Don’t Drink and Don’t Die

This is my step book. I took the picture that way in order to show that it is falling apart. The binding is broken in about five places, and two distinct chunks of pages completely come out. In pencil, inside the cover, the price of $3.50 remains. I thought this detail surely tells my age, but I see by a list from our central office as of yesterday that 12 and 12s only cost $6.40. I’m not sure, but I think only soft cover was available in our office. Mine has a hard cover, and it’s been through a lot.

I took the months of February, March, April, May and June to work through the sixth step line by line and concept by concept. I don’t really have a sense of completion, but I do feel I did a thorough enough job for this go around. Although I have spent literally years thinking about Step Six and feeling that I am ON Step Six, I never did it in this formal a way. My character defects, or at least the concept of them, come up pretty quickly in my mind when I face difficulties today. I know that this is where all of my difficulties with just about everything come from. So yes, entirely ready.

“Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.”

Since this Step so specifically concerns itself with humility, we should pause here to consider what humility is and what the practice of it can mean to us.

So first, humility.  One definition has to do with having a modest opinion of one’s own importance.  And as word leads to word, modest means free from vanity, egotism and boastfulness.  Humble means not proud or arrogant.

Humility is an important aspect of the AA program.  We’re told that usually, most of us had wanted to climb to the top of the heap, or to hide beneath it.  We are told to understand ourselves as a worker among workers, a family member among family members, a neighbor among neighbors.

In some deep, fundamental ways, I understand this.  I work with people who have severe disabilities, and I know that each is a person, completely.  Abilities between and among people vary drastically, and some are able to do many things, some only a few.  The person who can walk is not superior to the person who cannot, although their ability to get around is superior.  The person who can talk is not superior to the person who cannot, although their ability to communicate is better.

So yeah, I’ll take my halo in a size five.  Or not.  There are other times when I am very judgmental and I judge myself to be better than others.  I cannot do away with the notion that people who are conservative, in religion and politics, have it wrong, and I’m right.  I can work on it and I sort of do, but I just can’t imagine ever being totally over that idea.  And I’m not as good as others in just about every way I can think of.  I’m not as smart, I have few and pitiful talents, physically I don’t have much ability at all.

But I know the ideal I am to aim toward, which is humility and a belief that I am just a person blessed to be here now, just like every other.

I was thinking about the revelatory nature of AA and they way we are encouraged and supported and urged to share on the deepest level. There are lots of aspects of this that interest me. I have said and heard so many things over the years, it makes me pause.

On the very deepest level there is probably the fifth step. Where I live now, many people choose to do their fifth step with an anonymous clergy person. There’s a religious organization that supplies such people to listen, and I guess you can look at it as a bit of a tradition here. It’s not anything I heard much about in the other places I’ve lived. I’m sure people did it, but it’s a common experience here.

An anonymous fifth step must certainly be better than no fifth step, and I can understand that sometimes some people feel the only way they can possibly do it is with someone they don’t know and won’t see again. Still, I wouldn’t do that or recommend it unless there truly is no other way.

But THE fifth step is a very small part of the revealing that goes on at AA meetings. I’ve heard people admit to just about every sin except for murder, and I have known at least two people well who did kill someone with a car by driving drunk. I knew someone for some time who lost a baby to fetal alcohol syndrome. I’ve heard people say they have stolen and cheated and lied. People have been unkind to their pets and their children and their parents and their neighbors. People have wasted money and resources and opportunities.

I took this topic from As Bill Sees It, and the section is titled something like “We can’t do it alone.” The chairs pictured are from my home group, and after the picture was taken people sat in the chairs and talked things over together.

I’m an introvert. As I’ve written before, I believe this makes it tough to work AA in a way that someone more extroverted wouldn’t experience. It is by its very nature a very social thing, a self help group. I always hesitate to say that because I know that now and in the past, people in some very extreme situations have stayed sober without other AAs around to help. But in general, when people and meetings are available, it is vital to recovery to go socialize. One of the awesome aspects of the situation is that within the AA program, there are lots of other people who have trouble socializing also. And even the friendly outgoing people are used to being with and helping the loners.

I think the social aspect of it keeps some people out of the program. I read blogs written by people who know they could benefit so much from going to AA, but who don’t go and continue to suffer. Others make up their minds to stop drinking and do so, but they don’t go to meetings and they don’t share with other alcoholics. I don’t count either of those groups of people as being successful at dealing with their drinking problem.

