day 17 – step 1
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
i don’t think i am there yet. despite the things i write about here, especially in things i hate about me and faith, and my numerous unhealthy encounters described in other posts, i still think i can control it. after all, am i not choosing to stay off the drink today? who has power over that if not me?
but the truth is, i know this is just more bullshit. more excuses. more playing with semantics.
i am afraid. i’m afraid i can’t handle it. becasue i’m too sensitive. too weak. too fragile. i already feel like the world has eaten me alive — taken everything from me that is good, and stomped all over it. and i let it happen.
i feel like an idiot becasue i know what i need to do. it’s all spelled out for me. i know if i don’t, one of these days i’m just going to say “fuck it,” and then i don’t know what’s gonna happen. but i don’t know how to give in.
my emotions have been a little muted lately. too rational. i know if i go further with this process, i will have to feel my emotions, and that scares me. the things i wrote in the posts mentioned earlier are my reality. i don’t know what to do with that.
Blu….
A gem of a saying that someone told me in early recovery….
“Your head has a contract out on your ass”.
Simply meaning that our thinking habits (conscious and subconscious) can beat us up in the most brutal and tricky ways.
This was certainly true for me. One of the tricky ways my thinking would work me over was to pepper a blast of various thoughts at me all at once that felt like they bounced around my head like a bunch of beebees. I would be confused and felt like I was scrambling around trying to gather them all but the more I chased one, the more the others would get away from me until I was so frustrated, I wanted to drink.
Or at best, I wanted to lay down and just feel like crap, immobilized by the activity in my head. Or I wanted to scream.
Perhaps this describes how the feelings of…
“drink”,
“don’t drink”,
“I’m shit for wanting to drink” ,
“when will this end?”
“fuck it all”,
“no wait”,
etc, etc, etc
If this is what you are feeling… or anything like it, take it from me, many of us have gone through this type of thing. It is typical of an alcoholic mind.
The good part is we can surrender most if it away. And in time, we learn what to listen to and what not to listen to.
When I was in a state of not knowing what to and not to listen to, I made a simple decision to listen to what I felt was the most safe and simple voice. Which for me was my sponsor who had gone through similar things to me and was 6 years clean/sober.
Turned out he was right. Immediately, I learned to turn down most of the noise in my head and just do one or two small things that I could.
Sounds grossly simple but I can tell you, life began to get better immediately. Sometimes the suggestion was to just put everything down and get to a meeting or go for coffee. This simple act got me out of my head where all the thoughts were bouncing around.
I would then get back to what I was doing and be far more effective. It gave me hope for another day. Which really is all we have.
I hope this is of some help.
Ciao.
Chaz
Chaz
April 2, 2009 at 1:24 am
Chaz,
The metaphor of the beebees sounds familiar. I stopped going to AA meetings because .. I don’t remember why now. But I’ve noticed that the regular normal daily stuff is starting to get to me .. like shit at work, and shitty people at work, and people that don’t know how to drive, etc.
I think I should start going to meetings again, even if all I do is shut up and listen.
Thanks.. you’re always helpful. Lately my head has been spinning a little more than usual.
blu3nude
April 2, 2009 at 6:05 am