Horseface Steve is in Control.

Control:  To exercise authority over; direct; command.


I had a dream last night.  I'm sure I had many dreams last night but I remember this one, which is unusual because usually I sleep like I'm dead.  Anyway, I was in a play and I was running late; I was dressed in some clothing that would be appropriate for a Shakespearean play -- leggings and high necked collars and little slippers.  Maybe I was Hamlet or Macbeth or King Henry!  Certainly someone very important and absolutely crucial to the production.  I doubt I would have bothered to show up at all unless I was the center of attention.


The play was in a big, open, airy church.  It was an old church, with lots of stained glass windows and transepts and soaring stone arches.  There were dinner tables set up all around, decked out with linen tablecloths and fine crystal and floral centerpieces.  OK, I made that last part up so that I can embellish this not very interesting story.  The tables were round and covered with white tablecloths.  They could have been cotton or some cheap synthetic material.  I can't speak with any knowledge about the quality of the dinnerware, either.  But there were a lot of dressed up people sitting down or milling about the space, and they were nicely dressed.


I was running around asking where I should go.  "I'm in the play," I explained.  I hadn't practiced.    I didn't know anything about anything.  I didn't know shit.  I felt anxious, which seems reasonable considering I was getting ready to perform in a play that I hadn't practiced for.


There are no hidden cues in this fairly literal dream.  I'm in a church, which ain't going to happen even if I am cast as Hamlet.  And I'm in a play and I don't know where to go.  Certainly this reminds me of the characterization in our Book about The Director.  You know the guy: the one who will be happy if he can just arrange all of the scenery and get everyone to go where he wants them to go and behave as he sees fit.


I guess I'm lucky I wasn't naked.  I also have a recurring set of dreams where I'm in a university type setting and I have no clothes on and I'm trying to find the room where the final exam is being administered for a class I have yet to attend.


Control?  Me, control?

Running Shoes

Generalize:  To emphasize the general character rather than specific details of; make vague.


Most of my conversations with newish alcoholics end up with this characterization: "Egomaniac with an inferiority complex."  Then, I think: "This dude believes he's relaxed."  I hate to generalize . . . well, not really as it's a convenient way to place the world into tidy little boxes that I find comforting . . . but when I'm in a meeting I believe that I'm surrounded by hard-charging overachievers.  I don't see too much relaxed in the chairs around me.  I see some people who have managed to take their foot off the accelerator but not too many who think that slow is a good speed.


The difference for me today is that when I don't achieve the absurdly high levels of accomplishment that I think are my responsibility I have a way to handle the frustration and disappointment that can well up.  I have been able to lower the bar, but not too much.  It's still way up there.  I can hardly see it most of the time.  I still compile a hefty list of tasks to complete when I start my day and I still look at the tasks that were left undone with a critical and judgmental eye.  The difference in my world view today is that I can laugh at what I think I can accomplish, even as I try to accomplish it all, and I don't beat myself up with too large of a club when I fail to accomplish everything, which I do because the list is too long, and I am human after all.


Early on I heard a woman with a lot of sobriety say: "If you want to keep up with me you better put on your running shoes."  She was busy; she was active, and I liked that about her.

Enough Already!

Enough:    As much or as often as necessary;  to the required degree or amount; adequate.


This is a GREAT word for an alcoholic to ponder.  We use the idea to our advantage most of the time; we take the concept and wield it as a club to beat the world over the head, and we're not shy about bending the meaning to our selfish purpose.


For example, I may say that I don't have enough money or that my wife isn't nice enough or that the car I drive isn't luxurious enough, and my boss sure doesn't show me enough respect.  Then I think about my Program: it's good enough.  I go to enough meetings and make enough phone calls and spend enough time on my prayer and meditation.  


See how that works?  When I want something the meaning of the word seems a little dark and nefarious.  I'm getting Screwed out of something.  I'm not getting my due; not even close, not even in the ballpark.  Enough seems to be a bare minimum, far, far below what I should have.  Think enough oxygen to barely sustain life.  I'd be alive but I probably wouldn't be too comfortable.  Adequate! in other words.  I hate adequate.


Then, in the circumstances where I should be doing some work or giving something back, then enough seems to be kind and generous and perfectly acceptable.  I feel like I've climbed a great mountain and I'm looking down at the valley thousands of feet below: "I'm high enough here," I think.  The word seems to be imply that I've overcome great obstacles to get to enough, not that I'm just a tick over barely adequate.  I've given enough of my time, I've helped enough people, and I've been of enough service.


I'm good at twisting things around.  I can start an argument from a certain point of view and end up defending the exact opposite viewpoint.  This is why people don't like to argue with me.  It's not that I don't fight fair, it's that I'm barely coherent.  It's an argument with an insane person.


It's kind of fun, sometimes, though.

Long Lines and Small Rooms and Confidence Builders

Opinion:  Applies to a conclusion or judgment which, while it remains open to dispute, seems true or probable to one's own mind.


I was asked this question yesterday by a friend in The Program: "How can I get to the place where I don't care so much about what people think of me?"  
I pondered my response carefully, thoughtfully.  "Good question," I replied.  "First, let me tell you how you can walk on water."  
It's quite a challenge for people pleasers with lousy self-esteem to disregard the opinions of others, real or imagined.


