"The future looks dark no more. I do not even look at it, except when necessary to make plans. I try to let the future take care of itself. The future will be made up of todays and todays, stretching out as short as now and as long as eternity."
The guy who led the meeting talked about taking one of those tests with 15 or 20 questions that help you decide if you have a drinking problem or not. Like all alcoholics he lied repeatedly but still qualified as a problem drinker. Why are we all amazed when this happens? I think I answered in the affirmative on every question except for the one about car accidents and DUIs which - amazingly enough - I avoided. People who don't have a drinking problem don't wonder if they have a drinking problem. They don't think about drinking any more than they think about pasta.
Help is what someone needs and not what I want to give them. The leader talked about the intense discomfort he felt when he was in a social situation in early sobriety. We can all identify with that feeling that we didn't quite belong, that we didn't quite get it, that we were in the bathroom when the instruction manuals for life were being passed out. Most of us that stay sober learn to soldier through this discomfort, often by doing things with other alcoholics so we can fuck up and not pay serious consequences. He was playing cards at his sponsor's house one evening and excused himself for a minute to get something to drink. When he came back his sponsor said: "Next time maybe ask if you can get anyone else anything." He didn't start the conversation by saying: "Hey, you selfish asshole . . . " This guy wasn't doing anything deliberately wrong - he had just spent his entire life thinking about himself. It just never occurred to him to consider the feelings of anyone else.
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