You Have Everything Going For You!

Bikipatra put her finger on an issue that has dogged me all my life. In her blog she wrote:

"As far as I am concerned the attendance at Yale of a Mexican waiter's daughter is a symptom of grandiosity and pomposity. I wanted to go there because I was mentally ill. That I was gifted enough to go is an inconsequential detail."

Substitute "Yale" with another snotty eastern college plus an Ivy League b-school, and substitute "Mexican waiter's daughter" with "depressed, isolated, fearful, lost boy" and it becomes the story of my education and career.

I picked out a college based on "I'll show them all" and "Once this and that and the other thing happens, then I'll be happy." A few years later, since that hadn't worked, I added "I'll be financially set for life" to the motivations and went to business school.

Like any good alcoholic (pre-beginner though I was), I really expected a credential from an impressive, prestigious, superior, self-satisfied, rich, powerful school would magically transform me into a person with all those same desirable qualities.

The education was fine, I imagine about the same as any other college or business school. The problems are the gilt-edged, high-profile diplomas.

There was no magical transformation, needless to say, but a whole value system and self-identity seemed to come wrapped in the diplomas, like dead fish in yesterday's newspaper. I've struggled to knuckle under to the demands of the values and images, even while I've simultaneously rebelled.

The images, values, and assumptions are very powerful, reinforced by powerful institutions, and part of me is always sure something is wrong with me if I don't measure up to my diplomas. As Bikipatra points out, a lot of people around us, even some of those trying to treat our diseases, are drawn, unconsciously, into the assumptions and images, and have trouble seeing our credentials as symptoms rather than easy solutions.

"You can just walk into a 100K job any time you want. Take a high-pressure, rat-race job and you'll succeed at it without breaking a sweat. You're smart. You're talented. You're experienced.

Obviously, since you went to business school, your career is your top priority, you crave working 80 hours a week, you're confident, strong, a leader, you're inspired by corporate mission statements and you believe in the strategic-plan-of-the-month. You have all this education to "fall back on," so once you "pull it together" you can get right back in the rat race!

You have everything going for you!

Accomplish! Achieve! Earn!

All you need are self-confidence, self-assurance, self-reliance, independence..."

I haven't shown anyone anything, my education and my job have never given me happiness or satisfaction, and I have no financial security. In AA they always say "insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results." So why on earth would I want to "pull it together," embrace this persona of a corporate drone, and make myself miserable??

These diplomas and credentials I have "going for me" are nothing more than another symptom and expression of my disease, and "pulling it together" means nothing less than walking away from recovery.