K.I.S.

"The secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not."  

George Bernard Shaw

Look to the Elves

When I was newish I was occasionally asked to give a full Lead or talk in front of a group.  The talk is an opportunity for you to share what it was like, what happened, and what it's like now.  Early on most of us have a whole shit-ton of "what it was like" and very little beyond that.  I had a run where I would talk about each of The Steps in order and what they meant to me.  While this can surely be a good way to approach the Lead - after all, we're getting sober in a Twelve Step Program - it also showed a little too much hubris on my part.  Like I was some kind of expert on working The Steps.  A guy in Chicago watched me floundering around, in and out, drunk and sober, and said: "I don't know what you think you're doing but it isn't working."  The first time I decided to exhibit some humility and do a Lead the way you're supposed to I started to get depressed as I listened to myself drone on and on, interminably, camped in the "what it was like" section way, way too long.  "Someone should put this son of a bitch out of his misery," I thought, while I was talking.  Ultimately, it was good for me to listen to myself go over my drinking history in such gruesome detail.  It dispelled any notion that I might not be an alcoholic or even that I was in the  category of High Bottom drunk.

A wise man once said: "The three most important things in life are: be kind, be kind, be kind."  Rat Boy is always rooting through the junk he has in his backyard and I'm hyper-sensitive to any noise he makes.  Sometimes I can't even hear what he's doing over the drone of an air conditioner or a leaf blower but I'm really transfixed by the suggestion of noise coming from him.  I don't think he's a bad dude.   I think he's a fuck-up.  He's living in his mother's old mobile home in a senior park and he doesn't appear to have a job.  While I'm being pretty kind and patient I can always go further.

Remember: everyone is always doing his or her best.

Remember: everyone is thinking about themselves.  No one is thinking about you.  No one is doing anything to you.  They are obliviously crashing along through life with the tools they've been given.  Just like you.  My drunken actions weren't directed at anyone.  I was just drinking and ignoring collateral damage.

Because I believe in the concept of synchronicity I am not amazed when concepts gather together and present themselves to me on any given day.  My other daily meditation book today had these thoughts: "The elves that came in the middle of the night to repair a child's broken toys knew without seeing the results that they were creating happiness and gratefulness in another.  We can do the same for others.  We can decide to be more caring, to watch for opportunities to reach out to others."  Those elves were pretty good dudes.  You could do worse than be an elf.

I'm in Dr. Bob's Story in the Plain Language Big Book.  A couple of sentences popped out as being germane to my life:  "From childhood through high school, my parents forced me to go to church."  Dude, I'm hearing that.  "My whole life was about doing what I wanted to do, without thinking about the rights or wishes of anyone else."  Dude, I am definitely hearing that.  I always liked the fact that Dr. Bob attended the University of Michigan to study pre-med and the professors got together to tell him that going forward they'd be just fine without his presence.  Boy, did that ever happen to me at Ohio  State University's College of Optometry.  I remember those last awful sessions with brutal clarity.  "Go away and don't come back," was the tone the dean used.

Kiss at K.I.S.

"She is drawn to the happy crowd inside, who laugh at their own bad luck and understand hers.  The open expressions on everyone's faces, the light in their eyes, and the exciting and welcoming feeling in the house tell her that she is safe at last."

Plain Language Big Book of A.A.

There's another Chicago A.A. transplant that comes to Keep It Simple.  We had adjoining chairs this morning separated by a support pole in the K.I.S. church basement and Mike reached around the pole to pick up his book, getting awfully close to me in the process.  "I thought you were coming in for a kiss," I whispered.  "Later," he whispered back.  "When we're alone."  After the meeting, responding to some quip or other that I made, he re-quipped: "That's it - no kiss for you."

