When I was new in recovery I heard: “Find someone who has what you want and ask them to be your sponsor.” I always laugh at things we tell the newcomer. How would I know what someone had? So the first woman I picked as a sponsor was tall, blonde, had a degree from Harvard and was a published author: She had all the things I wanted! God laughed though, because she also had a great program of recovery—I had no idea about that -and she had grit! She took me grocery shopping, came to my house many times and took my phone calls at night, on her vacation and while nursing her newborn baby. And she made me read and write and work the steps.
Over the years I’ve had maybe ten sponsors, step sponsors and sponsors in other 12 step programs. Each one the perfect teacher, guide and gift for that stage of my recovery.
Tonight I had dinner with my sponsor and some of what we share is having a long career in AA and –God remains good—she also has experience in building a business while working an equally important day job, she’s an artist, wife, stepmother and a woman who loves clothes and style.
How lucky did I get? That very first sponsor told me one day, after I suggested that my new life in recovery probably meant I should not color my hair anymore: “You did not get sober to wear sackcloth and ashes: buy some new clothes and make an appointment to get some blonde highlights.”
We are met at the level of our needs in this program.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Jealousy
In my therapist’s office I read a back issue of Psychology Today from August 2009.
Here was the fascinating tidbit I learned about jealousy:
French Psychiatrist, Marcianne Blevis,—(It really helps that she is French I think) wrote a book called, “Jealousy—True Stories of Love’s Favorite Decoy”. She insists that jealousy is a signal—not to blame a partner—but to look within. Inside ourselves, she says, we will find the source of insecurity that makes a rival seem superior to us. What’s at stake in jealousy—she suggests—is not the partner or the relationship—but the survival of our sense of self.
What is exciting about this idea is that it follows another of Blevis’ assertions: All human emotions exist to help us figure out who we are in the world. So jealousy too is a productive emotion for us. This very thing we cringe to feel or are shameful to admit is trying to help us claim a self. Jealousy is a resource that we call on when we feel at risk, when our sense of self is in jeopardy. “When we are jealous we are in the grip of an identity crisis.”
But invariably, according to Blevis, we misdirect our attention. We imagine our so-called rival with an aura of magical attributes—yet we are the one who assigned those attributes to the rival!—and they represent (hello projection!) something unrealized in ourselves.
I love thinking like this and ideas like this that turn it all upside down.
Think about the kind of people who trigger jealousy for you. Pretty? Young? Sexy? Smart? Successful? Children? Travel?
They are shouting thru a megaphone—This is what I want! They are invitations to take a step toward something that YOU want.
Here was the fascinating tidbit I learned about jealousy:
French Psychiatrist, Marcianne Blevis,—(It really helps that she is French I think) wrote a book called, “Jealousy—True Stories of Love’s Favorite Decoy”. She insists that jealousy is a signal—not to blame a partner—but to look within. Inside ourselves, she says, we will find the source of insecurity that makes a rival seem superior to us. What’s at stake in jealousy—she suggests—is not the partner or the relationship—but the survival of our sense of self.
What is exciting about this idea is that it follows another of Blevis’ assertions: All human emotions exist to help us figure out who we are in the world. So jealousy too is a productive emotion for us. This very thing we cringe to feel or are shameful to admit is trying to help us claim a self. Jealousy is a resource that we call on when we feel at risk, when our sense of self is in jeopardy. “When we are jealous we are in the grip of an identity crisis.”
But invariably, according to Blevis, we misdirect our attention. We imagine our so-called rival with an aura of magical attributes—yet we are the one who assigned those attributes to the rival!—and they represent (hello projection!) something unrealized in ourselves.
I love thinking like this and ideas like this that turn it all upside down.
Think about the kind of people who trigger jealousy for you. Pretty? Young? Sexy? Smart? Successful? Children? Travel?
They are shouting thru a megaphone—This is what I want! They are invitations to take a step toward something that YOU want.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Happiness
I have been looking at a poster in the Ballard Designs catalog. A poster by Rodney White—his painting of two plump red cherries and these –also his-words:
“We tend to see happiness, when happiness is actually a Choice.”
I want to buy that poster and hang it over my bed.
“We tend to see happiness, when happiness is actually a Choice.”
I want to buy that poster and hang it over my bed.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Do You See Angels?
Today, March 24th is The feast of Saint Gabriel—messenger to Daniel and John the Baptist and to Mary—Gabe was the angel who delivered Mary’s big, shocking news at the annunciation. Whether your faith considers that story a myth, fairy tale or a fact the point is that there are holy messengers in our lives. In AA we meet many of them—they appear to us in our home groups, as sponsors or newcomers and in that person who speaks at a meeting whom we never see again but who leave us with a perspective or slogan or phrase that changes how we think.
Bob E., AA conference speaker from new Mexico always told his Eskimo story—he was talking about angels.
Yesterday I was struggling again with my thinking—how I scare myself into fear and worry. I prayed for help and happened to add to my prayer, “Angels and guides, if you are there, please help me.”
At noon I walked into a clothing store and while browsing the shirts and shoes I saw some little renaissance angels on a shelf—I moved closer and saw that the three little cherubs were holding their pudgy angelic hands: over eyes, over ears and the last one held a tiny hand over her mouth:
These were angels saying: See No Evil, Hear No Evil and Speak No Evil.
