Friday, October 22, 2010
Thursday, October 21, 2010
practising faith
Faith, we all seem to have our own ideas of faith. However I would argue that what we all have, are just varying degrees of faith. Considering the fact that most if not all of us can relate to the last few posts. This would indicate that the beginning sentences of this post are correct. Secondly it would seem that not many are truly practising Step Three.
Faith is the confident belief or trust in the truth or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.[1][2] The word faith can refer to a religion itself or to religion in general.[clarification needed]
As with trust, faith involves a concept of future events or outcomes, and is used conversely for a belief "not resting on logical proof or material evidence."[3][4] Informal usage of the word faith can be quite broad, and may be used in place of trust or belief.
Faith is often used in a religious context, as in theology, where it almost universally refers to a trusting belief in a transcendent reality, or else in a Supreme Being and/or this being's role in the order of transcendent, spiritual things.
Faith is in general the persuasion of the mind that a certain statement is true.[5] It is the belief and the assent of the mind to the truth of what is declared, based on the declarer's authority and truthfulness.[6] The English word faith is dated from 1200–50, from the Latin fidem, or fidēs, meaning trust, akin to fīdere, which means to trust.[1]
This is the definition of faith from Wikipedia.
So if we take this definition of faith, my hypothesis of varying degrees is potentially wrong. It would seem that we have the belief in the word. However in literal life applications we fall very short most of the time. I would venture somewhere in the neighborhood of 85-99%.
Back to Step Three. “Made a decision to turn our will and lives over to the care of God as we understood God”.
Now to interpret this step. I have to understand “will” my thinking and “lives” my actions. If this be the case. Why the frustrations and dilemmas? As the prayer says “Thy will not mine be done”. Noble and wonderful Idea. However most of us have created a plan and ideas about what we are going to do with our lives. And how we are going in live. Now that we are clean and sober. Who’s will is that mine? Or God’s? If I am truly practicing my step three I will pliable. I plan to do things or organize my life as what I believe of what would please my God. Sometimes I encounter obstacles for my learning and to strengthen me. However sometimes it’s because I am going in the wrong direction than what my God would have me go. In either case I must continuously pray, be open to his signs and words. If I do this I will be of God cheer.
So whose will are you truly following????
Remember God does not create garbage
Faith is the confident belief or trust in the truth or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.[1][2] The word faith can refer to a religion itself or to religion in general.[clarification needed]
As with trust, faith involves a concept of future events or outcomes, and is used conversely for a belief "not resting on logical proof or material evidence."[3][4] Informal usage of the word faith can be quite broad, and may be used in place of trust or belief.
Faith is often used in a religious context, as in theology, where it almost universally refers to a trusting belief in a transcendent reality, or else in a Supreme Being and/or this being's role in the order of transcendent, spiritual things.
Faith is in general the persuasion of the mind that a certain statement is true.[5] It is the belief and the assent of the mind to the truth of what is declared, based on the declarer's authority and truthfulness.[6] The English word faith is dated from 1200–50, from the Latin fidem, or fidēs, meaning trust, akin to fīdere, which means to trust.[1]
This is the definition of faith from Wikipedia.
So if we take this definition of faith, my hypothesis of varying degrees is potentially wrong. It would seem that we have the belief in the word. However in literal life applications we fall very short most of the time. I would venture somewhere in the neighborhood of 85-99%.
Back to Step Three. “Made a decision to turn our will and lives over to the care of God as we understood God”.
Now to interpret this step. I have to understand “will” my thinking and “lives” my actions. If this be the case. Why the frustrations and dilemmas? As the prayer says “Thy will not mine be done”. Noble and wonderful Idea. However most of us have created a plan and ideas about what we are going to do with our lives. And how we are going in live. Now that we are clean and sober. Who’s will is that mine? Or God’s? If I am truly practicing my step three I will pliable. I plan to do things or organize my life as what I believe of what would please my God. Sometimes I encounter obstacles for my learning and to strengthen me. However sometimes it’s because I am going in the wrong direction than what my God would have me go. In either case I must continuously pray, be open to his signs and words. If I do this I will be of God cheer.
So whose will are you truly following????
Remember God does not create garbage
Is Life Tough?
Yes life can seem tough and unfair. It may seem extremely unfair to a person in recovery. We watch people do wrong and get away with it. We watch people be unethical and seem to be rewarded. We wonder why we must be so honest, ethical and always do the right thing. It sometimes feels so frustrating. We attempt to live properly and sometimes it seems we don’t get ahead or even feel punished for doing the right thing. However when we continue on this path even when feeling frustrated. Make no mistake the rewards do come. Not always financially or in accolades from peers or society. They come in our hearts. They come in the feelings that come from living righteously > they come from the feelings that come from a clear conscious. There is no financial reward or accolade that can rival the feelings of a live of living righteously. Or that of a clear conscious. However these feeling of freedom and joy do not come overnight.
