go try to fix it? That is a valid concern if we were talking about taking someone else’s crazy and simply converting it into something to blame yourself for and running back to them crying about how sorry you are. That however, is not what we are talking about here.

Though a situation had not been entirely our fault, we tried to disregard the other person involved entirely. Where were we to blame? The inventory was ours, not the other man’s. When we saw our faults we listed them. We placed them before us in black and white. We admitted our wrongs honestly and were willing to set these matters straight. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 67)

I don’t want to travel to far into too many of the Steps as it would take us down way too many “rabbit trails” but, our recovery is about fixing the “us” not the “them.” Your recovery is about fixing “you” not about fixing everybody else so you can finally stay sober.

In other words, if your idea of a Fourth Step is writing a list of what is wrong with a bunch of other people and your idea of a Fifth Step is to take some time to talk to someone else about what is wrong with a bunch of other people, you are not working “Steps” or working in recovery. You are simply complaining.

The way you see these situations is a huge part of the problem and writing that mess down and vomiting it all over some other person is not a “fix” for how you see these things.

Let me slow down and break this down a bit:

Lets see that you have a huge trauma like someone you care about being shot and killed in front of you. Acting like you can really convince yourself it never happened (“I just don’t think about it”) is an outright lie. The idea that you can just “suck it up and deal with it” is a Band-Aid placed on a major injury. (There is a place for this mindset but it is simply a temporary and unsustainable short-term solution to a long-term problem).

The idea that you are not going to think about this event ever again and feel some of the associated negative emotions etc. is foolish. It will come up again and it will somehow influence your world when it does. The challenge is not trying to get it not to come up again. You will never be successful. Even if you convince yourself it isn’t coming up again, you are probably just disguising it when it does come up as something else.

The truth is you have to somehow change the way you see this even when the memories or related emotions do come up again. In other words you have to deal with and change the way you see these things so that when they do come up the effect they have on you is different. Much of the change that has to be done in our lives is the changing of our own perspectives and perceptions. The other activities such as the amends we make in Steps 8 and 9 are simply a test of how much we really have changed those perspectives and perceptions. As a matter of fact if a person’s perspectives and perceptions are changed in the way we are describing here then making amends would be a logical next step and wouldn’t even need to be described as a separate step or steps.

The main points here are:

If you are a heavy user of drugs or alcohol then no stone of your past may remain unturned. If you are having major problems of any kind in your life then assume there is no past as everything is potentially affecting you negatively now (in the present).
Other people do crazy things that are hurtful to us and that is in fact their problem. How you see these things and if they negatively influence the way you think and act now is your problem. As such, they are responsible for dealing with their part and you do not control that. You however, are responsible for dealing with your part (YES THAT MEANS DEALING WITH YOUR PART OF THEIR CRAZY BECAUSE THEIR CRAZY HAS SPREAD INTO YOUR CRAZY AS IF CONTAGIOUS)
We look at what other people do or did to us while we are in recovery not to somehow “fix” them or to simply feel better because we talked about this stuff, but to find what we need to “fix” about ourselves.
If you are uncomfortable with (or outright afraid of) looking at something “from the past” or resistant to seeing particular situations differently that is often an indicator that this might be one of the more important situations from your past that you need to look at and deal with.
Just “sucking it up” and “just dealing with it” may be a part of the process but is triage (stopping the bleeding) so you can deal with these things later. If you stop there you are just kicking the “craziness” can down the road to come up again later.
You have to fix the past in the present as part of changing your future.
You are not to camp in the past, but you do need to go to the past and change your view and your part (or secretly you are still camped there).

Please don’t let discomfort with dealing with your past stop your recovery!!! I leave you with these words from the Alcoholics Anonymous book:

We went back through our lives. Nothing counted but thoroughness and honesty. When we were finished we considered it carefully. The first thing apparent was that this world and its people were often quite wrong. To conclude that others were wrong was as far as most of us ever got. The usual outcome was that people continued to wrong us and we stayed sore. (Alcoholics Anonymous pgs. 65 – 66)

Wade H.

Am I Willing To Let Go (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
“The Watch Four” to Watch For! (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
To Be Selfish Or Not to Be; That Is The Question!!! (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
To Be Selfish Or Not to Be; That Is The Question!!! Part – 2 (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
To Be Selfish Or Not to Be; That Is The Question!!! Part – 3 (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)

Recovery: Change of Heart, Thought and Attitude

Recovery: Change of Heart, Thought and Attitude

…it should be pointed out that physical treatment is but a small part of the picture. Though you are providing him with the best possible medical attention, he should understand that he must undergo a change of heart. To get over drinking will require a transformation of thought and attitude. We all had to place recovery above everything, for without recovery we would have lost both home and business. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg 143)

Recovery is not just about doing things and being able to check the boxes that mean you did each thing. Recovery requires a complete change of:

Heart
Thought &
Attitude

Recovery requires not only a change in the way you think but a change of why you think the way you think. Many people believe that the way recovery works is to live the rest of your life thinking the same way and simply ignoring the self-destructive thoughts. Others believe that in recovery you will stay basically the same person but your thinking will somehow change in spite of being the same.

