We can do together....
In one of my first meetings I heard a guy say, "I've been here long enough to know I haven't been here long enough." I latched on to that little phrase, using it to draw a chuckle from the group when I was still too shy to say much other than my name. But lately, it is making more and more sense. I've been here long enough to know I haven't been here long enough.
Last night I sat with a small group of women with 20+ years of recovery; each committed to this process of deepening the spiritual connection, of consciously engaging with the questions that come with long term sobriety, each of us nearly bursting with gratitude for the gift of life we've been given, with all its ups and downs. Someone said that it feels like she is looking "backwards and forward at the same time." Yes.
It is important for me to connect with those on the path, maybe now more than ever - those I walk with hand-in-hand, and those who are leading the way. I can tell myself that I don't need to pick up the phone, that "I know what she'll tell me," that somehow I'm supposed to know how to fix myself after all this time. Ha! When did that ever work? I can now recognize those thoughts as my dis-ease in subtle action. My alcoholism rarely announces itself - Hello! Let's take a drink today! No, it's more of whisper: You don't really need a meeting... Ah, don't bother her... Let's just stay in tonight...
The "we" of the program has a depth that is only just now beginning to sink in. I need do nothing alone. That certainly applied in early sobriety when I was inspired to stay clean one more day by the example of those in the rooms. And it applies today as I navigate a new marriage, think about retirement, marvel at the gifts of growing older, learn to live with loss, recommit to my recovery on a daily basis...
I need the new member, for certain, to remind me of the gravity of the disease, to enchant me with the wonder of early sobriety. And, I almost desperately need my peers - those who I share history with, and those I've just met. Let's trudge this road together.
It is hard to comment because you hit all the points so elegantly...I don't have meetings here except one a week and an occasional impromptu one...so I don't struggle with that as much as I do when I'm in the US and there are so many meetings. I am grateful that our small group does have a range of sobriety so I get to hear the different perspectives and remind myself of earlier times in my sober life. Thanks again for writing. hugs.
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