A New State of Consciousness and Being

From The 12 & 12:  "Maybe there are as many definitions of spiritual awakening as there are people who have had them.  But certainly each genuine one has something in common with all the others .  . . When a man or a woman has a spiritual awakening, the most important meaning of it is that he has now become able to do, feel, and believe that which he could not do before on his unaided strength and resources alone.  He has been granted a gift which amounts to a new state of consciousness and being.  He has been set on a path which tells him he is really going somewhere, that life is not a dead end, not something  to be endured or mastered.  In a very real sense he has been transformed, because he has laid hold of a source of strength which, in one way or another, he had hitherto denied himself."

"A new state of consciousness and being.  Whew."  Not bad.  Who wouldn't want that?  I like the implication that we will see a commonality with others, that this fact will allow us to tap into strength and resources that we couldn't access before.  And that we'll no longer look at life as a long slog through misery unless we can exert our will and bend it to our liking.  Both sound like a recipe for misery to me.

But then in 1955, Bill W wrote this: "There are those who predict that A.A. may well become a new spearhead for a spiritual awakening throughout the world.  When our friends say these things, they are both generous and sincere.  But we of A.A. must reflect that such a tribute and such a prophecy could well prove to be a heady drink for most of us - that is, if we really came to believe this to be the real purpose of A.A., and if we commenced to behave accordingly."

Also whew.  I used to promote Alcoholics Anonymous as THE solution to alcoholism.  Oh, callow youth!  I no longer do this.  I'm appreciative of anyone who comes into The Rooms and gives us a look.  I often say that, for the alcoholic, we have A solution to the problem of alcoholism.  It's not for every one.  If you don't like it or you think you can do better elsewhere I say: "Good for you.  Godspeed.  No hard feelings on our part and good luck to you."  But isn't this typical of our kind?  We've found something that works for us - finally found something - and now we're going to ram it down the throats of everyone within spitting distance.  This is my newish attitude about sponsorship, too.  I can help you?  Great.  I can't help you.  Great.  Go find someone who can.

Don't Fall Off a Cliff Today

"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.

The Dude Will Abide

Excitement prevents stability.                                                                                                                        Lethargy causes laxity.

The goal is calm abiding.

The dude will abide.

When your mind is too intense, and you experience excitement, you need to loosen it, like loosening the strings of a guitar a bit.  Similarly, when you have laxity, your mind is not intense enough, so you need to increase its intensity by making it a little more taut, like tightening the strings.  My mind is like a fine stringed instrument, one that Peter Townshend has bashed into a bank of Marshall amplifiers repeatedly or that Jimi Hendrix has set on fire.

"The force behind developing concentrated meditation is mindfulness, which is the ability to stay with an object, not allowing distraction.  You exercise mindfulness by putting your mind back on its object of meditation every time it falters, which will happen time and time again."

Here are the three greatest gifts that Alcoholics Anonymous has provided me:

1.  A working God, a kind God, a positive God, a non-threatening God who talks a lot about heaven and never mentions hell.

2.  A community of people who have made my life a complete joy.

3.  And three is the tricky, irritating one: the imperitive to ruthlessly, relentlessly analyze my inner workings so I can find out what's wrong with me and quit trying to find what fault with other people, places, and things.

It's not them - it's you.

Angry Chris

 Here's another Angry Chris anecdote . . . 

I state repeatedly that talk is great but talk is also cheap and behavior, action, is where the rubber meets the road.  I have heard far too many people speak platitudes with their lying mouths and then behave in ways that I find objectionable.  Don't tell me - show me.  Anyway, Chris would share driving stories early on.  I don't know what it is about guys but driving is one huge trigger.  Why we think other drivers are out to torment us personally is beyond my understanding but we seem to think that someone stranger in a car has it out for us personally.  For a while he would get so pissed that he would turn around and follow someone whose driving offended him.  Then that stopped.  The stories shifted to where there was a lot of horn-honking and curse-hurling and bird-flashing and first waving, but he no longer chased the offending party.  There was radio silence for a while until he shared the story of driving through a neighborhood on Halloween night with his girlfriend and her kids and being admonished by a parent for driving too fast.  He gritted his teeth, admitted his infraction, and then drove off slowly, muttering death threats and curses and imprecations at this person.  I loved it.  Bad action gives way to bad speech gives way to bad thinking.  Bad thinking is something I still have to work on - I'm much better at it, no longer damning people to an eternity on a lake of fire - but, boy, it's a far sight better than  

Angry Chris

The guy that chaired our meeting yesterday was a regular for a number of years before moving on to other groups.  He has about seven years of sobriety and there were a surprising number of members in attendance with about the same amount.  I love listening to people who have made it to that five to seven year window.  I believe we lose sight of a lot of people then - not necessarily to drinking but often just to complacency and ennui - but the ones that stay seem to a member to pass through into a greater realm where I perceive a real deep sense of calmness and spiritual comfort instead of looking at recovery as a necessary track.  It's so remarkable that I can see the peace reflected in their faces.

