There is a Solution...and I’m Not It

The 9th Step Promises

1. If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through.

2. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness.

3. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it.

4. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace.

5. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others.

6. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear.

7. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows.

8. Self-seeking will slip away.

9. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change.

10. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us.

11. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.

12. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us - sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them.

Alcoholics Anonymous p83-84

The reason a recovering alcoholic isn’t ready to pursue a relationship - and shouldn’t place one’s self in a position where that ball is set rolling (flirting, dating, sexting, sex, etc) - is because it takes long, hard work to be restored to sanity. If you’re in a relationship already when entering recovery, your hope is that you can recover well enough to save it, or to be okay in it. But the relationship lasting after recovery is still not always the case, nor should it be. This is where having a good sponsor is important; we sick alcoholics and addicts don’t always know what’s best for us, and we can get ourselves into a whole lot of trouble when we do things our own way. The 12-steps-with-a-sponsor-approach isn’t the only way to recovery, but if we do go this route and work closely with a recovered human being with much more experience - who has been restored to sanity through working the steps - more is revealed to us. We are better equipped to make sane decisions, and less apt to hurt others and ourselves. 

I finally have a sponsor whom I call and to whom I talk (and as importantly, to whom I listen) every single day - and I actually want to do this. I believe that the words that come out of her mouth are true, which is important. And I’m actually being honest with her about my thoughts, feelings and actions - more honest than I’ve ever been. It feels hard as hell. My ego kicks and screams as it tries to claw and fight its way back to the surface to drag me under - but I know that rigorous honesty with another human being IS the first step in recovery. I’m SO SICK of my own insanity and the suffering it brings myself and others that I’m shining the brightest light I can on this bitch, so we can both look at its ugliness and see it for what it really is. The ego can only survive in darkness. 

Me? I’d rather dwell in the Sunlight of the Spirit, and enjoy the peace of those promises up there.

So, to get there - to recover, to be restored to sanity - I have to stop doing things my way. If there’s one thing I learned from re-reading my blog posts from 7 to 4 years ago, it’s that, yes, I am insane, and to say that I hurt people - some very deeply - is an understatement. And it’s my nasty little ego that not only prevents me from admitting my shortcomings to another human being, but also tries to stop me from following the direction of someone more sane than I. It can’t handle the idea that someone else might have the answer. It fights me being told what to do. 

Thankfully, when my now-sponsor (I’ll call her Tasha) makes suggestions, she only suggests to follow what’s in the book of Alcoholics Anonymous, which has helped millions of alcoholics already. This program of awareness is more powerful than my ego. I don’t even have to call it the hand of God - but I choose to. Tasha couples that with her own experience, strength and hope - and I can take it or leave it - but I’m choosing to take it.

Without a good sponsor, recovery doesn’t work for me. Margaret wasn’t even the best of sponsors, in hindsight, though I thought so at the time, placing her on the highest pedestal. Boy, did she fall hard. After her suicide, I completely stopped trusting any one in the program at all. I stopped recovering, soon after I had started. I kept pursuing relationships when I wasn’t sane - until I found a guy who was also crazy enough to stay with me. 

It lasted a little over four years. After fighting it in the beginning, I conceded and settled into it quite comfortably. Here was everything I ever wanted. He was a hard-working chef, we bought a house, he could help me raise my son, we had a daughter, his son (my son’s age) came to live with us, I continued my work with adults and children with disabilities until I started a photography business, we were engaged to be married, and I was photographing Love for a living. I felt like I had “made it”.

But I was still spiritually sick. I resorted to smoking weed, then vaping THC, addictively, to deal with the fact that on the outside, life looked amazing, but on the inside, I was suffering. Parenting was overwhelming. I had no clear view of my finances and didn’t know what I was doing in my business. I had too much work and too little money. I was asking - forcing - Bernard to watch the kids and clean and cook for me 60-70 hours a week so I could work any time he wasn’t working, on his days off, and late into every single night, at my computer, in addition to shooting weddings and sessions. I made no time for him, and also resented him for everything. He just wouldn’t do everything I wanted, and he did things I didn’t want. I had no peace, and I was neglecting everyone, drowning in a sewer of my own design. There was no God-consciousness, nor real consciousness of any kind.

