This week I am reminded of this lesson: Habit is a gift of recovery. Last week I had a “resentment relapse”. All the old fears and my head yakking at me. I was working up all my old fear scenarios—practicing my “I’m so smart” dialogues in my head, where I say the most cutting and the most clever remarks. Reminder: Insanity is talking to people who are not there. Another reminder from Alanon: resentment is giving up rent-free space in my head.
And perhaps the best reminder: resentment is like setting yourself on fire and hoping the other person dies of smoke inhalation.
But even with all that knowledge from years of recovery I was into it: My mental hand on my hip, my focus anywhere but on myself.
But here is the gift of recovery: Even as all of that was happening I was also praying, writing in my journal, calling friends to tell on myself, and going thru my lessons. Not the first day, but by day two I knew I had to pray for the person I was resenting. I wrote out my prayers—even while I was grumbling internally—and I started to pray for her happiness, heath, success and peace.
I find it helps me to write out the prayer and the numbers one to 14 and each day cross off a number as I offer the prayer. That way I do it whether I feel like it or not.
The habit of recovery saves my butt. It didn’t stop me from having resentment—but it got me started on letting it go even as I was playing with the matches.
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Hi Diane, it's Cate Murphy from Benn. You blog really inspires me. Just got home from a meeting where we talked about lack of power being our dilemma. Often think of my first night at Benn when i confessed my fear in a meeting downtown and afterward you assured me that others thought that way.
Thanks for that and for the reminder about praying for the resentee for 14 days. The idea of crossing off each day on a calendar is brilliant! My forgetter is so active that the two weeks are seldom completed before i find a new resentment. All the best, Cate in Calif.
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