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Post Info TOPIC: Cunning, Powerful and Baffling...


MIP Old Timer

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Cunning, Powerful and Baffling...
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There isn't any doubt and there is no effort to do anything other than accept that description.   I was driving home from work with my wife and another passenger in the car.  My wife is a very fear based person and her imagination seems to be addicted to it.  It is safer for me to let her drive rather than to do it myself because she then has  more control of her actions and reactions...not so when I'm driving.  My wife imagined that a car exiting a side street was going to hit us and while it wasn't even close to being a threat her imagination and reaction was about imminent harm and she cries "watch out and crabs for the panic bars"...I don't even know where she is looking and am jolted by the reaction not knowing what is or will happen and then reacting myself with anger and resentment.  Its more usual than not and my reactions at times grow way beyond safe.  This time I clenched my fist and almost swung it into her space.  I don't know how our passenger felt while I said half under my breather "what the he...."

I pulled myself together best I could and got home and finished my tasks as best I could while also holding tight to my serenity and keeping my body language and personhood out of our mutual spaces.   She read my body language and didn't question it because she knows...this isn't the first time; it happens more than we care.

Amazing when I thought that it was subsiding well the disease issues me a powerful lunge and says with force, "It's time you had a drink"!!  Forcefully...the longer I don't drink the more forceful the compulsion becomes at times.  Of course I don't drink and I continue taking care of my affairs properly with assurance that I will speak with my sponsor and listen to his ESH.  My sponsor reminds me that when he lost the compulsion...it never returned and then he still listens and settles on there are differences in experiences with sobriety continuing to be the similarity in our journeys. 

I know all kinds of tricks which have been taught me in the fellowship to be able to listen to the voice or feel the tug and not respond with anything other than a reliable tool and continued sobriety.  I have come to a perception that my alcoholic personality and my sober personality co-exist sometimes in this alcohol free body.  I doesn't seem that my alcoholic personality has found a better place to hang out in...feedback?  wink



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MIP Old Timer

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Great post Jerry, ...

Alcohol IS a subtle foe!!! ... ... ... After completing the steps, I did, in fact, lose all desire to drink ... the compulsion to drink was totally remove, I didn't even think about it except in meetings where we got into intense discussions on the subject ... and 'that' only reinforced my commitment to maintain my spiritual condition ...

I have since learned that 'time' and 'conditions' change things ... after about 5 years sober, the wife and I got word that she was being transferred back to our home town ... great, but pulling up stakes and leaving my home group of 5 years was hard ... and of course me being sober didn't remove all her little annoying habits that bug me either ...

I said that to say this, ... over the last year of moving, and trying to re-settle, our whole routine has changed ... there was NO 'comfort zone' ... tensions of this whole ordeal made our 'nerves' a great deal more sensitive ... I had let my spiritual condition start to suffer ... and I'm here to tell ya, the compulsion to drink came back like an ocean storm roll'n in ... (cunning, baffling, powerful ... for sure) ... so I can say with certainty, for me, it wasn't a 'once & done' deal ... once I got my prayer and meditation routine back in order, the compulsion was once again lifted ...

You know full well what pg 85 tells us:

It is easy to let up on the spiritual program of action and rest on our laurels. We are headed for trouble if we do, for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of Gods will into all of our activities. How can I best serve Thee-Thy will (not mine) be done. These are thoughts which must go with us constantly.

So ... ... ... I know you carry this in your tool box as do I ... it's one of those 'invaluable tools' that we must carry with us everywhere we go ... (trust me, I've said many a prayer while riding in the car with my wife, she scares the begeebers out of me, LOL) ...



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'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'



MIP Old Timer

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((*j*))

When you truly accept you are a gift from hp... and everyone else is too... the compulsion to harm a precious gift to the universe will dissipate in hps time... maybe just enough in this lifetime that the peace you radiate will generate a vibration through others... like me... so gently and majestically that the outcome touches millions. xoxox



-- Edited by justadrunk on Sunday 14th of December 2014 06:11:40 PM

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MIP Old Timer

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Pappy and JAD you are both right on and I am grateful for your ESH...your recovery because I have never been able to do this on my own.  Subtle is an understatement Pappy...I know that you understand that; we cannot assume we have it made or we find out the compulsion has never slept.  I have always known that because it has never left me and I don't drink and still relapse into my old behaviors...the "instant asshole just add alcohol".  What came back was that personality...not bad...very reactive, resorting to power and control, fear, manipulation and the like to get my will listened to and respected.  JAD I know what you know...the God Perception of God's creation and the rightness and sanctity of it.   I know that I am loved unconditionally and so is everyone else.   That realization and perception must be more compulsive than any other one I have.  Still working this.   (((((Mahalo))))) smile



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I believe that is why they put Step 10 in he mix .....

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MIP Old Timer

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Jerry F wrote:

 

 ... am jolted by the reaction not knowing what is or will happen and then reacting myself with anger and resentment.  Its more usual than not and my reactions at times grow way beyond safe.  This time I clenched my fist and almost swung it into her space. ...

 I have come to a perception that my alcoholic personality and my sober personality co-exist sometimes in this alcohol free body.  I doesn't seem that my alcoholic personality has found a better place to hang out in...feedback?  wink


An impulse toward violence. Is that what you're describing here, J.F.?