There is also the relief of the freedom from the past. If you get truly honest, with self. We have no right to demand to feel so free. After all in our past life what have we been guilty of? If anything we should be forever grateful we don’t get everything we deserve. If you think about it honestly. We really have not paid the piper for all we were guilty of while we were using and abusing. But for the grace of God. We have a reprieve, a pardon if you will. We need to be thankful and grateful for what we do have. Have you checked your gratitude list lately, perhaps it is time to renew it.
Remember God does not create garbage
There is also the relief of the freedom from the past. If you get truly honest, with self. We have no right to demand to feel so free. After all in our past life what have we been guilty of? If anything we should be forever grateful we don’t get everything we deserve. If you think about it honestly. We really have not paid the piper for all we were guilty of while we were using and abusing. But for the grace of God. We have a reprieve, a pardon if you will. We need to be thankful and grateful for what we do have. Have you checked your gratitude list lately, perhaps it is time to renew it.
Remember God does not create garbage
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Relapse
Hi, Today’s blog is about relapse. It is something that you will battle in one way or another throughout your recovery. You face it all the time. You see the one’s in the meetings. You know the ones. They are constantly coming in and out. Most of them are results of yesterday’s blogs. We pity them because they don’t get it. We see the pain for some. The desperation. We also thank them. For they show us what we don’t want. We sometimes even envy them. Because they got to run away one more time, they got that “escape”. However then we see the cost, and we thank them for showing us why we are here and why we do what we do. We also see the one’s that seem to have had some time under their belts. We wonder why. Well the answers are many. Sometimes we see that they had just been dry and not really changed. Sometimes they had just been dry and not done the work. Sometimes they had just not done the “hard” work. Sometimes they just forgot to continue the work. Sometimes they just forgot where they came from, stopped attending meetings, stopped praying, and stopped doing the work.
Sometimes they just got lazy. They stopped being vigilant about, their program, they stopped taking personal responsibility. Relapse does not just happen out of thin air. It’s a slow, sometimes faster build-up of things. We get frustrated> we start asking why I have to be so honest, ethical, moral or have so much integrity. While Joe blow doesn’t. And he seems to be ok. Most of the world isn’t. Let’s face the truth we live in a society that doesn’t really value or support honesty, integrity or proper ethics. In all reality we live in a society that seems to give more to those that don’t have Morals, ethic integrity or honesty. However For us it is a must or we pay the ultimate price. RELAPSE, Then death if not literally, at the least emotionally, spiritually, mentally and slowly physically. Relapse actually starts when we start slipping on are honesty, are morals, are ethics, are integrity. When we start cheating a little on our taxes, or partners. When we start the little lies. When we start entertaining in our heads, you know those private thoughts and battles. The ones where we think we can get away with it, no one will notice, everyone else does it. That it where relapse starts. These are the red flags that I need to pay attention to. Fix what has I’ve been ignoring in my program. More meetings. Talk to sponsor. Prayer and meditation. Spending more time with those that important to my recovery. You know where you have been lacking. If you get honest with self. Help another, Help yourself.
Remember god does not create garbage
Sometimes they just got lazy. They stopped being vigilant about, their program, they stopped taking personal responsibility. Relapse does not just happen out of thin air. It’s a slow, sometimes faster build-up of things. We get frustrated> we start asking why I have to be so honest, ethical, moral or have so much integrity. While Joe blow doesn’t. And he seems to be ok. Most of the world isn’t. Let’s face the truth we live in a society that doesn’t really value or support honesty, integrity or proper ethics. In all reality we live in a society that seems to give more to those that don’t have Morals, ethic integrity or honesty. However For us it is a must or we pay the ultimate price. RELAPSE, Then death if not literally, at the least emotionally, spiritually, mentally and slowly physically. Relapse actually starts when we start slipping on are honesty, are morals, are ethics, are integrity. When we start cheating a little on our taxes, or partners. When we start the little lies. When we start entertaining in our heads, you know those private thoughts and battles. The ones where we think we can get away with it, no one will notice, everyone else does it. That it where relapse starts. These are the red flags that I need to pay attention to. Fix what has I’ve been ignoring in my program. More meetings. Talk to sponsor. Prayer and meditation. Spending more time with those that important to my recovery. You know where you have been lacking. If you get honest with self. Help another, Help yourself.