August 19

"Patience is more than a virtue.  It's the ultimate test in powerlessness.  Patience means waiting for people, places, and things beyond our control.  Patience means letting go and trusting that a Higher Power is in control."                                                                                                                                        Daily Reflections Book

I am in the section of the Plain Language Big Book called "A Vision For You."  I was reading this morning about the growing excitement everyone was feeling when The Fellowship was gaining some momentum and they estimated that there were a hundred people who had recovered.  100!  I go to a meeting that has a hundred people who I would call regular members.  Anyway, my sobriety date is August 16, 1987 which is the last day I used drugs, more or less.  It was getting a little foggy at the very end so I'm not absolutely sure of the date.  My last drink was on Easter Sunday of the same year and for some reason I've apparently never looked up what the exact date was.  So I did that today and was flummoxed and flabbergasted that it was April 19, 1987, exactly one year to the day before SuperK took her last drink.  We've been together a long time so this hitherto unknown coincidence blew us both away.

Ganesh Is The Best God

I have spent far too much of my life letting my relationships with other people - my perception of these relationships, anyway - define who I am instead of letting go of what other people think of me.  Today . . . I don't really care.  That doesn't mean that I don't want to be loved and appreciated, that I stop trying to develop good, caring relationships or that I believe I can behave in unkind and unethical ways and still be comfortable in my own skin, but that people are going to come up with their own idea of who Seaweed is and I can't do anything about that.  Their ideas may be spot on and they may be way off the mark but it's all none of my business.  Today I work very, very hard at allowing other people to be who they are.  It takes a ton of stress off my overworked mind to let everyone live their own best life.  The miraculous payoff for me personally is that I've been able to detach more and more from their opinions of me.  I cannot emphasize enough how freeing this is.  I get to be me and not some articifial construct of who I think you want me to be.  It has become second nature for me to quickly slough off a perceived slight or disrespecting and think: "Oh, right, that has nothing to do with me.  That's their deal."  I don't have to engage or justify.  I go back to the incident with the woman in the pool who told me I'd better take another shower after sitting in the hot tub for ten minutes.  I quickly cycled through an angry response to a long conversation where I convinced her that she was an idiot to saying: "Whatever."  That was her.  That wasn't me.

The Toltecs talk about the process where parents, teachers, and society teach young people how to fit into the collective Dream of the Planet by using a system of rewards and punishments.  I bought into this perceived reality where these beliefs, world views, concepts of success, and moral codes were absolute truths rather than just agreements made by previous generations.  It doesn't mean that they're all defective and need to be tossed into the dustbin but that I don't have to hew to all of them.  I get to be me.  I don't have to "fit in."  I get to look inside and follow my own instincts of how to behave and respond.  The Toltecs detach from the opinions of others primarily by practicing the Second Agreement: "Don't take anything personally."  This is the understanding that nothing other people say or do is actually about you - it's entirely a reflection of their own mind.

God, for instance.  Whew, that's a big ol' can of whoop ass.  Humans have been chasing the idea of a Higher Power forever and this concept is always changing and it's remarkably different across cultures and regions while having some remarkable similarities.  The Christians and Jews and Moslems have this stern god and there's only one of them and what he says, goes.  There are 1.2 billion Hindus in the world who worship many gods but one of the main god-figures is called Ganesh.  Ganesh has four arms and an elephant head and is often sitting on an elaborate throne dressed in elaborate clothes.  You could spike a four year old's OJ with LSD and give him crayons and some paper and he might draw something like that.  One point two billion people!  There may be 500 million Buddhists alive who revere a fat dude who is mostly naked and has a vapid, vacuous grin on his face.  Frankly, he looks stoned.  Five hundred million!

Who gets to choose which is the "right" God?  Not me, that's for sure.  My God is sort of an amalgamation of a lot of different things but, I'll tell you this, he's in a good mood.  He's quick to praise and slow to anger, quick to compliment and never criticizes.  Who wants to believe in a pissed off God?  That's fear, that's control, the need to make people do what you want them to do.  My God is lazy and sarcastic and likes Black Sabbath and sneaks the occasional cigarette.

Rock a bye, baby, in the tree tops.                                                                                                          When the wind blows, the cradle will rock.                                                                                         When the bough breaks the cradle will fall.                                                                                           And down will come cradle, baby and all.