When my then-sponsor (who never worked the steps with me, because I told her I had worked them already - plus I never followed her suggestions) - moved away, the search was on for real recovery. At this point, I was hoping to use the steps to save my relationship and my business, and to be the best mom I could be. I knew I was making a mess of things, but I was powerless on my own to stop it. I was even willing to quit smoking weed / THC and be sober again for real.

But, of course, I couldn’t do that on my own. I tried on my own, over and over, and failed every time. So, I went to Narcotics Anonymous, and a sponsor there helped me to quit smoking weed with a very thorough and intensive step 1. My sobriety date - clean and sober - is now April 6, 2019. 

As I embarked on step 2, I decided that, since AA was the program that started it all for me - I still haven’t had a drink in over 8 years - I wanted to go back to basics. I knew AA could restore me to sanity, because, as I began the process there before, I could feel it. I picked the oldest old-timer in the room at my home group, with 37 years of continuous sobriety, and asked her to take me through the remaining steps.

But, she got sick with pneumonia a couple weeks later, and we never had the chance to do the work before she was in the hospital, and of course, unavailable. I prayed for her recovery and I wanted to wait for her - but I needed help, now. So, I got a new sponsor. But her husband had a severe stroke while he was out on the coast on a job. She went out to the hospital and then the recovery facility to be with him, where they still are to this day. She got me through steps 2 and 3 over the phone, but she wanted to do them with me “officially” in person before having me move on to step 4, and we just never got the chance.

Months went by, and I continued to be a terrorist at home. Stagnant in the steps, I was powerless to change. I decided to just start step 4 on my own. It almost saved my relationship when he found my notebook and my personal moral inventory, where I admitted my resentments, and my selfishness, my dishonesty, and my fears, followed by my prayers asking God to remove these defects, show me what He would have me be, and give me the strength to be it. 

But the required change in me never occurred without taking steps 5-12. I was stuck repeating the same things over and over. The relationship did finally end; he had had enough. Never mind whatever his own character defects were - mine were glaring. I know the relationship wasn’t good for either of us from the beginning, in truth, but once we were in it...we were “in it to win it,” I had hoped. I had made the investment . . . but I lost it all.

Homeless with two kids two days before Christmas, with my sponsor still out of town, I started the search again. I found an old-timer who was willing to hear my inventory and do step 5 with me. I showed up at her house on the appointed day and time. I was desperate. But she didn’t answer the door, or the phone, after multiple attempts. 

A few days later, she texted me and told me she had had the flu, with no offer to reschedule. Screw that, I thought. I went ahead and did my 5th step with a friend, and 6 and 7 on my own. I shared my shortcomings, I was willing to have God take them away, and I asked Him to. But as I looked at step 8, I knew I needed to do this with a sponsor. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. How can I trust myself to be thorough on my own? How do I know that I will take step 9 correctly, where the promises begin to come true? Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. How do I know I won’t still hurt people with my “amends”. I went to five AA meetings the next day, and I knew that, no - I can’t do this alone.

I decided to keep searching. On January 24, 2020, Tasha was the speaker at the local Friday night meeting. She seemed so familiar. Where did I know her from?

I related to nearly everything she shared. At the end of the meeting, I ran out to my car to get my big book. There it was, her name and number on the last blank page, along with the date and the name of the meeting where I’d met her. I rarely write people’s names and numbers in my big book. But I had met her a year prior at another meeting, down the mountain, where, after hearing her speak for only 3-5 minutes, I knew I wanted what she had: her awareness, sanity. She spoke recovery, truth. 

I had called her one time, and we talked about Thich Naht Hanh, Eckhart Tolle, and recovery. I later found out from my then-sponsor Shasta that Tasha was sponsoring Shasta’s husband Josh, and Tasha’s partner Destiny was Shasta’s sponsor. Serendipity!

I went back into the meeting room after seeing her name and number in my big book and showed it to her, and I asked her, “Is this you?”

