By: Anon.
The cerebral Mr. Spock tells Captain James Kirk in a time clothed in the fantasy of the future, that “Change is the one essential principle of the Universe.” Of course this alien also did not consume alcohol. To one blessed with neither that insight nor that physical constraint, change came hard. This was so even when the circumstances of change had been thrust upon me by a doctor’s medical warning and a Divorce Court’s “Kick Out Order.” Undaunted, I would lie in my tub of blissful denial that the test was a “false positive” that the doc has simply mis-read it and wallow in the legalities that would prevent me from being thrown out of a residence which I alone owned, just check the deed.
When the tsunami of these changes broke upon me and I finally stopped drinking and started trudging the road, I began to accept all of them and the new reality that had come with them – almost. Of course there had been the admission followed swiftly with a coming to believe. I had become convinced of my insanity and knew I alone had no defense, mental or otherwise, against it. Thus The Decision had made much sense. Only then did my Sponsor begin to discuss the real change that I was now to confront. My old way wasn’t working and hadn’t been working for a long, long time. So it seemed like my sponsor had the rather easy task of convincing me of the obvious, one pretty simple proposition: Be prepared to change or it is likely you will drink again and, if you drink, you will die. Simple, straightforward – his laughter, as I seemed to actually be pondering this proposition, was the dose of reality I needed to accept it too. With Decision made and inventory done, the admission thrice had then opened the door to a new way of thinking, I hoped for a new way of living. But as to this, I was admonished that only time would tell. As the days went by, I then came to find out that time passed for A.A.ers in a very wonderful way, it passed “One Day At A Time.”
As the days passed and life happened, most of those things about which I had then been so worried, never even happened. Those that did, in some instances struck with harsh consequences and even cruel efficiency, but the Steps I had taken had prepared me. I dealt with them as best I could, with all the honesty and integrity I could muster, for I had not then been alone. I found to my surprise and comfort, that with each disaster, someone in my groups, at my meetings, had been there before, had survived that calamity, had weathered that storm. They told me they had done so – sober, and thus I could too, if I didn’t drink and I went to the meetings.
But those who are not busy living are often busy dying, so it was I discovered that life being lived, sober, was still living on life’s terms, not on mine. I found that even in sobriety, calamities can happen, the floor upon which you are so comfortably standing one minute can suddenly vanish and leave only the abyss. Where then does one turn? What rope does one grasp to shinny up to safety? As my newest abyss loomed, my sponsor’s words began to ring in my ears “With any problem I must confront, I first ask myself-Which step applies?” How do I bring the steps to bear to address this new problem or, as seems to be so with me now, these new disasters?
Step 4 was the answer. For while I was so prepared to exhaustively take the inventory of those with whom my relationships were now souring, I had to then ask myself, what was my part in all of this? The difficulty of asking myself these questions quickly became dwarfed by the answers honesty compelled me to give to them. Then the kicker: I had to forgive these ill doers also. It was then an echo of this Step once taken so many years before now began to reverberate. Forgiveness, better to give it than to seek it. But I had not done so then and was not ready to do so now over a decade later, still the anger had patiently lingered. So where was this “change” about which I had been so confident, about which I wanted to be so proud? Taking my inventory today about new problems had revealed this omission of my prior effort, and had displayed how that effort had not been completely thorough, despite my best intentions. “Do not be Discouraged” a good friend extolled. So I was not. I asked to be shown the next right thing and be given the courage to do it. More will surely be revealed if I just don’t drink and go to the meetings.