I’ve also seen the culture where the only sharing a person does is with his or her sponsor.  I’ll have to write about “back in the day,” but when I started AA, in the late 1970s, it was sort of required at the beginning that a person get phone numbers and call and talk to people in addition to their sponsor.  Personally, I’m extremely grateful that this is how I started.  I hated it, and I would not have done it had there been another way.  I believe I would have stuck with just a sponsor and maybe another friend or two, and that would have been it.  Because it was expected I would call and speak to another person every day, because it was required, I did it, and it broke a huge hole through my wall of isolation.

I also imagine that for those lucky extroverts, the socializing and sharing that goes on in AA is of an excellent quality and the content is supreme.  Whether we like it or not, every day we have a chance to hear about the very humanness of those around us, and to know we’re not alone.  I have no doubt too that all I’ve said and all I’ve heard has made me more tolerant of and patient with the people outside the rooms, in the rest of my life.  Almost anything anyone can tell me I have heard already, and I’ve known someone who has gone through it, whatever it may be.  I know that the people who seem arrogant and all together are not.  I’ve heard their counterparts describe it and explain it many times over.

The moment we say, “No, never!” our minds close against the grace of God. Delay is dangerous, and rebellion may be fatal. This is the exact point at which we abandon limited objectives, and move toward God’s will for us.

And that’s it, that’s the end of Step Six in the Twelve and Twelve.

I won’t, can’t, don’t say no never to anything AA has to offer. I have every character defect every other person has, to my own unique degrees. I have come far in dealing with the things that I did that were very wrong when I was drinking. I have given up the thought that there might be character defects I will never deal with, and will always engage in. I understand that my character defects block me from God’s grace, which is the good things in life that God would give me, if I could receive them.

As much as is humanly possible for me right now, I say that I am entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

I’m not feeling particularly guilty, but I wanted to write about something that is not my story and not Step Six. No doubt this will come in handy if I make it around the steps and back for Step Four. I found this on a list of prompts to help with Step Four. Is guilt a character defect? Probably. The question that was asked as a prompt is looking back over your life, what do you feel particularly guilty about?

My adult life has been spent in AA. I have not, since I’ve been sober, done things like drive drunk, steal, cheat, lie on a big scale. I’m trying to think of things that bring to mind guilt from before I was sober. The essence of guilt, I think, is feeling that I’ve done something wrong while knowing better, having caused harm even though I knew it was harmful, or having been very negligent. I’m coming up empty for thoughts from before sobriety. That may just be where my head is, or it may be that a lifetime of AA plus raising my own children has made me see most of what befell me as normal and fallible.

The biggest guilts of my sober life have to do with my children. They are minor, really, but they effect me. AA has given me such an excellent platform to stand on. It’s given good people to turn to and rules to live by that have made for a good life experience.

I have to give more thoughts to writing the particulars about what I feel I’ve done wrong regarding the children. A few instances come to mind that would probably invade their privacy. As I said, though, these aren’t huge things. Today when I feel guilty it’s usually because I’m trying to help and support two people at once, or because there are certain helping aspects of my job that I’ve abandoned, more as a way to keep going than anything else.

As I was writing that, a good example of my current state of guilt came to mind.

This is Xandra. She is my death row doggie. Carole and I adopted her last year from a kill shelter. Xandra was four years old (So they said, but they also called her a labradoodle. Um, no), unspayed, filthy, with awful teeth. She sat in the corner of the pen barking nonstop. We were out to find a different doggie. Through circumstances I’ll have to write about at some point, we were looking for a dog to add to the household (which had another dog and three cats - still does). I set criteria at 30 pounds or less (Xandra weighs 64), between 3 and 5 years old (she was 4, so that worked), female (yes) and from a shelter (yes). One way that Carole and I are often bad for each other is that neither one of us can say no often enough to the animals, and we end up having just one too many, just enough to make things unmanageable.

I will come back to this topic because it has sent my mind sort of racing. My character defects do come into play big time around this dog.

For now, I think that considering what are the things we feel guilty about can show us either where we need to improve our conduct, or where we need to shrink our ego and be our right size concerning what we can and should do in situations, or both.

At the very least, we shall have to come to grips with some of our worst character defects and take action toward their removal as quickly as we can.

I’m a little alarmed to note that I have just one paragraph remaining in Step Six. Just a little though. I do feel that I’ve made progress and increased my understanding and increased my practice of the step.

I wrote before that I think every person has every human character defect there is, just to an individual extent. It reminds me of an expression I heard often when I first came in. “If you sober up a horse thief, all you will have is a sober horse thief.” Horse thieves! They weren’t plentiful, even back in the 70s. Along the same lines is the saying “the drunk who brought you in here will take you out.” The essence of these is that if we don’t change ourselves, we will just continue our bad behavior, or we will drink, or both.

