Inserenity, etc.

A silent prayer for the alcoholic who still suffers, in and out of these rooms. Especially in my prayers tonight are my real-life fellows B and C.

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Another fight with my wife this afternoon. Resulted in that (now-recognizable) feeling of "inserenity" in my gut, thoughts ran wild with self-pity and resentment, called my sponsor and vented, he gave me some advice and suggested what I might say to her. Talked to her again, followed my sponsors advice, feeling serene again. Cool. I love AA. :)

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I seem to be somewhat unusual, in that I've done all 12 steps, in order, in a structured step workshop, in my first 6 months of sobriety. Far too fast to be thorough, but I was diligent enough to do them as well as I could, and the benefit was simply incredible.

So what do I do for an encore to this impressive achievement? I was thinking of commissioning a plaque in my own honor at the Alano club...

Just kidding! I think the main thing I gained from my 2-minute 12-step drill was a desire to do them again! It was like a flash of lightning, illuminating a dark, stormy, unfamiliar landscape for an instant: I have a better idea of the lay of the land, where I'm going and how to get there. It still isn't a walk in the sunshine, but it's a hell of a lot less scary than wandering around in the pitch dark without any clue at all.

I just finished another step one last week with my sponsor. We read aloud and discussed step one in the 12X12, which is now an old friend. He had me write about powerlessness and unmanageability in all areas of my life. The exercise was much easier, and actually much deeper and thorough, than my first step one. Here's part of what I wrote:

I’m powerless over everything other than my own (second) thoughts, my own actions, and my own responses to the words and actions of others and to the conditions and events of the world. I pray for the courage to change the things I can – which are my own thoughts, actions and responses. I pray for the serenity to accept the things I cannot change – which are others’ words and actions, and conditions and events in the world. I pray for wisdom to tell the difference – which seems to depend on eliminating self-will and wishful thinking, eliminating fear of outcomes that I’m powerless over, and trusting God to protect me and guide me.

Most aspects of my life still seem to be unmanageable. By the grace of God, the unmanageable urge and temptation to drink has been removed, on a daily basis, for a number of days. God has granted me a measure of motivation, strength and endurance to improve the manageability of being a father to my son, and to improve my ability to keep my side of the street clean in my relationship with my wife, and He has granted me a measure of serenity to accept my wife’s words and actions.

I pray that God will continue to increase my ability to do my part to reduce the unmanageability of my life, according to His will.

Some guys have told me 12-step recovery is like peeling back layers of an onion. Somewhere along the line, in the last few months, it seems I've been granted more ability to face my shortcomings and character defects more honestly, with less fear, and without hating myself and beating myself up so much. I've also noticed that prayer flows naturally into a lot of spaces in my life, though prayer was virtually absent from my life not too long ago.

This is pretty cool stuff, I think. I love AA! :)