His question did make me think about how much of recovery and life itself is simply going through things a few times.  As SuperK is known to say: "Time takes time."  For most of us the process of learning how to live takes some repetitions.  Every time I worked through something I had a little more experience about how to live through it the next time.  I'm not always thrilled with this process.  I prefer to be struck; as in, struck patient, struck tolerant, struck confident.  I want to think it and have it be so.  I'm not interested in the steady, unspectacular work that leads to good outcomes.


I played basketball in high school and was very good at making my free throws.  This was an important part of my game because I couldn't score reliably from more than 2 or 3 feet when no one was around, and those opportunities didn't come too often.  So I figured if they were going to let me directly in front of the basket, all by myself, and try to score some points I was damn well going to make the shots.  The point is that I shot a hell of a lot more free throws in practice than I ever did in games.


If you pray for patience, god puts you in long lines.  If you pray for tolerance, god puts you in a room with someone who irritates the hell out of you.  If you pray for confidence, god puts you in situations where your confidence is tested.  I see good outcomes and want to be placed there by a magic hand.  I was never able to see all of the work that went into getting to that good place.


What other people think of me is none of my business.

A Ton

Heft:  Weight; heaviness, hence: importance, influence.


I chaired a meeting yesterday.  In this part of the country, the chairperson shares for a few minutes to establish a topic and then calls on people.  When I was done, mightily impressed with myself, of course, I looked around the room for a minute.  I couldn't help but think of this old joke: "The good news is that there's a solution.  The bad new is that it's us."  Mostly, I was impressed with the caliber of people I saw.  There were a lot of folks out there with real substance.  I don't run into too much fluff and air in AA.  I run into a lot of strength and weight.  There seems to be some thoughtfulness and purpose behind the fear and insecurity that so often floats on the surface.


I'm under the impression that most alcoholics fall in the Type A personality category.  I know a lot of us protest that we're cool and calm and relaxed but I still respectfully disagree.  We take things seriously.  I don't mean to suggest that we can't laugh and have fun and enjoy life but I do believe that when it looks like the enemy is going to breach the ramparts, I'd like to have a crowd of drunks around me.  


I think we'd get the job done.  I think we'd rise to the occasion.  

Risk. Not the Game.

Risk:  The chance of injury, damage, or loss; dangerous chance; hazard.


It has been definitively proven by someone that successful risk takers in our society share some of the attributes, the mental and emotional make-up, of alcoholics and drug addicts.  I read that somewhere so it could be true.  It's not like I saw it on The Television, though.  That's a guarantee of the accuracy of a statement, but I'm going to have to go with what I've got at this point: the written word in a reputable newspaper crediting legitimate researchers who have run rigorously honest studies.


The idea is that some of us are drawn to the thrill of living on the knife edge of experience and once we get used to being there, then we find it hard to draw back.  It seems to be in our genes.  


I hope this is true.  I like the idea that I'm behaving so erratically because I just can't help myself.

Adventure

Adventure:     The encountering of danger; an exciting and dangerous undertaking; an unusual, stirring experience, often of romantic nature; a liking for danger, excitement, etc.: as, he is full of adventure.


When I was drinking my life revolved around a series of dark bars with no windows, late at night, or dark apartments, with the blinds drawn, mesmerized by the flickering images on The TV.  If it was light outside, I was often asleep or suffering from the effects of too much alcohol and drugs.  It was quite surprising to find out there was a whole world out there.  It was quite stressful, too.  I didn't know how to do normal things.  I was very fearful of normal things.  Part of me wanted to be enveloped in the comforting dark, by myself or alone in a crowd, alone, alone, alone.


There's a story in our literature about a man who suffered a complete nervous breakdown because of his alcoholism.  He was literally so terrified he was unable to leave his house.  As he sobered up, he started to take little baby steps in the big, bad world.  He began by walking to the end of the block and back - that was all he could take at first.  Gradually, he took more and more chances until he was reintegrated back into sobriety.  He talked about how through a happy combination of time and some extra money he was able to start traveling again.  He confessed to getting into a huge uproar before he left, afraid, not wanting to leave, but always enjoyed himself once he got under way.


I like this story.  It seems to encourage me to take some chances.  Not get drunk and jump off the top of a bridge into a fast moving river on a dare kind of chances, but good, get out there and live a full life kind of chances.  I still wish I could get some kind of upfront guarantee before I try something new or go somewhere I've never been but I wish for all kinds of stuff that I don't get.  


I say: Go take the plunge.  It's worth it.


On one of my many adventures, I flew from Istanbul into Damascus, Syria in the middle of the night.  My buddy and I took a taxi from the airport into the city; the driver didn't speak any English and drove his Mercedes cab about 90 MPH right down the middle of the deserted freeway, with his lights out.  I thought: "WTF?  I'm going to die here."  It was beyond stressful.


Of course, it ended up being a vacation that I treasure more than just about any vacation I've ever taken.  I admit that I may . . . MAY . . . have pushed my comfort level a little too far on this one, but what an adventure!  What a trip!  I got to sit in the middle of the full boil of one of the oldest cities in the world, smoking a hookah and drinking tea, watching the world stream by.  Wouldn't change it for anything.  Was it fun?  Absolutely.  Was it stressful?  That's not a strong enough word to describe what it was like.