His informal nickname early on was Angry Chris because the dude was  . . . well . . . pretty angry.  I found out soon after that he didn't really like hugs so I made sure to hug him at least twice in each meeting and if I was chairing I announced that Chris really liked hugs.  It was like hugging a board.  Dude didn't move.  He was not relaxed during the hugs.  Then, a while later, I told him that I loved him.  The expression on his face!  Like I passed gas that was so offensive as to be almost lethal.  Then guess what I did?  Went out of my way to express my affection when I saw him and when he was leaving.  That's my specialty - finding a sore spot and probing it over and over.  Yesterday he hugged me first and he told me he loved me.  

Great, wondrous shit, man.  Unbelievable shit.

California Dreamin'

Balance:  A condition in which different elements are in correct proportions; having the right amount - not too much or too little - of any quality, which leads to harmony or evenness.

Many times our recovery will seem like it's proceeding at a snail's pace.  Our potential for growth is a result of effort we put into it and the time we give it.  The steady regulation of time forces growth to be gradual and balanced.  For growth to be good, it must stand the test of time.

I often walk after the Saturday meeting with a younger guy - a good dude, a dude I respect, a dude with a big Program - who is not a sponsee but I think he looks to me as a mentor or minor league, fill-in sponsor or a voice of wisdom or reason or as someone who is so stupid that I won't be able to see how awful his behavior  is.  We sometimes talk about women in recovery.  And men in recovery who are interested in women in recovery.  And how sometimes - not often but it's not unheard of - the occasional bad actor will take advantage of a woman who may be hurting or lonely or confused.  And I'm not going to suggest this is a one way street - there are plenty of wack-o females in The Rooms as well who mislead and toy with men - but men are conditioned socially to pursue women they find attractive.  As SuperK says: "I'm married - I'm not dead."

Anyway, my friend has commented on the charms of this young woman who has been with us for about five months.  She looks like a poster child for California and has a very sweet, kind personality.  A few weeks back I saw him speaking to her after the meeting - this woman and her cute sponsor - and I gave him a little shit about it in a good natured way.  Then today, after the meeting ended and I was talking to some friends, I saw him approach her again and they appeared to exchange phone numbers.  As he was walking out I sauntered over and turned both of my hands palms-up as if to say: "What the fuck?"  I was smiling.  Kinda.  He said jokingly: "I don't want to talk about it" and walked outside.

A bit later I passed him on my beach walk and he stopped me: "I've been running down here wondering how I can explain my behavior to you and I decided I'd just lie."  He was laughing but still . . . it wasn't all that funny, if you think about it.  "I'm smitten," he said.  I get it.  This girl is cute and he's been married a long time and he's been sober about seven years which is when we start to think "Really?  This is all there is?" and I think she's a pretty trusting individual, especially in A.A. where a number of us older guys have treated her with a lot of consideration and respect so far.  It's okay to be attracted to forbidden fruit and to fantasize occasionally about things we want but can't have.  We need to overcome these urges.  This is how we grow.

Be interesting to see how my buddy behaves.  He seemed contrite, abashed, embarrassed.  I hope so.  I don't hang with guys who are two-timing their significant others. 

Lonely in Our Isolation

Lonely:  Alone; solitary; a standing apart of others from your kind; sad because one has no friends or company.

Isolation: The condition of being alone, especially when this makes one feel unhappy (stresses detachment from others, often involuntarily).

From an Alcoholics Anonymous pamplet entitled "Many Paths To Spirituality" . . . . 

"Alcoholism can be a lonely affair.  Often, we drank to keep the pain of life at arm's length, and then, when the pain overran us, we drank to wash it away.  Our families, friends, employers and even complete strangers began to pull away from us, wary of our denials and skeptical of our many lies and pledges to stay sober."

Boy, do I know a lot about those "pledges" to stay sober.  What I was pledging was to keep lying as long as I could get away with it.  I'd say whatever you wanted me to stay if you would just get off my back.  "Denials" are also quite familiar to me.  Saying that you didn't do something even though it was completely transparent that you did that exact thing.

I was musing idly in my aimless retirement about that informal saying "Bring the body and the mind will follow."  I was directed in my journey to first act well, then speak well, then think well . . .or at least try to think well.  I'm awfully secure in my speech and my actions today while freely admitting that my thoughts occasionally veer into the uncharitable and sometimes get quite close to the murderous.  I give my self a break on this.  I can kill you in my mind as long as I don't actually kill you or even tell you that I'm going to kill you.  But we do get better physically, then mentally, and finally, spiritually.  It's that last one that has the occasional trip wire.

Boom!