It’s precious to me that there lies the solution to my life’s problems. Not that any are solved or leave completely, but that I will continue to grow in my ability to handle them if I work the steps. If I don’t, I will drink.

One immediate benefit I found in the program was that without drinking, for some reason, I didn’t lie. Drunk, I lied, even when the truth would have been better. So that kind of dishonestly left for me very quickly. And of course it needed to. I couldn’t have continued on, sober, if I was lying all the time.

I like the metaphor of “coming to grips with.” If I can grip them, maybe I can control them, rather than having them control me. My worst character defects are now what they were then. I think they are headed by fear, then come selfishness and selfcenteredness, sloth, anger, jealousy. I feared everything so much when I was newly sober. The support of AA has lessened that substantially.

A few months ago, at work, my boss’ boss’ boss commented to me to not be so afraid all the time. Now work is one area I feel pretty confident in, if only because by the grace of Carole I don’t need the job. And I did interact with this man around some very emotional and difficult situations. Still, I was surprised that I still give off that fear vibe so strongly that someone who doesn’t know me can read it.

I’m still taking action toward their removal, and this part of it. Again, I’d love to be further down this road at this point. Now I’m paying attention and actively trying.

Let’s dispose of what appears to be a hazardous open end we have left. It is suggested that we ought to become entirely willing to aim toward perfection. We note that some delay, however, might be pardoned. That word, in the mind of the rationalizing alcoholic, could certainly be given a long-term meaning. He could say, “How very easy! Sure, I’ll head toward perfection, but I’m certainly not going to hurry any. Maybe I can postpone dealing with some of my problems indefinitely.” Of course, this won’t do. Such a bluffing of oneself will have to go the way of many another pleasant rationalization.

I find it interesting that here, character defects are synonymous with problems. At any point in life, most of us could probably list our problems at any given moment. We have health problems and money problems and work problems and relationships problems, problems with our pets, our houses, our hobbies, our mind. I’m coming to understand more fully that the external details of my life, the good details and the bad details, are separate from the problems that lie within me, my character defects. Surely these act together to make me who I am at any given time. And I can change and effect some of my external details, things like where I work, where I live, and how I take care of my body. Other things are beyond my control and with these it is my attitude and outlook that I can work on changing.

I was looking back at what I had written so far this month, and I see that before I knew about my upcoming uterine biopsy I already reflected that maybe I won’t be at Disney ever again. I know it’s not important. If I go to Disney again, I’ll be different, the other people will be different, and Disney will be different. You can’t step in the same stream twice.

I’m not quite sure where I’m going with this. My immediate reaction to this section of the sixth step is twofold. One, I wonder how much it was watered down in order to become palatable to prospective AAs. I think that some of this was written with that in mind, not scaring people away. Again, it is interesting to conjecture but I will never be able to answer this question. The book says what it says. I’m not so far away from the time that it was written that I can’t easily understand the language.

Second, I wonder that I or anyone would want to indefinitely postpone dealing with character defects, or, if you rather, problems.

I remember my reaction at first when I saw this step and thought I could not, would not ever heal that relationship, so I couldn’t work the step. The next time I approached the step in a more formal way, and with more experience and humility, understood that the character defect that lead me to have a relationship I’m unwilling to heal is, to quote Dr. Seuss, “big and deep and tall.”

For me, the hazardous open end closed over time, really as a result of my better understanding. My opinion only, but I don’t think a person will make it over the long time wanting to postpone dealing with these indefinitely.

So very many things about living in the “now” come up when I’m frightened about something like a medical test. I started looking through my pictures to find one that might illustrate something about this predicament. My pictures folder is filled with pictures of my pets, and pictures of the people I work with, many of whom have severe intellectual disabilities. One of the things I contemplate about living in the now is that many of these beings, the pets and the people, don’t worry about dying or being sick or disabled.

Now I should explain that I cannot profess to really know what any person (or animal for that matter) thinks about. It’s an extremely important concept to keep in mind that all people have to be respected fully, no matter what their abilities or disabilities are, and we have to assume that each and every one has every thought and feeling that all others do, too. And of course living things from people to pets to bugs fight death and try not to die.

This picture is the view out of the front of my house to the church across the street. This is the church where Carole and I and her sponsee started our meeting. The congregation is more than 100 years old, and the building is getting there too. I love old things, buildings and antiques. I think if I had to start a career completely unrelated to what I do now, I would go into historical preservation. You can see the lighted cross in this view, and I see that every time I look out my bedroom window, unless there’s very thick fog.

I wonder about the other people who have looked at this view through the years. I wonder about the people who founded the church and built the church and attended the church. I wonder about all the thoughts and prayers and words that have gone on in that building. So many of those people have died.

