Tolerance, Patience and Good Will
We have begun to learn tolerance, patience and good will toward all men, even our enemies, for we look on them as sick people. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 70)
Love and tolerance of others is our code. And we have ceased fighting anything or anyone – even alcohol. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 84)
This change is a huge one for many of us in recovery, but is often overlooked as part of the process. Tolerance, patience and goodwill towards all especially those we would think of as enemies is a very tall order.
The ideas of having intolerance, having impatience and not showing good will toward all men all fall back to a concept that I repeatedly go back too:
Selfishness – self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 62)
Having intolerance, having impatience and not showing good will toward all men are all hinged on the idea that the world is somehow put here to keep you comfortable. As if it is somehow the duty of every person on earth and of everything that happens to ensure that I am never made uncomfortable. If something does make me uncomfortable, I either have to express that discomfort to the world around me or to those involved in some way. Or there is the other unhealthy extreme: If something makes me uncomfortable, I will keep it to myself (along with everything else that has ever made me uncomfortable) and let these feelings pile up until I become some uncomfortable with so many things that I can hardly stand to wake up in the morning.
Both of these extremes are terribly destructive to any hope of recovery and are directly tied to one of the deepest problems all of us who are alcoholics/addicts suffer from: “Selfishness – self-centeredness”!!! Here is a rather blunt newsflash:
THE WORLD AND ALL OF THE PEOPLE IN IT WERE NOT PUT HERE TO KEEP YOU COMFORTABLE!!!!
That means that big part of what we have to learn in recovery is that there are things, people and times in life where we are each going to be uncomfortable and it needs to be okay.
An awesome marriage or dating relationship most often begins with some awkward and uncomfortable conversation when the two meet and a marriage usually starts with a risky proposal and the potential for terrible rejection.
An amazing athlete at some point nervously stepped into the ring, onto the field, into the arena, onto the court, etc. for the first time with great discomfort.
The greatest scholars in the world most often become that way by years of challenging schoolwork and research that monopolizes all of their time and energy.
Even the process of getting to all of the promises of recovery involves a trip through a great deal of discomfort, not the least of which is learning to be empowered by discomfort instead of avoiding it at all costs.
As a matter of fact, everything that will lead you to greatness is tied to some level of discomfort. The new mindset has to be to embrace the necessary discomforts and to properly deal with the unnecessary discomforts.
In the passages quoted above, we are speaking specifically about people who make you uncomfortable and the exact same ideas apply. Some people who make you uncomfortable are actually providing the good kind of discomfort. Some are providing kind of discomfort that you need.
A healthy parent, for example, will not keep a child comfortable at all times. A child who is allowed to do whatever he or she feels no matter what is a child that will not learn what is needed for a successful life. A child who constantly hits other children needs to be made uncomfortable to understand that hitting is okay. That may mean just being told not to do what he or she feels comfortable doing or may be as dramatic as spanking, but discomfort is part of the process.
A good or a productive sponsor is not going to let you only do what you are comfortable with. As a matter of fact, if you are truly and alcoholic/addict the mere idea of being abstinent to work through recovery is terribly uncomfortable and everyone trying to help is directing you to and through this uncomfortable experience.
How much of the discomfort you get from others is actually needed for you to grow or is retaliation for something you have done to them in the first place.
Selfishness – self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us, seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past we have made decisions based on self which later placed us in a position to be hurt. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 62)
One more has to do with the occasional occurrence where a person makes you uncomfortable, hurts you in some way or outright ticks you off for no apparent reason. Is it possible that that person is suffering in some way or is somehow emotionally/mentally sick in some way?
Those who are familiar with Steps 8 and 9 will understand that a big part of working those steps is getting people to see that you were sick when you made them uncomfortable or hurt them and you are in the process of getting better. For some of the people we made uncomfortable or who we hurt that is a lot to ask of them, but by the time you are doing those steps, you should know that this is the truth. Is it possible that some of the people who make you uncomfortable or who hurt you are sick in the same way you are/were and simply have not gotten better yet. This is what the first passage we quoted from page 70 was describing:
We have begun to learn tolerance, patience and good will toward all men, even our enemies, for we look on them as sick people. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 70)
Maybe it would be far less selfish and self-centered to try to help such people get better rather than to try to force them to keep you comfortable. The least you could do (assuming you are trying to not be as selfish and self-centered) is to be tolerant and patient with them knowing that they may be suffering as you have been.
This is a concept that is deeply involved in working your 4th and 5th Steps. The quote from page 70 in the Alcoholics Anonymous book is in a passage describing how you know when you are completed with a thorough personal inventory. In other words you are not completed with your Step 4 (and definitely not completed with your Step 5) if you have not “begun to learn tolerance, patience and good will toward all men, even our enemies”. If you were under the impression that you had done a thorough Step 4 or Ste p 5 and you have not seen or experienced this sort of change in yourself, you have missed something incredibly important to your recovery and to your life. This is one of the key building blocks of building the new you.
To get different results in your life, you will have to be a different person. To get new results in your life, you will have to be a new person.
After all a huge part of the whole recovery process is getting this new attitude. At the end of the information about Step 4 the idea that a new attitude is a key goal of Step 4 is made completely clear:
Having made our personal inventory, what shall we do about it? We have been trying to get a new attitude, a new relationship with our Creator, and to discover the obstacles in our path. We have admitted certain defects; we have ascertained in a rough way what the trouble is; we have put our finger on the weak items in our personal inventory. (Alcoholics Anonymous pg. 72)
In most cases not having enough tolerance, patience, or not showing enough goodwill toward all men (and women) are key obstacles in our path and list key attitudes that must be changed.
Stay Sober My Friends;
Wade H.
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