"We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same." Carlos Castaneda
I cannot yell at anyone in recovery any more. We're not stupid - we know what we're doing, at least in a vague and peripheral way. If I tell someone who is smoking meth that it's probably not a good idea no one is going to say: "Really! Wow, I never thought of that! Thanks for pointing that out!" This week a woman asked me to give her daughter - who is struggling to stay sober - a hard time, shake her up, yell at her. "Sorry," I said. "Not my style." I just can't do it anymore. Not that I ever did it much, but the people I find myself drawn to in The Rooms are generally so hard on themselves that I can't bring myself to heap on more. Most of us know what we're doing - we just don't want to make the changes yet. The tragedy is that it ends up being too late for some of us.
I look at my Higher Power the same way. I'm sure there's positive stuff in the religious tomes and tracts that I was subjected to in my youth but it was the dire warnings that stuck in my mind. I'm a negative guy who is drawn to the problem or the shortcoming in everything. For chrissake my job was to try to find or anticipate problems in machinery. Why would I think this wouldn't translate to my personal life? And to repeat myself: humans who spent energy anticipating trouble survived and passed this worry-anxiety gene to their progeny. Happy go lucky ones fell off cliffs.
Talk is cheap. Show me - don't tell me.
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