Reminders

"There is stuff inside us.  Some of it information that we neither remember nor even know we have recorded.  Like old files, it needs to be cleaned out.  But how can we clean out what we don't know we have?  By self-monitoring, by plumbing the depths in writing, drawing out our own thoughts."

"Restlessness is often a cover-up for some deeper experience taking place in the unconscious.  Rather than confronting some unpleasant thought we experience, we try to bury it so we won't have to deal with the issue.  The result is that sense of unease which we call agitation or restlessness.  There is nothing you can put your finger on.  But you don't feel at ease.  You can't relax.  When this uncomfortable state arises, just observe it.  Don't let it rule you.  Don't jump up and run off.  And don't struggle with it and try to make it go away."

As a member of Alcoholics Anonymous I believe wholeheartedly that I've been involved in the greatest social experiment of the 20th Century.  I believe that - despite all of its flaws and shortcomings - that A.A. has helped more people recover from substance abuse than anything else that has been tried.  But to ensure that I don't drift into a smug, arrogant satisfaction I keep reading and studying philosophical and religious thought and I often see that A.A. is simply a re-packaging of theories and practices that have been around for a long time.  One of the above quotes comes from Native American heritage and the other from a far Eastern Buddhist tradition.  Can you tell which is which?  See the common threads with our Steps?  Restlessness, irritation, and discontentedness can't be dealt with by wishing it away or using alcohol to blunt its effects.  We have to sit with it, no matter how uncomfortable it makes us feel.  No more running away.  And how about the reminder we need to constantly self-examine and that writing is one of the most effective channels to this freedom?  Something happens, I dunno what, when I write.  Stuff comes up and comes out, stuff I wasn't able to hork up consciously.  I can't tell you how many times I'll sit down to write with nothing specific in mind only to find my pen way off in the weeds, hashing out something I was repressing or forgetting.

Old ideas.   Old, old ideas are the best ideas.  There's a reason they've survived for centuries.