Remember god does not create garbage
Monday, October 18, 2010
Personal responsibilty
Failure to take personal responsibility for one’s own recovery. This is without a doubt, the biggest reason for recovery failure. You hear it all over, A.A./N.A. doesn’t work, it’s a cult, or the blame it on a person they met there that steered them wrong. So on and so on. Every time I hear how the program doesn’t work. It’s always the same the reason it doesn’t work is always about blaming someone or something. Never do I hear any personal responsibility.
It’s like A.A. /N. A, is supposed to cure them. WRONG the program just shows you how you can recover, it provides the tools. The meetings and the fellowship is just for support by sharing Experience, strength and Hope, along with maybe a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen, and the fellowship of shared pain and loss as well as support. You have to take the personal responsibility to do the work, to put in the effort, to face the truths, and to change. The biggest problem with people attempting recovery today is just that. They are always looking for the counsellor, the sponsor the treatment center, the recovery coach to cure them. It doesn’t matter if you have the best treatment center in the world the best sponsor, counsellor, and/or coach in the world. If you are not willing to do the work. Take the suggestions. You will never find recovery.
Or they blame the guy or lady they met in a meeting that used them, or steered them wrong. Again failure to take responsibility for their own actions. Yes there are sick people in the meetings. And guess what, your one of them. Let’s look at reality here for a moment. None of us got to these rooms because we excellent examples of role models, we were all, to some extent liars, cheats, thieves ETC... The same sort of people that you were hanging with on the streets or in the bars. Were you always so stupid on the streets and in the bars to be taken in and conned. Unfortunately everybody in the rooms is not always seeking the same path of being a better person. We are all to one degree or another “Recovering Assholes”. Some are just not able to see it and some are not looking to change.
The point being is if you truly want recovery, you have to do the work, all the program does is give you the best tools in the world to accomplish the job, as well as the support and teachers on how to use the tools and find happiness and support for the struggles along the way. No one, no matter how some may try. Can do the work for you. You need to do the work and hang with the winners.
Remember God does not create garbage
It’s like A.A. /N. A, is supposed to cure them. WRONG the program just shows you how you can recover, it provides the tools. The meetings and the fellowship is just for support by sharing Experience, strength and Hope, along with maybe a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen, and the fellowship of shared pain and loss as well as support. You have to take the personal responsibility to do the work, to put in the effort, to face the truths, and to change. The biggest problem with people attempting recovery today is just that. They are always looking for the counsellor, the sponsor the treatment center, the recovery coach to cure them. It doesn’t matter if you have the best treatment center in the world the best sponsor, counsellor, and/or coach in the world. If you are not willing to do the work. Take the suggestions. You will never find recovery.
Or they blame the guy or lady they met in a meeting that used them, or steered them wrong. Again failure to take responsibility for their own actions. Yes there are sick people in the meetings. And guess what, your one of them. Let’s look at reality here for a moment. None of us got to these rooms because we excellent examples of role models, we were all, to some extent liars, cheats, thieves ETC... The same sort of people that you were hanging with on the streets or in the bars. Were you always so stupid on the streets and in the bars to be taken in and conned. Unfortunately everybody in the rooms is not always seeking the same path of being a better person. We are all to one degree or another “Recovering Assholes”. Some are just not able to see it and some are not looking to change.
The point being is if you truly want recovery, you have to do the work, all the program does is give you the best tools in the world to accomplish the job, as well as the support and teachers on how to use the tools and find happiness and support for the struggles along the way. No one, no matter how some may try. Can do the work for you. You need to do the work and hang with the winners.
Remember God does not create garbage
Being Real
Hello, today I want to discuss another vitally important part of staying clean and sober. I will break it into some different parts. However it all comes back to ---Being Real.
The first part that helps us to become real, and more importantly at ease with self which translate into a feeling of completeness, or wholeness- which basically break down into to you being happier.
This is what one of the processes of doing the steps properly. This process helps us to see who and what we truly are. When we begin to see who and what we have become, without the justifications, rationalizations and lies. We get the truth about ourselves. Not only of what we’ve become, we also see the parts that we have buried, the parts we don’t like, and more importantly the persons we want to be. The first step is seeing the truth for what it is. Then accepting are selves for who we truly are—the good and the bad. This is vitally important. We have to accept are negatives; because they are part of us, to deny the negative is to deny part of ourselves. This doesn’t give us license to be bad or to act out inappropriately. What it does is tells us where we need to concentrate our energies to improve, also what areas we have to guard against. It is information to form better plans, goals ETC... We need not beat ourselves up over our negatives, as I said earlier they are a part of us. We need to accept the part of our nature. Let me validate this for you a little more clearly. We are not saints; no one among us is perfect. No one among us will ever be perfect. I do not believe that any person who has ever lived has been perfect. There may have been one, in all time. I’m not going to get into a debate about religion. However some will say that Jesus was perfect. As I said I am not going to debate this, so I will grant that possibly one person in the whole history of mankind has been perfect. ONE. Not even the saints were perfect the battled with their own shortcomings and demons.
