HOW TO STAY OFF THE MENU

"Why does Sea World have a seafood restaurant? I'm halfway through my fish burger and I realize, Oh my God .... I could be eating a slow learner." — Lynda Montgomery


There is a saying, I don't know its source, that goes like this: "If you don't want a place at the table you've reserved a place for yourself on the menu."


What table? What menu?


If you attend Twelve Step meetings, you know what table. Recovering addicts gather around those tables and sit in those meeting circles three, five, seven, nine times a week because that's where experience, strength, and hope reside. That is where recovery is served.


What menu? It is addiction's menu, addiction's plan for the remainder of your life. "We are people in the grip of a continuing and progressive disease whose ends are always the same: jails, institutions, and death." (p.3, Narcotics Anonymous, 5th Ed., WSO Van Nuys CA, 1988)


Don't be a slow learner. Get yourself a place at the table.

LETTING GO

Letting go is letting go of the wanting.
Resignation is saying "I can't have it but I still want it."
Letting go is saying (and accepting) "It's not for me," and doing without the wanting.


Life is a test. It is only a test. If this were your actual life you would have been issued better instructions.

STEALTH DENIAL

Admission without acceptance is stealth denial.

Acceptance without action is stealth denial.

Action without guidance is stealth denial

An addict engaging in stealth denial courts relapse.

 

Or, as the old-timer once said: "If you're not going anywhere, any path will get you there."

RECOVERY: WHOSE JOB IS IT?

The old-timer hadn't seen Mike at meetings for a long time when he ran into him grocery shopping. "Good to see you again, Mike. It's been a long time. How are you doing?"

"Okay," said Mike. "Got in a fight at work and lost my job. Things aren't so good at home, but I haven't used. And I know what you're going to say."

"You do?" said the old-timer.

"Yeah. You were going to say, why don't I go back to the meetings."

"So, why don't you?"

"Aw, the program just doesn't work for me," answered Mike.

"It doesn't work for me either," said the old-timer. "It doesn't work for anyone."

"What?"

"To recover from addiction and experience that happy, joyous and free thing, you have to work the program."

 

REVELATIONS

Three things you'll never hear from an addict:
1. "What's in it?"
2. "You go first," and
3. "No thanks. I've had enough."

POWER AND POWERLESSNESS

I heard a fellow at a meeting years ago say that he was "powerless over everything." I supposed at the time he was overstating things attempting to express his powerlessness over the disease of addiction. But then he went on. He was powerless to change himself, powerless to resist that next drink, his sobriety due exclusively to the intervention of his higher power. He didn't last long.

Unless you go the route of the white-knuckle wonders, getting and staying clean is a team effort: Other recovering addicts, your sponsor, meetings, the Steps, your higher power, and YOU. If you are not on your own team, the program doesn't seem to work. If you are on your own team, that "happy, joyous and free" recovery is assured.

So what does being on your own team mean? Every member of a team has a function. Your function on your team is to go to any lengths to get and stay clean and do the work necessary to arrest the disease and build a new life. It involves numerous powers that you do possess:

You have the power to walk into that first meeting.

You have the power to ask for help.

You have the power to not use for twenty-four hours.

You have the power to ask someone to be your sponsor.

You have the power to follow the suggestions of your sponsor.

You have the power to read the program literature.

You have the power to work the Steps with your sponsor.

You have the power to not pick up that first drink or drug.

You have the power to choose your own higher power.

You have the power to seek help in your recovery from your higher power.

There are two attitudes when attending those first few meetings. The first attitude is: "How are you going to fix me?" The second attitude is: "What do I need to do to recover?" Guess which one leads to a life in recovery.

A USEFUL PRAYER

"[Insert name of HP] help me focus on the present moment and fill my mind with the task at hand."