I just had to laugh. And I had to buy them!
Who are your messengers? Where are your angels?
Bob E., AA conference speaker from new Mexico always told his Eskimo story—he was talking about angels.
Yesterday I was struggling again with my thinking—how I scare myself into fear and worry. I prayed for help and happened to add to my prayer, “Angels and guides, if you are there, please help me.”
At noon I walked into a clothing store and while browsing the shirts and shoes I saw some little renaissance angels on a shelf—I moved closer and saw that the three little cherubs were holding their pudgy angelic hands: over eyes, over ears and the last one held a tiny hand over her mouth:
These were angels saying: See No Evil, Hear No Evil and Speak No Evil.
I just had to laugh. And I had to buy them!
Who are your messengers? Where are your angels?
Monday, March 22, 2010
First Book Day
The first printed book--The Gutenberg Bible—was printed on this day in 1457. Printing changed history and books change lives. What books have changed your life? A nod to all of our recovery literature but what else?
Robin Norwood’s, “Women Who Love Too Much”, is one that changed mine. And “The Wisdom of Yoga” by Stephen Cope, and “Anna Karenina” by Tolstoy and Trollope’s “Autobiography” and I love to re-read Diane Schoemperlen’s, “Our Lady of the Lost and Found.”
What book is your guide? Compass? Favorite?
Robin Norwood’s, “Women Who Love Too Much”, is one that changed mine. And “The Wisdom of Yoga” by Stephen Cope, and “Anna Karenina” by Tolstoy and Trollope’s “Autobiography” and I love to re-read Diane Schoemperlen’s, “Our Lady of the Lost and Found.”
What book is your guide? Compass? Favorite?
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Ebby Dies in 1966
On this day in 1966 Ebby Thacher died in Ballston Spa New York. Ebby was Bill Wilson’s sponsor and the man who first carried the recovery message to a very ill Bill W. in Brooklyn 30 years earlier. Ebby’s role is documented in our Big Book in Bill’s story and of course in the many history books about AA.
The message that Ebby brought to Bill that cold, drunk night was not AA, of course—there was no AA until later that year. But Ebby brought the message and practices of The Oxford Group—an evangelical Christian movement that also saved drunks. Our 12 steps evolved from the six steps of the Oxford Group.
Ebby struggled to stay sober while Bill and then Bob went on to “found” Alcoholics Anonymous. But on this day we must remember there would be no AA and no Bill or Dr Bob without Ebby.
We never know the role we are playing in someone’s life or what our momentary good might someday be part of.
Thank you Ebby for carrying what you could and doing what you did.
The message that Ebby brought to Bill that cold, drunk night was not AA, of course—there was no AA until later that year. But Ebby brought the message and practices of The Oxford Group—an evangelical Christian movement that also saved drunks. Our 12 steps evolved from the six steps of the Oxford Group.
Ebby struggled to stay sober while Bill and then Bob went on to “found” Alcoholics Anonymous. But on this day we must remember there would be no AA and no Bill or Dr Bob without Ebby.
We never know the role we are playing in someone’s life or what our momentary good might someday be part of.
Thank you Ebby for carrying what you could and doing what you did.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Tools
I’m reading a new book about AA called “Undrunk”. It’s about being a newcomer and what happened in the first year. Funny to those of us who have been around a bit—all those impressions and misperceptions: Cult, God talk etc. But one great part of the new book is the description of the slogans: one by one he walks thru: “One Day at a Time”, and “All you need to know about God is that you are not it”. Some I have not heard for a while like, “Nobody ever got sober confessing the other guys sins.” (That is a help with my “her” work.)
But tools: literature, phone calls, sponsorship, working the steps, service. They are tools, and like the other kind you have to pick them up and use them. Some we’ll use more than others, we’ll have favorites and ones we prefer. But it helps to have at least a little bit of experience with all of the tools. I like the saying that comes also from the business world: “If your only tool is a hammer then every problem will be a nail.” We need to develop skills with tools.
But we also need to use them and to practice with them.
Recently I heard the artist Larry Poons speak and he was talking about using artist’s tools and the tools of any kind of creative work. “The creative process means”, he said, “that you trust your reactions with the tools in your hands.”
Also true in recovery. First get a well stocked recovery tool box. Then trust your reactions with the tools in your hands. That too is a creative process.
But tools: literature, phone calls, sponsorship, working the steps, service. They are tools, and like the other kind you have to pick them up and use them. Some we’ll use more than others, we’ll have favorites and ones we prefer. But it helps to have at least a little bit of experience with all of the tools. I like the saying that comes also from the business world: “If your only tool is a hammer then every problem will be a nail.” We need to develop skills with tools.
But we also need to use them and to practice with them.
Recently I heard the artist Larry Poons speak and he was talking about using artist’s tools and the tools of any kind of creative work. “The creative process means”, he said, “that you trust your reactions with the tools in your hands.”
Also true in recovery. First get a well stocked recovery tool box. Then trust your reactions with the tools in your hands. That too is a creative process.
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