hi all. today it rained nearly all day. it also got dark around 4:30 or close. i was tired bc i was up till two and i felt negative and worried. i also forgot to eat lunch and got lost on my way to a thing for school. i got where i was going which was good. and i ate a good dinner which was also good. i felt better mostly--except on my way home from my school thing i got thinking about drinking. not deep terrible thoughts but weird thoughts like if i drank today then...would happen. i found myself sort of mulling this over in my brain for a while. ok, i would stop at bar and then i would order drink and then i would...
but before i got to the actual drinking part i did have the good sense to skip way forward. the remorse. the cravings. the shame. all of the annoying events which cause shame. then the embarassing events that cause remorse. all of it. i thought what the heck is wrong with me? then i thought about it all--the rain, the hunger, the tiredness, the darkness, the stress. i thought about how it is a miracle i did not go get a drink, not today or any other day. i realized then just how powerful a disease addiction can be--so powerful that it that will sit and wait for me or you to think it is gone and then, and only then, totally fuck your life up.
i thought about my family, my friends, school, work. all of it. i thought about how lucky i am and how lucky we all are. driving around in our cars, with our gasoline, food, shelter, health. i thought about how this disease really only can manifest itself in a brain that has stopped seeing the beauty and love that is all around it.
more and more i see the antidote to addiction is love. self love. love of humanity. love of life. love of giving. i sat in this meeting a month or so ago and the topic was "peeling in the onion." people were discussing the onion, layers, growing, changing etc. at the end this guy just says that, to him, when you peel back his layers what he ultimately finds is love. this idea really resonated with me. this sense that we need to get back to our real and true selves because that is where our love is. our love for ourselves and our capacity to share it with others. it is all there--we just need to get back to it.
so--another sober night that ends with me feeling connected, loved, and maybe most importantly loveable. hope you've gotten there today too--and if you havent--keep trying. xxk
Good stuff Karen. You keep finding gold in the rubble--or keep recognizing it. Loving oneself, feeling the extraordinary love and energy that surrounds us, loving what is, not what could be, could have been, or was--that's it. This was a long long day for me and may not be over yet as my father seems to be heading into his final time in this incarnation and I'm keeping my phone on just in case. But it was a good day in which I did my best and felt connected to my work, my friends, my family and myself. Happy to read your words and know you're out there doing the same. xoxox Ame
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