It may be unnecessarily limiting to frame such impulses as being contained solely in either a sober or alcoholic personality.

Especially, if it "happens more than we care" and is "more usual than not."

 



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MIP Old Timer

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Tanin during the years of discovery which have now lasted the entire length of my recovery my AA counselor at the VA diagnosed me as DP...dual personality.  I was born and raised in our disease and at 12 in order for me to defense the insanity in my life I altered to using violence whenever I get afraid additionally alcohol in chemical form came into my life at 9 and at 13 attached and when I drank and got inebriated my fear level and distrust increased and the practiced defense was violence almost always and I drank still and got violent when I did.  Alcohol and adrenalin are a toxic mix; add testosterone to it and the need becomes one for a power much greater than the 3 of them combined.  Mahalo  smile



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MIP Old Timer

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Jerry F wrote:

 Tanin during the years of discovery which have now lasted the entire length of my recovery my AA counselor at the VA diagnosed me as DP...dual personality.  I was born and raised in our disease and at 12 in order for me to defense the insanity in my life I altered to using violence whenever I get afraid additionally alcohol in chemical form came into my life at 9 and at 13 attached and when I drank and got inebriated my fear level and distrust increased and the practiced defense was violence almost always and I drank still and got violent when I did.  Alcohol and adrenalin are a toxic mix; add testosterone to it and the need becomes one for a power much greater than the 3 of them combined.  Mahalo  smile


 Well anger, resentment and a closed fist, as you mentioned in the OP, is not a good troika , either. And it wasn't a defensive context. More a control thing, I'd guess.

You seem to be blaming alcoholism for your described event, J.F. Specifically, your "alcoholic personality."

Maybe the cause originates elsewhere.

Best of luck to you.

 

 



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MIP Old Timer

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T the anger and closed fist is a sign of fear...a fear reaction, fight or flight, learned behaviors as alcoholism also is in part a compulsion, leaned behavior, habit.  You assume other than defense and are allowed assumptions in hindsight.  "I'd guess" wouldn't fit my experiences and again hindsight allowed.  Do you assume that the depth and width of your own recovery journey is the standard to measure others?  How deep have you gone and how wide?  Seem, assume, Maybe? 

 

"Maybe the cause originates somewhere else"

 

Fill in your Bio would love to experience your journey and maybe discover a "somewhere else".  Other members journeys including sponsorship, college, career as a behavioral health therapist working within a large rehab out/in patient all level; adolescent, adults, individual, family, alternatives to violence men's case worker, Hawaiian Cultural Alternatives to Violence Kumu, sponsor in a dual program, former street fighter, victim of alcoholic/addict family abuses, victim of police assaults and jails....hmmmm how deep and how wide can the inventory get. My sponsor taught me to take the frame off of it and my VA alcoholism counselor loved helping me discover the one person I had lived my entire life with and never knew anything about...me.  Is it perfection or progress? If it is perfection do we get a guarantee?   In hindsight for me I have learned much about the alcoholic that is me...mind, body, spirit and emotions and evidenced by the OP...there is more to remember and more to know.  I can use that and I can pass it on. 

 



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I can't control my thoughts, I can control my actions, and more importantly, my mouth. Pride in one form or another is my biggest foe, luckily, I have the 12 Steps instead of the bottle.

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MIP Old Timer

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I agree with luckily or maybe more blessedly we have the 12steps which I hope for me become more habitual than my drinking ever was.  As for not being able to control my thinking I've done much work on this and that including listening to sponsorship and others with more wisdom and experience than I.  One of my counselors, a psychologist reminded me once, "You are responsible for what you think" and while my knee jerk reaction was "Uh  No" after a few days working it and listening to others in the fellowship I now know for me also that is true...Thoughts and feelings and behaviors are choices...mine.   smile



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MIP Old Timer

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Jerry F wrote:

 T the anger and closed fist is a sign of fear...a fear reaction, fight or flight, learned behaviors as alcoholism also is in part a compulsion, leaned behavior, habit.  You assume other than defense and are allowed assumptions in hindsight.  "I'd guess" wouldn't fit my experiences and again hindsight allowed.  Do you assume that the depth and width of your own recovery journey is the standard to measure others?  How deep have you gone and how wide?  Seem, assume, Maybe? 

 

"Maybe the cause originates somewhere else"

 

Fill in your Bio would love to experience your journey and maybe discover a "somewhere else".  Other members journeys including sponsorship, college, career as a behavioral health therapist working within a large rehab out/in patient all level; adolescent, adults, individual, family, alternatives to violence men's case worker, Hawaiian Cultural Alternatives to Violence Kumu, sponsor in a dual program, former street fighter, victim of alcoholic/addict family abuses, victim of police assaults and jails....hmmmm how deep and how wide can the inventory get. My sponsor taught me to take the frame off of it and my VA alcoholism counselor loved helping me discover the one person I had lived my entire life with and never knew anything about...me.  Is it perfection or progress? If it is perfection do we get a guarantee?   In hindsight for me I have learned much about the alcoholic that is me...mind, body, spirit and emotions and evidenced by the OP...there is more to remember and more to know.  I can use that and I can pass it on. 


 Probably safer, as you said in your OP, to let her drive.



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