“No....wait...yes...but that’s not how you spell my name.” She helped me fix it. I told her what I had been dealing with, that Shasta moved away and we never went through the steps, and that I kept getting sponsors with whom I didn’t get to go through the steps, but that that’s all I want - to take the steps with a sponsor and recover - and I could see in her eyes that she knew what I was going to ask before I did, and she said yes after I had only started, “Would you...”.

Call it fate, God - Tasha’s sponsoring me now, and I’m so, so grateful to have this opportunity to finally be restored to sanity. I’m not gonna lie - there is a guy I’m obsessed with, as usual - but I know not to trust my own thoughts right now. 

I started the steps over with Tasha because I want to be thorough. I’m back on a new step 4 inventory, looking more fearlessly and honestly than ever.

Because, as Tasha always says, truthfully...

“I’M the problem.”

But, there is a solution. I’m just not it!

On Fire

I used to hate building fires. I just couldn't get them to catch. When I was living with Bernard, I resorted to "making" him build the fires . . . and he would use something called a "fire starter" - these little brick-shaped pieces of compacted something-that-burns - along with lots of lighter fluid and kindling.

I'm living on my own now in a studio, a room with a kitchen and a wood stove, and a bathroom out in a hallway, and a laundry room across from the bathroom. My landlords are a sweet old couple who live upstairs. They are always sweet enough to make sure I have enough kindling for the wood stove. They don't have to do that. But I appreciate it very much.

I've learned to not throw away any food boxes, paper or paper towels that, in the old days, I would throw away in the trash (side note: I'm also recycling plastic for like, the first time ever). I used some Fire Liter bricks the first few weeks of living here, but then I ran out. Short on cash, I found that I can stuff a few old TV dinner boxes with the used (dry) paper towels and other crumpled used paper, and those work well underneath a small pyramid of kindling.

As it turns out, building, starting, and keeping a fire going takes patience, attention, and even a little selflessness. That's sort of how you cook things, too. You can't just throw it over heat and walk away - which is what selfish, impatient me wants to do. Of course, it doesn't work that way.

The conditions for a fire have to be just right. The lightest material that catches fire most easily from a stricken match goes on the bottom. But, straight paper won't do it; there also has to be a bit of density, so it doesn't burn out too quickly. It needs to stay on fire long enough for whatever is above it to catch. There has to be enough air circulating around it, but not too much. So then there's the pyramid, or "teepee" (if you want to be unconsciously offensive but maybe more accurate) of kindling, on top of that bottom "fire starter". Dense wood doesn't catch fire easily without more intense heat - but smaller, thinner pieces catch well.

Once the smaller pieces of wood are burning, you can't just throw a giant log on and close the wood stove door and call it a fire. I should have mentioned, of course, that, first, the flue handle (or handles if it has two) have to be pushed in all the way, opening the path(s) for the air inside to escape. Fire follows air. So that's also why, if you just throw a log on, you'll collapse the pyramid and there won't be any more air in between the smaller wood pieces to keep the fire going. Only when the flames are burning the wood so hot that it creates red hot coals plus flames can you then finally add the larger wood. But it can't lay flat; it has to be at a slight angle, so two or three pieces propped against each other is ideal, also pyramid-like.

But you can't close the door right away. The fire can't always handle so many sudden changes in conditions right at once. You have to wait for the new wood to be on fire - each new piece - before closing the door.

Now, if you keep the flue open, the fire will burn quickly and fiercely. That's what you want at first, but then, if you don't close it some, the wood will burn too quickly, and before you know it, you're out of wood. So you want to keep the flue open just long enough for the new, larger, heavier wood to start burning fiercely (although that wood needs to have first been seasoned: in other words, dried for a season after being cut down, otherwise, it's "wet" wood and won't burn well - the outsides will catch, but the inside won't burn, and you'll just be left with a solid chunk of coal that doesn't actually burn).

Once that heavier wood is burning well, then you can close the flue almost all the way so the wood burns slowly, to conserve the wood. And, of course, you have to watch it throughout the day to make sure it stays burning, putting another log or two on, every once in awhile, at just the right times.

