We are learning

We are learning, each day of our abstinence, to see more clearly what lies before us. Less and less are we hampered by our own selfish needs, distorting that which we face. We all have within us the talent for seeing things as they really are. But it is a process that takes practice, a process of turning within to the untapped talent which is one of the gifts of a spiritual life.

We are spiritual entities, one and all. And the genius to see as God sees is ours for the asking. This program is paving our way. Each day it becomes easier to live an honest life. Each day we trust more the people we encounter. And each day we take greater risks being our true selves.

Vulnerability

Some of us may have made a decision that no one was ever going to hurt us again. We may automatically go on "feelings freeze mode" when faced with emotional pain. Or, we may terminate a relationship the first time we feel hurt. Hurt feelings are a part of life, relationships, and recovery. It is understandable that we don't want to feel any more pain. Many of us have had more than our share, in fact, at some time in our life, we may have been overwhelmed, crushed, or stopped in our tracks by the amount of pain we felt. We may not have had the resources to cope with our pain or take care of ourselves.

That was yesterday. Today, we don't have to be so frightened of pain. It does not have to overwhelm us. We are becoming strong enough to deal with hurt feelings. And we don't have to become martyrs, claiming that hurt feelings and suffering are all there is to life.

Rejoicing

A quality we all share, a very human quality, is to expect perfection from ourselves, to expect the impossible in all tasks done. We must rejoice for the good we do. Each time we pat ourselves on the back for a job well done, our confidence grows a little bit more. Recovery is best measured by our emotional and spiritual health, expressed in our apparent confidence and trust in "the process."

We need to recognize and celebrate our strong points, and they'll gain even more strength. Likewise, we need to practice prayer and listening to guidance first to develop our ties to God, but more importantly to be able to acknowledge when help is at hand. We can do all we need to do with God's help.

The Grief Process

To let ourselves wholly grieve our losses is how we surrender to the process of life and recovery. Some experts, like Patrick Carnes, call the Twelve Steps "a program for dealing with our losses, a program for dealing with our grief."

How do we grieve?

Awkwardly. Imperfectly. Usually with a great deal of resistance. Often with anger and attempts to negotiate. Ultimately, by surrendering to the pain.

The grief process, says Elisabeth Kubler Ross, is a five stage process: denial, anger, bargaining, sadness, and, finally, acceptance. That's how we grieve; that's how we accept; that's how we forgive; that's how we respond to the many changes life throws our way.

Although this five-step process looks tidy on paper, it is not tidy in life. We do not move through it in a compartmentalized manner. We usually flounder through, kicking and screaming, with much back and forth movement - until we reach that peaceful state called acceptance.

Impending change

The specter of change builds dread in most of us. We fear the effects on our personal lives. We lack faith that the impending change will benefit us. Only time can assure us of that. And it will, just as every change we've survived up to now has done.

Changes are gifts, really. They come as hallmarks to our present attainments. They signify successful growth. And they announce our readiness for more growth. How we struggle to understand this, and how quickly we forget it once we have adapted to the change. The struggle is then repeated the next time change visits us.

We long for permanence, believing it guarantees security, not realizing the only real security available to us come with our trust in God, from whom all change comes as a blessing on the growth we've attained.

The Simplest Prayer

How do we pray? With little experience, many of us don't even know how to begin. The process, however, is neither difficult nor complicated.

We came to Narcotics Anonymous because of our drug addiction. But underlying that, many of us felt a deep sense of bewilderment with life itself. We seemed to be lost, wandering a trackless waste with no one to guide us. Prayer is a way to gain direction in life and the power to follow that direction.

Because prayer plays such a central part in NA recovery, many of us set aside a particular time each day to pray, establishing a pattern. In this quiet time, we "talk" to our Higher Power, either silently or aloud.

Getting Through the Discomfort

Our goal in recovery is to make us feel comfortable, peaceful, and content. Happy. We want to be at peace with our environment and ourselves. Sometimes, to do that, we need to be willing to face, feel, and get through discomfort.

I am not talking here about being addicted to misery and pain. I am not talking about creating unnecessary pain. I'm talking about the legitimate discomfort we sometimes need to feel as we heal.

When we have surgery, the pain hurts most the day after the operation. When we do the kind of work we are facing in recovery, we are doing an emotional, mental, and spiritual surgery on ourselves. We're removing parts of us that are infected and inflamed.

Are we victimizing ourselves?

Some believe that people create their own trouble by attracting the wrong
conditions and people in their lives. This may not be entirely
true, but we can find that some element of it was at work with us.
Time and time again during our drinking, we set ourselves up for abuse
and rejection, though our motives seemed right.

Why did we do this? Supposedly to punish ourselves, the theory has it.
If this is true, then we should now call a halt to the process
immediately. If we've emerged from the terrors of alcoholism, we've had
all the punishment anybody needs.

We can change our bad patterns by looking carefully at the people and situations
we seem to attract.

Recovery is a process

Recovery is a process, one that rebuilds our lives. And the Twelve Steps provide the foundation to support our growth as healthy, productive women. But each Step must be carefully and honestly worked, or the whole foundation will be weakened.

How lucky we are to have found this program and the structure it offers. We looked for structure in our past. We searched, maybe for years, running from one panacea to another, hoping to find ourselves. Booze - pills - food - lovers - causes; none gave us the security we longed for. We couldn't find ourselves because we hadn't defined ourselves.

Making Amends

Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
  —Step Nine of Al-Anon ( AA)

When we make amends we need to be clear about what we're apologizing for and the best way to say we're sorry. What we are really doing with our amends is taking responsibility for our behavior. We need to be sure that the process itself will not be self-defeating or hurtful.

Sometimes, we need to directly apologize for a particular thing we have done or our part in a problem.

Other times, instead of saying "I'm sorry," what we need to do is work on changing our behavior with a person.

There are times when bringing up what we have done and apologizing for it will make matters worse.

Leaving Room for Feelings

We are people, not robots. An important part of us - who we are, how we grow, how we live - is connected to our emotional center. We have feelings, sometimes - difficult ones, sometimes disruptive ones, and sometimes explosive ones that need to be worked through.

By facing and working through these feelings we and others grow. In relationships, whether it is a love relationship, a friendship, a family relationship, or a close business relationship, people need room to have and work through their feelings.

Some call it "going through the process."

It's quite uncomfortable to be an adolescent at age thirty-two. --Peggy Cahn

Our lives are in process every moment, which means change is ever-present. As new information is sorted and acquired, old habits are discarded. We don't let go of some old behaviors easily, however. They are like comfortable shoes. They may be worn thin, and they probably embarrass us in certain company, but we slip them on unconsciously and then it's too late.

Maturity is an "as if" behavior, initially. Emotional development was stunted, for most of us, with the onset of our addictive behavior, thus, we often respond to situations like adolescents.

Letting Things Happen

We do not have to work so hard at gaining our insights. Yes, we're learning that painful and disappointing things happen, often for a reason and a higher purpose. Yes, these things often work out for good. But we don't have to spend so much time and energy figuring out the purpose and plan for each detail of our life. That's hypervigilence!

Sometimes, the car doesn't start. Sometimes, the dishwasher breaks. Sometimes, we catch a cold. Sometimes, we run out of hot water. Sometimes, we have a bad day. While it helps to achieve acceptance and gratitude for these irritating annoyances, we don't have to process everything and figure out if it's in the scheme of things.

Solve the problem. Get the car repaired. Fix the dishwasher. Nurse yourself through the cold.