An Opportunity to Love...

Spiritual awakenings trade one set of problems for a better set. If this doesn’t happen, what has really changed? Before recovery, I struggled with honesty and fear. Fear is often a companion with me on my own recovery journey.

Does this discourage me? Sometimes.

But here’s the thing…. My fear does not control me or require me to self-medicate through starvation. I no longer need to stick my head in a jar of peanut butter (option 2 post self-starving) to survive my worst days of carrying the message to people who often prefer I just get up off my tushy and leave the psych ward, and them, alone.

Some days I still want to say, “Dude, I could be home right now wrapped in a cozy afghan reading a good trashy romance novel. I don’t need your attitude.”

But that would not be honest and today I am all about honesty. Honestly, I do need to regularly sit on plastic chairs in a psychiatric ward. I do need to be called out late at night or early in the morning to try. Just try.

I do need their attitude. I need it to remind me of where I have been and how quickly I could return there. I need it to teach me patience. I want it to be an opportunity to listen well, love deep, and demonstrate empathy.

So when this sad, lonely stranger about to jet from her psych ward stay to go get a fix tells me to “Go the f*&^@ home.” I listen. I listen well. I get up and go. This is part of my own work, expecting nothing in return.

Addiction promises what it cannot deliver but we are far enough along this road to know - we expected it to work for us. We had expectations. I need her sassy attitude. I need reminders of what it is like to live in such a way that I require some compulsive act with absolutely no hope of it actually helping me.

The 12-step process is not, ever, selfish. It is an opportunity to love and be loved well. Not by what we do or accomplish, but as a living testament to the fact that we tried.