Learning to be fully human

Have you ever felt like you were giving up your right to choose the life you want to live? When I feel this way it is usually because something is standing between me and my preferences. Each morning I have several rituals that I use to center myself and start my day as a person who is in long term recovery with a commitment to being “turned” and placed on a path that leads to life. Not just any life - but a good, decent life. A life where I do not have to sneak or hide or lie or cheat or steal.

If I had a nickel for every time I thought or someone else said to me, “It’s my life! I get to live it MY way!” I would be a wealthy woman. The problem with this kind of thinking is this: When we have this kind of attitude, what we are really doing is constructing a personality, not becoming a full and whole human. This construction project began the instant we were born. We observed how folks responded to us. We listened to what our community valued. We evaluated and compared and competed for attention, affirmation and resources we thought we needed. We have pretended, we have played games, we have turned ourselves inside to get attention, approval or resources to live a life of our own making. This is fantasy living and it is as unsatisfactory for building a decent life as cotton candy is for providing a nourishing meal.

Recovery helps us remember and reconstruct our lives. When we “turn”, we do so knowing full well that we turn to a God who has our best interests at heart, who knew us before we were born, who knows how we are created and what we are created for. He gets us better than we get ourselves.

“If you don’t go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don’t deserve me. If your first concern is to look after yourself, you’ll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you’ll find both yourself and me.”

~ Matthew 10:38-39 The Message