Closing it all the way is great for if you have to leave for the day, or for overnight, after stocking the wood stove full of heavy wood on top of lots and lots of red coals and other wood that's all ready burning, because the embers will burn very, very slowly and be available much later or the next morning for another fire - if only done just right.

Attention, patience, and selflessness. I can't always just do things "my way". I'm finding out, more and more, that my way is, in fact, the worst way.

But, that's okay. God is grace - mercy that I don't deserve - and I will be restored. God and I are building my fire together.

If I do things His way, I will be on Fire. But keeping the fire going means paying attention throughout the day. Having patience with myself, and others. Continuing the fearless, searching soul-searching work. Being as selfless as I can. Serving others. God's will, not mine, be done.

   BB Bill's Story, p.16  

Faith has to work twenty-four hours a day in and through us, or we perish.

Dear God

Margaret was right. It’s not funny.

I finally just went back and actually read this blog. God help me.

In fact, God, I’m just going to talk to You now. Enough of this consciousness manifestation I-think-I-know-things thing. You are the Alpha and the Omega. I am nothing. You are Everything. I’m nothing.

I need You. I don’t know what to say, except, please, I need You to get rid of “me”. I’m a terrible human being. Most people don’t know this. I need You to help me stop using them. Help me stop deceiving them. Help me stop deceiving myself.

My only desire now on this beautiful Earth that You’ve created is to work for You. If I were to be given what I deserve, I know that it would be a slow, painful death because of my vast, vast Sin, followed by an eternity of torture. But You’re so merciful with your amazing Grace that You have allowed me yet to live. Please, remove EVERYTHING that is “me” without You. 

Help me think of You first in the morning when I rise. Help me every moment of the day to seek You first. Keep my eyes upon You. Keep my heart in You. Enter into me with every breath I take. Please take my will away. Thy will be done. 

I don’t deserve your forgiveness, yet I know it is mine. So I am Yours to use for Your Purpose. You Are My Salvation. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. I know the Truth. You are the Truth, the Life, the Way. I want nothing more than to abide in You.

Psalm 22 

19 But be not thou far from me, O Lord: O my strength, haste thee to help me.

20 Deliver my soul from the sword; my darling from the power of the dog.

21 Save me from the lion's mouth: for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns.

22 I will declare thy name unto my brethren: in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee.

23 Ye that fear the Lord, praise him; all ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him; and fear him, all ye the seed of Israel.

24 For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; neither hath he hid his face from him; but when he cried unto him, he heard.

25 My praise shall be of thee in the great congregation: I will pay my vows before them that fear him.

26 The meek shall eat and be satisfied: they shall praise the Lord that seek him: your heart shall live for ever.

27 All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee.

28 For the kingdom is the Lord's: and he is the governor among the nations.

29 All they that be fat upon earth shall eat and worship: all they that go down to the dust shall bow before him: and none can keep alive his own soul.

30 A seed shall serve him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation.

31 They shall come, and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that shall be born, that he hath done this.

23 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

2 He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.

3 He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.

Amen.

Consciousness and the Power of Manifestation

I've started "sort of" podcasting. Nothing high in audio quality. It's humbling to listen to myself. I see why people have a hard time understanding me when I speak. I'm so terrified of opening my mouth that I don't open it all the way when I talk. It has both to do with my bad teeth, and, a warped mind, of course.

Working the steps with a new sponsor, daily, more thoroughly than ever before, is having an effect. A good one. It's very uncomfortable, and at times I don't follow her suggestions, and I pay for it a little, and hurt people a little, but I'm aware enough - now more than ever - to catch it and just keep trying to do the next right thing. Admittedly, blogging isn't the next right thing - I do have more important, more "right" things to do, but this will always be a sort of therapy for me. I like typing . . . it's much faster than writing with my hand. I can't write fast enough by hand, but when I'm typing, I can almost type as fast as I think.

"Stream of consciousness"... it's been called, which is...

'A person's thoughts and conscious reactions to events, perceived as a continuous flow. The term was introduced by William James in his Principles of Psychology (1890).'

Ironically, this is actually the opposite of consciousness, according to Mooji, Eckhart Tolle, Sadhguru, Sri Akarshana, Thich Naht Hanh, etc. (my gurus).