I understand that all I have is now. It’s false to think that I know what will happen in any case. Lightening could strike my house now and kill me. I may survive many medical situations or other life threatening catastrophes. From what I understand of the program regarding things like this, there is a universal vulnerability to being human, and ultimately the more I accept that, the more serene I will be. Also I understand from the program that each and every day I’ve had since my first day of sobriety has been extra, a gift, something I did not earn or deserve, something many other people fail to receive. I am so privileged among people to be healthy, to have enough money and material possessions, to have children and pets and a home and a spouse and a career.

I really love my life, and I selfishly want another 46 years. I realize that I am right here right now, today, and I’m grateful.

Looking again at those defects we are still unwilling to give up, we ought to erase the hard-and-fast lines that we have drawn. Perhaps we shall be obliged in some cases still to say, “This I cannot give up yet . . . ,” but we should not say to ourselves, “This I will never give up!”

A long time ago, I thought of this in terms of someone I was unwilling to talk to. There’s a relationship I was pretty sure I would never be willing to mend, so I thought I would never, ever, be able to do the sixth step. More recently, I heard a newcomer voice this very thing. This person said he is unwilling and unable to forgive two family members. He expressed that he actually hates these people. And so, he concluded he therefore couldn’t do any of the steps.

What is the defect at play here? I honestly don’t know. I see pride, obstinance*, and a severe lack of love and grace. In other places in the literature, I know we are said to sometimes defy God, and to be defiant. We are resistant, and we resist what is given to us, and what we know to be best. These are the common characteristics of children, adolescents and teenagers.

I gave up “no, never,” a long time ago. There are few things I’d even be tempted to use those words about regarding myself and what I’m willing and able to do. The way this concept resonates for me at this point is to substitute and say, “Looking again at those defects we are still struggling with after years of effort . . . In some cases we will say, “This I haven’t conquered yet.”

I understand that it is life long, and that I will never reach the ideal. I understand that I have to be willing to continue to really try. I understand that if I lose my willingness over any appreciable amount of time, I will regress, and worse. I understand that my rewards are proportionate to the effort I put forth. I understand that the rewards are beyond what I can imagine I would want for my life.

I’ve reached these conclusions by the evidence I see in my own life, and in the lives of others.  When I was able to stop drinking, I understood that it was abstinence or death.  When the urge to drink was mostly out of the way, I understood that it was grow by working the program, or be miserable.  I will look again at those defects that I still struggle with, and I will attack and examine them with renewed effort.

*The browser spell check did not like the word obstinance, so I went to an online dictionary to see if it is a word and if I’d spelled it properly. The ads that were generated for that dictionary page asked, “Defiant? Poor grades? Defiant child?” To that I say yes, no, and yes.

After all these years, I admit I don’t meditate in a formal fashion. Prayer and meditation is something I am going to spend renewed effort on now. I’ve been doing the prayer thing at work, and that’s good. To summarize, I printed up a few “new” prayers from http://www.worldprayers.org/ and I try to read and write them in order to memorize them. I do this at lunch time (I really don’t have a lunch break) and sometimes during difficult meetings. I know I’m learning the prayers, but I’m not doing it well or quickly. I also read an AA meditation book first thing every morning at work. I keep it where I stow my cell phone, so it’s something I don’t forget to do ever. I also have longer meditations, poems and sayings I’ve collected, and I hang one over my desk each week and try to reread it, contemplate it and apply it to my week. The nature of these things is such that they all apply to so many situations. I try to concentrate on one at a time as it applies to my work week or my home week. In this way I learn it better and incorporate it more over time.

At home, I have a flipping photo thingy from when I was in junior high. Instead of photos, I inserted short sayings and poems that appeal to me. I flip it weekly, and try to contemplate the saying there through the week. I have a Christian meditation book I try to read each morning. I have other AA-inspired meditation books I’ve read at different times. Right now, As Bill Sees It is in the bathroom.

I want to start the prayer thing at home as well as at work, and I think I’d like to work on it and do it as part of this blog.

Before I start with the prayer today, though, I want to expand a bit on what Hillary said and why I like it and how I’ll use it. She said

When you hear people saying or think to yourself, If only, or, What if, I say, please, don’t go there. Every moment wasted looking back keeps us from moving forward.

Life is too short, time is too precious, and the stakes are too high to dwell on what might have been. We have to work together for what still can be.