They just had the advantage of knowing them, accepting that those were part of their nature and worked at keeping them in check. A little example from Star Trek (yes now you know I’m a closet trekkie) in an older show Captain Kirk went through the transporter while it had an issue; and thus it created two Kirks, one arrogant, hostile argumentative, controlling you get the picture, while the other was kind, demure, apologetic, indecisive, the point being is neither could be the captain because separate they did not process the traits to be the captain. However they were both part of Kirk, together they made the Captain Kirk that was legendary. Point is the without both parts we are not the person we are supposed to be, We need to accept both parts on the path of learning who we truly are, however this will be a long journey.
One thing that will immensely help on this journey. And bring great joy. Is one of the reasons for meetings and the fellowship. Even though you may find support and understanding in your family. There is nothing like finding a few like minded people travelling the same journey. Who you foster a true friendship and kinship with. A few close friends who will love and accept you even when you’re being an a!@#$%hole. Who will call you on your s!@#t. Who will tell you the truth even when you don’t want to hear it (because that’s what real friends do). People you can be real with. You don’t have to put on the face of a son, daughter, parent, employee, boss. Just being you.
As you find these people and yourself, you will learn how to be the same person whether at work, a meeting, at family dinner or wherever and they will all be the same person and this person will be far far happier, physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
Remember God does not create Garbage
The first part that helps us to become real, and more importantly at ease with self which translate into a feeling of completeness, or wholeness- which basically break down into to you being happier.
This is what one of the processes of doing the steps properly. This process helps us to see who and what we truly are. When we begin to see who and what we have become, without the justifications, rationalizations and lies. We get the truth about ourselves. Not only of what we’ve become, we also see the parts that we have buried, the parts we don’t like, and more importantly the persons we want to be. The first step is seeing the truth for what it is. Then accepting are selves for who we truly are—the good and the bad. This is vitally important. We have to accept are negatives; because they are part of us, to deny the negative is to deny part of ourselves. This doesn’t give us license to be bad or to act out inappropriately. What it does is tells us where we need to concentrate our energies to improve, also what areas we have to guard against. It is information to form better plans, goals ETC... We need not beat ourselves up over our negatives, as I said earlier they are a part of us. We need to accept the part of our nature. Let me validate this for you a little more clearly. We are not saints; no one among us is perfect. No one among us will ever be perfect. I do not believe that any person who has ever lived has been perfect. There may have been one, in all time. I’m not going to get into a debate about religion. However some will say that Jesus was perfect. As I said I am not going to debate this, so I will grant that possibly one person in the whole history of mankind has been perfect. ONE. Not even the saints were perfect the battled with their own shortcomings and demons.
They just had the advantage of knowing them, accepting that those were part of their nature and worked at keeping them in check. A little example from Star Trek (yes now you know I’m a closet trekkie) in an older show Captain Kirk went through the transporter while it had an issue; and thus it created two Kirks, one arrogant, hostile argumentative, controlling you get the picture, while the other was kind, demure, apologetic, indecisive, the point being is neither could be the captain because separate they did not process the traits to be the captain. However they were both part of Kirk, together they made the Captain Kirk that was legendary. Point is the without both parts we are not the person we are supposed to be, We need to accept both parts on the path of learning who we truly are, however this will be a long journey.
One thing that will immensely help on this journey. And bring great joy. Is one of the reasons for meetings and the fellowship. Even though you may find support and understanding in your family. There is nothing like finding a few like minded people travelling the same journey. Who you foster a true friendship and kinship with. A few close friends who will love and accept you even when you’re being an a!@#$%hole. Who will call you on your s!@#t. Who will tell you the truth even when you don’t want to hear it (because that’s what real friends do). People you can be real with. You don’t have to put on the face of a son, daughter, parent, employee, boss. Just being you.
As you find these people and yourself, you will learn how to be the same person whether at work, a meeting, at family dinner or wherever and they will all be the same person and this person will be far far happier, physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
Remember God does not create Garbage
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