Toolbox

Pray for potatoes, but grab a hoe

 Talking to others in recovery is important for those of us who didn’t talk much to start with, as well as for those who often overcommunicated, those who provided streams of information, but never really shared how they felt. Whether we were reserved or gregarious, sharing honestly about what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now made a big difference in our ability to understand the impact that alcoholism and addiction had on us. We found that talking to others in recovery opened up a two-way channel that provided us with necessary information about ourselves and about sobriety. And, in return, we found that our experience could benefit others.

For those of us who made a practice of lying, obfuscating, or just fudging the truth, the idea of getting honest with ourselves and with others was a hurdle we had to get over in order to maintain our sobriety. The practice of misrepresenting the truth was so ingrained that we often lied about things without even thinking. Many times, when drinking, we got caught up in a web of lies, forgetting what we had said and to whom. We told employers we couldn’t come to work because we were sick or some family member had died when really we were just hungover and needed a few drinks to get “back to normal.” And, when we got caught in a lie, there was only one thing left to do: tell another one.

Approaching life from the perspective of honesty took many of us a while to achieve. But, if we could start by accepting the fundamental truth about ourselves – that we were alcoholic and could not manage our own lives – the process of getting honest in other areas of our lives became a little bit easier. Sometimes, though, even well into sobriety, we find that there are still things we lie about – perhaps just little things that make us seem better off than we may actually be or more accomplished among our peers -- yet we know with continued sobriety and a persistent willingness to face ourselves, warts and all, that honesty will prevail and we will be able to recognize and accept ourselves as we truly are, both good and bad. Honesty is a necessary ingredient to humility, and humility is a building block of spiritual growth.

Alcoholics often pride themselves on how much they can drink, but as those of us in recovery have come to know, it really only takes one drink to get us drunk. Many of us thought we had the proverbial wooden leg without realizing that we were actually undone the moment we took the very first drink, not the last; that the first drink set up a compulsion all but assuring we would end up drunk – again.

But, in the end, it made it easier for us. We realized we didn’t have to stand firm against a tidal wave of alcohol in order to stay sober – a prospect that seemed too overwhelming for us to accomplish. All we had to do was not pick up the first drink. Breaking our drinking problem down to this most basic level helped many of us to see that staying sober was possible. If you don’t pick up the first drink, you can’t get drunk.

Many of us were not very interested in being part of a group when we were caught up in active addiction. We didn’t particularly like being tied down to what others wanted or thought. It was more important that we arrange things to suit ourselves rather than worrying too much about the wants and needs of others. The two most commonly spoken words in our world were “I” and “You,” and it reflected the way we operated.

In recovery, however, there was another word that had to be added: “We.” It didn’t take us long to realize that we couldn’t stay sober without the help and support of others in recovery. Something had to change, and when we started becoming a part of the whole rather than trying to struggle to the top of the heap or to hide underneath it, we found our recovery got stronger as our network of support got wider. We began to feel safe amongst our peers.

Consider the following: the Panama Hat is actually from Ecuador; India ink is from China; Danish pastries were not invented in Denmark; Tennessee Williams was born in Mississippi; a ten-gallon hat only holds 3 quarts; Spanish Moss is neither Spanish, nor moss; there is no lead in lead pencils.

In recovery, we come to realize that things are not always what they seem – or how they may feel at any given moment. Things change – our emotions fluctuate – and what we feel may not actually provide a complete picture of the truth.

One of the strengths of AA – or any twelve-step program, for that matter – is that not everyone wants to drink (smoke, gamble, etc.) at the same time. Just think of the madness if we all showed up at the same meeting on the same night, wanting to get high. Who would be there to affirm the progress we have made, to indicate the benefits of an addiction-free life?

The simplicity contained in the recovery slogan First Things First completely escaped most of us during our active drinking and drugging. Consistently jumping to conclusions, we were like people who read the last few pages of a book and said we were done. The idea of taking logical, incremental steps toward any particular end was preposterous – who had time for all that stuff? And besides, what could it possibly tell us that we didn’t know already? Our arrogance, impulsivity, and disregard for process conspired time after time to short-circuit our success, leaving us angry, frustrated and looking for someone to blame.