This applies to all of my situations, of course, but it resonated most strongly for me with regard to my work situation. Briefly, I lost a boss who meant a great deal to me at work. Henceforth she will be known here as Edith. She tried hard to do good things for my workplace, but for various reasons (and I surely don’t know them all) she was not able to continue. I miss her there daily. Outside of work, she’s become a friend, so I lost her in the work capacity only. My work partner and friend, Irene, has come back to work with me after a time away. Irene often, probably several times a day, mentions one or another thing that is wrong with our program, and these are all things that Edith was taking care of. If only weighs on my mind often.

Of course I know the concept of not looking back, either to regret or to celebrate. All that takes time away from today. Hillary said it in a way I was able to heart right now (That is a Freudian typo that I’m going to leave.  Of course I meant HEAR). That’s added to by my highly emotional state over Hillary’s campaign. So I’ll write these words down for my rotating meditations, at home and at work, and try to learn them and live them.

As to prayer, I’ve chose a new one for home, and I’ll record it hear and try to learn it here.

Holy Spirit,
Giving life to all life,
Moving all creatures,
Root of all things,
Washing them clean,
Wiping out their mistakes,
Healing their wounds,
You are our true life,
Luminous, wonderful,
Awakening the heart from its ancient sleep.

hildegarde of bingen - 12 century

This appeals to me because it seems basic, as in bringing me back to the base of things, which is God.

Part of the reason I began this blog is because I can be reluctant at times to let newcomers and others know the long timer experience isn’t all peaches and cream. Of course they know that. But. There’s no one around who remembers me when I was drinking. There’s no one who knows how much better I am. I have plenty of issues now, and they are nothing compared to the way I used to be. I do get better and happier, more serene and more peaceful as any appreciable amount of time goes by. My problems today are of a very high caliber. They are “luxury” problems, for sure.

A luxury problem is a small problem with something wonderful. Which university to attend, for example, when your choices are all good and your capacity to pay for it or pay the money back are good. A luxury problem might be when you wreck your very nice car, and you’re fine, but you have to deal with the details of getting it fixed or replaced. Which job to take when you have good choices. Fixing something within your nice house, with the resources to do it.

All of my problems are not always luxury problems, but most are, and really all are today. It’s hard for me to complain in this case, or to admit everything isn’t well and wonderful.

I wrote that I hate vacation. Two weeks ago, under strange circumstances, I voiced the feeling that I also hate change. In one of those magnificently timed “coincidences” that make me feel or sense or hope that a higher power is influencing things, a friend sent me a meditation pointing out that every single thing is changing every single second, and that hate is not a productive or gracious way to feel about it. It pointed out that I have within me qualities to help me like and embrace change. I can learn to use things like vision and imagination to enjoy and employ change.

So vacation. I’m at Disney World in Florida. I’ve been here several times, beginning when I was a kid. I understand and appreciate that I am extremely fortunate in this. From the money and will to do it down and through the capabilities within my body and mind I am very very lucky. This time, my daughter chose it as the destination in honor of her graduation from college. Again, I am extremely fortunate and blessed. My son and my wife are also here, and from the money to do this to the physical abilities and the fact that we can all get along well enough to do this, I am one of the luckiest people on earth.

In that context I still want to write about and list what’s wrong. Number one, I can’t take the heat. I’ve never been good with heat, not at any time during my life. It’s ninety degrees here with blazing sun, and it’s humid. And I had to spend lots of time rushing from one destination to the next. I have a feeling also that my family members don’t completely believe how bad the heat makes me feel. It’s the night of the first day right now, and I’m really a bit frightened that I’ll either collapse or ruin everybody’s vacation.

I also really really feel out of balance. It’s not chic or cool to admit that I like to work, I like to be in touch with people, I like to have all my stuff with me. And good lord I like my critters. And I need time to do nothing. So generally, in a five day work week with two or sometimes three days off, with all my stuff and several hours to devote to my pets, I feel good. Here, now, I am pining for the pets and imaging they (and especially one) is sad and feeling abandoned. I also had to keep going and moving from around eight in the morning till around ten at night. That’s too much for me.

So honestly, honestly, I’d rather be home and not at Disney and not on vacation. I’m going to try hard to change this. I’m going to try and do better physically tomorrow, drinking more and ……. I don’t know what else. I can’t think of a great strategy to tolerate vacation better. To like it. To love it. What’s coming to my mind right now is that it’s another day down and another day closer to being home. But I’m not staying with that or accepting it as the way I should be. I do know I shouldn’t be trying to tolerate it, but aiming toward the perfect ideal of accepting, embracing, and understanding it and myself. God is certainly extremely gracious to me right now. And sobriety is so worth it! I would not could not be anywhere close to this if I was drinking. My family wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t be here. I wouldn’t have means to afford this or skills to implement it or cope with it. This is so luxurious.