According to my gurus, consciousness is not a person's thoughts or reactions to events, but rather, the awareness of those thoughts, and the deep realization that our thoughts and consequent feelings that inform and trigger our reactions to events come from an egoic state, not consciousness. Consciousness is there in the gap between thoughts - it is not the thoughts themselves, if it can be called an "it". Consciousness is The It, underlying everything, Life, Being, One, Connectedness with the Universe. It's still there when the thoughts and feelings occur, of course, as the Source in which those thoughts and feelings spring. But there's another "thing" - the ego - and the mind-patterns associated with it - that is the unnerving force behind the thoughts and feelings and behavior patterns that subconsciously drive us.

So there's the duality...Consciousness...and the mind. Consciousness is the hope for humanity. Consciousness is peace.

Many people call Consciousness "God." It's makes it translatable, talk-about-able. For those of us struggling with addiction, this is the Power greater than our selves, our egos, our instincts that pulls us back from the very gates of insanity and death. As the book of Alcoholics Anonymous says on page 53, "When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is, or He isn't. What was our choice to be?" Will I choose Consciousness, and Life, or will I continue to follow my own mind, my insanity?

The first three steps are, basically: (1) I can't; (2) God can; (3) I think I'll let Him. Him, It, Consciousness, whatever words fail to describe the Is-ness don't matter. Step 4 is where I begin to truly and deeply look at what my mind is doing. It's where I get to begin to understand why and how "I'm" the problem. By observing my thoughts and feelings, I get to get down to causes and conditions. It comes down to ego, behavior patterns, instincts. My security, identity, ambitions, pocketbook, self-esteem, and pride are threatened, causing my fear, dishonesty, selfishness, self-seeking, and resentment . . . causing my reactions that create wreckage and havoc in my life.

I'm an alcoholic, cannabis addict, love addict, anything-that-relieves-my-crazy-thoughts-and-feelings addict - I'm bodily and mentally powerless over these things, and I need something greater than myself to restore me to sanity. It doesn't really matter what I call it . . . as long as it isn't "me".

So from here, admitting my defects to another human being, and to God, then I become willing to have these defects removed, and by asking God to remove them and by making amends for harms done do I get to build the arch through which I walk to freedom. I go out to repair the damage done by my unconscious self-will run-riot and accept a new way of living. I'm willing to do things not "my way". I'm willing to not do things "my way." I'm willing to do the next "right" thing, and not do the next "wrong" thing . . . the thing that will hurt someone, throw me into resentment or self-pity, and get me drunk, high and/or dead.

So I need to hurry up and finish this blog post. I have a meeting to go to and more work to do for my clients. But before I go, I'll just share one more thing.

The power of manifestation is REAL.

I thought, after my recent 4-year relationship - the one that I thought was the relationship to end all relationships (and for the time, it was) - that it would be easy to be single again and not get involved with any new men, since I'm working the steps with a truly wonderful sponsor. But, as I wrote in my last post - self-knowledge is the beginning, but it's not the solution.

There is a Power greater than myself at work. I asked It to get me into my studio apartment after the break-up, making $2,000 in one day. Thank you, Master Sri.

But, I've also manifested four men, one after another. I have to laugh at this: I had prayed to "someday" meet a "spiritual guy" . . . I told God that I didn't care if he was older, in his forties or fifties, even. The law of attraction and power of manifestation works so well, of course, that two men, over 50, and spiritual, showed up in my life within days. At the same time, I was reminiscing about one of the guys on my list, "The Satellite Communications Engineer". I opened up Instagram a few days later, and of course, there was a message from him. After that, I told God that I could be with a guy in a wheelchair - maybe that would be good for me. Today, I got a message from a guy in a wheelchair, whom I don't know, have never met, and whom I didn't know existed when I said that to God.

Master Sri Akarshana talks about the importance - as does the end of the 4th step sex inventory in the Big Book - about being very specific about our ideal, whatever it is that we want. Because the Universe will give us what we want.

Right now, I really just want to recover and be restored to sanity. You hear me, God? Okay, cool. Let's just do that.