Everywhere
you go, there you are!
Recovery Journal
January, 2000
Reprinted with kind permission
While working with a couple of women I sponsor, I was reminded of the
thousands of ways I have tried to hide from myself in my life, though
my addictions. I flashed back to how I felt, “the morning after the
night before,” as I would turn in a drunken fog, in strange bed, with
a strange man, and scram inside that I had “done it again.” On more
than one occasion, as I skipped from one addiction to another,
practicing each one with great zeal, I would put my head I my hands,
shaking in terror asking, “how did I get here, again?” The question
always made me sick with remorse, self pity, self loathing, confusion,
anxiety, and depression.
How could I be traveling on this train again, roaring down the tracks,
on the express train hell. Why? Why? I didn’t matter if I was
overeating, overspending, drinking or acting out in all sorts of
strange ways, I always inevitably faced the same person in the mirror
day after day, with the same horrible feelings. “I can’t do this
anymore,” I would say. “Enough is enough, no more!” I would vow.
Hundreds, maybe thousands of times, I would swear to quit for good
this time. The end! I pleaded for God to help me.
Most of the time I was in such unbelievable pain that I would have
done anything to alleviate it. So, God would help me He would guide me
to the right page in a book, the right part of a conversation with
someone that would give me some insight and I would breathe a sigh of
relief. “So, that’s the answer.” Quickly I would scurry about trying
to change my ways with all the determination that I could muster. This
was not surrender, this was WAR! If it took true grit, I would grit my
teeth and get on with the business of “being good.” Step on the
scales, how much did I really weigh? Look at the bottle, how much did
I really drink the night before? Open the bills, how much was I really
in debt? If ‘he’ called, I would not answer.
Finally I was left with me, myself and I, to do battle with ME. I was
my own worse enemy and I was determined, to kill her ugly spirit, that
had put me on this terrible path. I was going to annihilate all those
bad feelings, that remorse, humiliation, self pity and self loathing.
I was going to win over the darkness that forced me to do all these
things to myself. I was going to win this battle between the forces of
good and evil.
A couple weeks into the battle, as the pain started to lessen victory
as assured. “There, all I needed was one decisive battle, and the
demons would die,” I would say to myself. Two months away from the
booze and drugs and the world began to look a little brighter. Thirty
pounds later and by golly my shape started to come back. Six weeks
away from ‘what’s his name’ and my life was starting to be manageable.
I was rounding the corner, coming down the home stretch. It might have
taken others a lifetime to slew this dragon but I was made of stronger
stuff. I could do this in a couple months and then get on with my new
life.
With my new confidence, I would advise anyone who would listen on how
to do this thing that I was battling and be victorious. Maybe I could
write a book about it, 101 Ways to Stop Drinking, Smoking, Overeating,
and Overspending. I could travel the country spreading the gospel
according to Barbara. What a concept! The further away I walked away
from my compulsions, the easier it was to take all the credit and
consider it a cake walk. My ego had a field day, basking in the
limelight of apparent victory. I was higher than and drink, pill,
credit card or candy could ever take me.
Everywhere you go, there you are! Part Two~ Barbara L. Harding
There is a pivotal period of time in the A.A. program usually the
first 90 days, which we call, “The Pink Cloud or the Honeymoon Phase.”
“Phase” is the operative word here. Anyone who has ever gone through
this phase and relapsed, knows how fleeting those feelings of victory
are. What’s around the next corner for us after the ‘honeymoon phase’
is us…staring us in the face.
Striped of our drug of choice, when we finally meet ourselves, maybe
for the first time, coming around the corner, and it’s startling.
Without our drug of choice we run head long into who and what we
really are, and it ain’t pretty. This is when we really begin the work
that will last a life time. We realize that our disease is us. It does
not live outside us, it cannot be physically removed, it lives deep
inside our soul. It is not in the bottle, or in the pill or the credit
card or in the candy. They are merely pawns.
We are the disease and our thoughts created every thing we did. Our
physical disease can be triggered by the drink or the pill or the
credit card or the candy, but our mental disease is a lot more
illusive. Those little itsy-bitsy thoughts start in motion a
locomotive bent on self destruction that gathers steam slowly. With
each ‘chug’ the engine of self destruction, gathers more and more
steam until we were nearly unstoppable. We roar through homes and
neighborhoods and factories and office buildings and cities and states
wreaking havoc wherever we go. And it all starts with that disease,
that thinking disease of addiction.
An old timer once said to me, “once you put down the drink, then you
have a thinking disease.” I did not fully understand the impact of his
works of wisdom until I suffered the devastating affects of my long
term thinking as I crashed in despair. Our thoughts skim the bottom of
our mind and find all sorts of things to attach to. Once on the
surface, those thoughts stink with resentment. They are drenched with
sarcasm and self pity. They will drive us to use again and again and
again. They will tell us that we are justified in our anger and self
pity. They paint a picture that it’s hard not to believe.
The truth is I can never escape myself. I will always take me with me.
What a simple concept. How come it’s so hard to truly understand?
This program of recovery is not for cowards.
For it asks us to go where few dare to tread. It asks us to go deep
into our thoughts and feelings and ask the question, “Why? “Why” do I
feel that way? “Why” do I think those thoughts? “Why” is the sword,
that slices through my thinking. It stops me in my tracks. It takes
the wind out of my sails and makes me think.
Addiction is a thinking disease, and just as thinking caused my
insanity, only thinking can save me.
I can choose to be at war with my will, or I can surrender to my
Higher Power. I can be at war with my thoughts or I can embrace them
and turn them around in a different direction.
My addiction will be with me for the rest of my life. It is who and
what I am. It is my greatest adversary and my greatest asset. It has
given me the ability to love myself and others. It has connected me
with the human race and with a Higher Power.
Yes, everywhere I go, there I am, thank God.
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