A simple refocusing, however, began to put things back into perspective. If we were willing to start at the beginning of our emotional, physical, and spiritual endeavors, we found there was a sense of logic to our actions, that we were developing a context into which the facts seemed to fit more appropriately. We realized how much we were missing by reading the last few pages of the book. It was like trying to make amends in Step Nine without first developing the willingness to do so in Step Eight. Putting First Things First, we found, was a wonderful way of keeping both feet on the ground.

Pushing aside mountains of evidence about our addictions was a hallmark for many of us. Faced with overwhelming confirmation of our problems, it was as if we prided ourselves in having reality dismissed on a technicality. We found it was easy to deflect all kinds of difficult truths about ourselves by focusing only on the minutiae. For example, we could discount the statement “You’re drinking all the time,” coming from a hurt and angry spouse, thinking to ourselves, “Not all the time,” counting in perhaps those few hours when we were passed out, using that tiny irregularity as a wedge to separate ourselves from any impact the statement might have had. But in recovery, we learned to identify rather than to compare. It didn’t do any good to pick apart what we were hearing and to distance ourselves from people simply because they were drinking whiskey and we only drank gin. By using identification to bring us closer to others, we were able to recognize ourselves in them and to feel the stirring of hope that if they could recover, we could too.

Living in the now

While caught up in our addictions, we spent most of our time shuttling back and forth between the future and the past, rarely touching down in the here and now. Most of us found the present to be too painful. But in recovery the present became a much easier place to inhabit. We found that we were able to enjoy life more easily if we just stayed put. Living in the now was easier by far than the awkward time travel we had engaged in for so long, alternately reminiscing about the good old days or dreading imagined difficulties to come. Or maybe it was the other way around and we spent most of our waking hours bemoaning the past while dreaming of a bright new tomorrow where all the wrongs done us would be set right and we would finally get our due. It wasn’t easy at first, but slowly we got better at staying focused on what was right here, right now. “Yesterday is a canceled check; tomorrow is a promissory note; but today is cash in hand.”

In business terminology, many of us didn’t know what we had on the shelves when we first came into recovery. After years of mismanagement, much of the stock had gone bad and our reserves were depleted. On the brink of bankruptcy as going human concerns, we needed a major overhaul, and sobriety proved to be just the ticket. But, what to do with all that stuff – emotional, physical, and spiritual baggage – we had carted around for years? How could we tell what was worth holding onto and what needed to be chucked out? The answer was to be found in a “searching and fearless moral inventory” as suggested in AA’s Step Four. By examining our past behavior and scrutinizing how we treated others, we began to get a picture of what kind of people we really were – of where we needed improvement and how our character defects had warped our perceptions of ourselves and the world around us. Without such an honest self-appraisal, we found we couldn’t continue moving forward with the changes we so desperately needed.

Selective memory is a disconcerting element of alcoholism and addiction, and sometimes we tend to remember only the elegance and romance of the first drink or drug – perhaps as we dine in a fine restaurant or share tender moments among friends – often forgetting the inevitable outcomes that seemed to flow more often than not when we picked up a drink or a drug, leaving us, perhaps, laying face down on a dirty sidewalk, stoned again. Better to think the drink or drug use through to its logical conclusion and to keep the memory green by reminding ourselves of how things really were.

It was easy for many of us to stop. We did it all the time – to get people off our backs, to prove a point, to clear up for a little while. But staying stopped often proved a more difficult task. Once the novelty wore off, it was usually just a matter of time before finding an excuse to start the downward cycle all over again. Staying stopped required a whole different commitment, though – and often meant leaving behind familiar people, places, and things we thought we couldn’t live without. But in the end, simply staying stopped became an easier thing to do than trying to pick up the pieces, yet again, of another failed attempt to keep our addiction in check.

Many of us were convinced we could do it alone. The idea of asking for help was unthinkable. If we couldn’t do it ourselves, it wasn’t going to get done. Most of this reaction toward life was based on fear – fear that others might see how helpless we really were. But listening to others wasn’t such a horrible thing, after all. Just sitting in a meeting, or talking with others in recovery, helped provide answers we could ultimately implement ourselves. What we got from others were suggestions, things that had worked for them in similar circumstances, not iron-clad directives. Slowly, with a range of possibilities provided through the experience of others, we began to trust in our own capabilities once again and to believe in ourselves, if only a little at a time. (H.O.P.E. = Hearing Other People’s Experience)