If you are going to change your thoughts and attitude you are going to have to change the reasons you have those thoughts and attitudes. What I am getting at is the fact that if you are very advanced in addiction/alcoholism you either change completely or you stay the same. You cannot think the same way and do different things (for very long).

YOU ARE EITHER CHANGED OR YOU ARE THE SAME AND IF YOU ARE THE SAME YOU SHOULD EXPECT THE SAME RESULTS.

Think of those of us at the worst levels of addiction/alcoholism who try to quit on our own. We know that quitting means not doing it again. We decide to quit and are firmly resolved to staying abstinent. Yet suddenly we use again. In some of these instances we tell ourselves some insanely trivial reason why this particular time does not count as relapse even though we know that any use at all means I have no longer quit. The problem is not just what happens after I start using. The bigger problem is my attitudes and thoughts immediately before I use again. What was going on in my mind that made me think it was okay to do something I was firmly resolved not to do? Something that I knew to be so self destructive and so destructive to all of those around me.

So we shall describe some of the mental states that precede a relapse into drinking, for obviously this is the crux of the problem.

What sort of thinking dominates an alcoholic who repeats time after time the desperate experiment of the first drink? (Alcoholics Anonymous pg 35)

But there was always the curious mental phenomenon that parallel with our sound reasoning there inevitably ran some insanely trivial excuse for taking the first drink. Our sound reasoning failed to hold us in check. The insane idea won out. Next day we would ask ourselves, in all earnestness and sincerity, how it could have happened. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg 37)

“Our sound reasoning failed to hold us in check. The insane idea won out.” Whatever happens at the moment we decide to use cannot even be called sane and definitely cannot be considered a time when we are in control.

If we do not change the entire basis of why we think the things we think, we will still end up thinking the same thoughts. This change is the basis of recovery and should be the desired result also.

Many of us who frequent Alcoholics Anonymous meetings hear this stated regularly and often miss or ignore this fact. For example, if you are familiar with something called “The Promises” one of them is:

Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg 84)

That is a desired result and in the list of promises it is really the summary of some of the results of this change of attitude and outlook.

Why is all of this important? The truth is that if you are going to gain this new footing for your thoughts and attitude to stand on, you will need to be willing to let go of your old footing. To have a change of heart, the old heart has to be removed to allow the change to happen.

A huge goal for your recovery is to not only change who you are, but to change why you are who you are.

If the reasons you do and even think thinks you think have led you to do things that destroy your life and the lives of those around you then those reasons are probably wrong. You probably need new reasons!

IN RECOVERY, IF YOU ARE NOT CHANGED; YOU ARE THE SAME AND CAN EXPECT THE SAME RESULTS.

In the Alcoholics Anonymous book, Carl Jung is quoted as having put it this way:

The doctor said: “You have the mind of a chronic alcoholic. I have never seen one single case recover, where that state of mind existed to the extent that it does in you.” Our friend felt as though the gates of hell had closed on him with a clang.

He said to the doctor, “Is there no exception?”

“Yes,” replied the doctor, “there is. Exceptions to cases such as yours have been occurring since early times. Here and there, once in a while, alcoholics have had what are called vital spiritual experiences. To me these occurrences are phenomena. They appear to be in the nature of huge emotional displacements and rearrangements. Ideas, emotions, and attitudes which were once the guiding forces of the lives of these men are suddenly cast to one side, and a completely new set of conceptions and motives begin to dominate them. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 27)

Recovery is going to require that you have “huge emotional displacements and rearrangements.” Ideas, emotions, and attitudes which were once the guiding forces of your life have to be cast to one side, and a completely new set of conceptions and motives must begin to dominate you.

That is the change of:

Heart
Thought &
Attitude

Are you open to that? That is what recovery must look like if you expect it to work! Being able to say you did this or that will not keep you sober if each these things do not lead to change in your life.

“CHANGE IS A CONSTANT. THOSE WHO REFUSE TO CHANGE TO BE BETTER WILL BE FORCED TO BE CHANGED TO BE WORSE”

Wade H.

Recovery: More Than Information and Memories (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
“The Watch Four” to Watch For! (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Is Your Recovery Pointless? What is the Point? (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)
Are You Willing??? (wadehrecoverynetwork.wordpress.com)

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