Here's a visual from a Simpson's episode:  Marge is putting baby Maggie to bed and she begins to sing this lullaby.  Maggie begins to peacefully fall asleep as a thought bubble in the background shows her in a cradle that is rocking gently in the top branches of a tall tree.  She's smiling and Marge's voice is melodic, comforting.  The line about the branches breaking begins to worry her and then the final thought bubble shows the cradle with Maggie in it speeding through the branches on its way to smash up on the ground.  She's terrified and after Marge kisses her and turns out the light we see her wide-awake eyes as she sucks furiously on her pacifier, too agitated to sleep.  

Who comes up with this shit?  What deranged, Dark Ages nanny came up with this song.  It should be in a compilation called "How To Make Sure Your Infant Can't Fall Asleep."

From the chapter "A Vision For You" in the Plain Language Big Book: "They can't imagine their life without alcohol.  And some day, they won't be able to imagine life with alcohol or without it.  They won't want to imagine life continuing at all  A person who reaches this place will experience deep and extreme loneliness.  We say they are at the 'jumping-off place.'  They will wish to end their life."

The last time I drank I consumed a large, huge volume of 12% cream ale.  My recollection is a case of it.  I was too drunk to walk and my speech was thickly slurred.  Fair enough but the wicked catch was that I experienced not one minute of relief.  I was aware - no oblivion - and awake.  At some deep level I must have understood that the game was over.  I must have understood that it was recovery or misery.

"It is the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous.  It will help you find relief from boredom and worry.  Your imagination will come alive.  Life will mean something at last.  The most satisfying years of your life lie ahead."

The Saturday morning Keep It Complicated meeting is larger than normal.  I picked up a new guy who doesn't have a car - I didn't have to say a word because he talked a blue streak the entire ride, confirming the strength of my morning serenity which is the outcome from the calm, peaceful life I have - and we got to the meeting early.  The room was pretty quiet and it got louder as more members arrived.  Not bad loud - joyful loud, good energy loud, happy loud.

I like that loud.

Seaweed: Minor God

Setting my intention for the day.

Realizing I have no idea what my intention is.

Wondering why I listened to a guided meditation about setting my intention after finding out I still don't know what my intention is.

How about staying in the moment?  Right here - Right now.

How about building your own God?  Like he's a Tinker Toy.  Or an Etch-A-Sketch.  Try different combinations until you get one you like.  Then it's your God.  Maybe it's me.  It could be.  I think I'd be a pretty good God.  Why not me?  I return time and time again to the Bill Murray line in Groundhog Day when he's trying to figure out why the day keeps repeating in an endless loop.  He wonders if he's God.  His alarmed and skeptical co-worker says: "Let me get this straight - you think you're God?"  Bill says: "I didn't say that I'm THE God.  Maybe I'm A God."  I'm pretty sure that I'm part God.  God-like.  A minor God.  Not the lead.  Maybe I'd win Best Supporting God at the Oscars.  I'm too selfish to be the lead God.  I'd be skimming some good will and cash off the top of anyone I'd try to help in my role as minor God.  A consigliari.  A Gal Friday.  A fixer.  Got a problem?  Give me a call I'll see what I can do.

The worst thing about my church God - admittedly a pretty good God in most aspects - was that if I didn't believe everything God said or - especially - if I behaved badly then I was going to Hell.  This seems like an overreaction to me.  I'm a gossip so I'm going to Hell?  I'm lusty and selfish so I'm going to Hell? You install a powerful sex drive and then toss me into Hell for being lusty?  Holy shit, that's messed up.  There's no punishment from my current Erector Set God.  My life was pretty Hellish before I got sober.  I think I've done my time in Hell, served out my sentence, so now I'm shooting for Heaven.  Heaven-ish, anyway.  Someplace nice.  California weather with Missouri prices.

My God is kind of a doofus.  One of those characters that I thought was missing a few marbles when I ran into him.  The kind of doofus who had a goofy smile on his face while his hair was on fire.  He was trying to put it out -  he's not that doofus-ey - but with an amazing amount of good cheer.  "Hey, sometimes my whole head catches on fire so this is no big deal."  This so reminds me of Alcoholics Anonymous and the laughter and buzz of good vibes that hits us when we go down the stairs and burst into a church basement full of recovering idiots.