Have any of you reached the insight in early sobriety just how much you do whatever everyone else around you is doing? This didn't hit me with my drinking, though I guess I instinctively knew this because I haven't been to a bar in over 9 months now, but I noticed I can go almost a whole day without smoking as long as I am around other people that don't smoke. I thought about this and realized, I also don't complain unless I am around people that complain all the time. I don't gossip much unless I am around other people doing it. Basically, I almost automatically do whatever everyone around me is doing without even thinking about it. This sort of scares me because I'm wondering what might ever happen if, indeed I do find myself in a situation where everyone is drinking and I can't just get out of it. Furthermore, it irritates me that my character is dictated by others so much and the desire to fit in. As a side note, I know this is codependency related as well because I will smoke often by myself....and I did the same with drinking...but I won't smoke if hanging around a nonsmoker or a group of them all day. I guess this is the reason for having a strong higher power (that is not an actual human being), cuz if I hung around God all the time, I might start acting a whole lot better (albeit never perfect).
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
The big stumbling block we all face, especially in the first years, is Live on Life's Terms.
Sometime I get stumped on that, still.
If we are not drinking, behaviors that were second nature to us, right. Then we put the plug in the Jug, and now....what???
It seems like you are saying well I've tried this, I'll mirror what others do, it will teach me a little about how to do this "Life on Life Terms" thing that feels so very foreign to me at times. But after trying it, you discovered it did not work.
But in all your writings I see you growing by leaps and bounds, and looking at this behavior, well I sort of see you looking at it, Just before you drop it, or changing it into what does Mark wants to do?
Kind of like that saying of when the Student is ready, the Teacher will appear. And it sounds just like you are on the verge of shedding some behavior you dont care for. You being the student, and you being your own teacher here too. Does that make sense??
We humans can be like lemmings!! I guess that's why they say "stick with the winners". I can tell you from experience that sticking with troublemakers never did me any good, but alas, you know this to be true for all folks.
I see this all as part of our being so unable to be "true to ourselves", or even to know who the heck we are, as alcoholics. Good stuff, and now that you mention it, I would not have eaten that cheesecake today at a picnic, if all the other ladies I was hanging with hadn't been eating it, and encouraging me to do so as well. :o/
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~Your Higher Power has not given you a longing to do that which you have no ability to do.
if I hung around God all the time, I might start acting a whole lot better (albeit never perfect).
I like that!!
Hey PC!! I really related to this, I use the term "I absorb" those negative things. I sometimes have to talk with and be around some of these folks, so I try my best to equal it out with positive Steppin folks. I do those things, more than I'd like to (gossip, criticize, complain with people), I think, so they'll like me. (People pleasing) *Working on it* I end up feeling sick to my stomach after it's all said and done.
I'm going to have to step back from a woman in the Program that I've been friends with for almost 3 years. She is showing every indication of heading for that drink and I have allowed her to interfere with my peace of mind. She said that she knows what she's doing is wrong, but she's going to do it anyway. Whoops I was about to tell you what it was.
Take it Easy PC, growing up isn't an easy thing to do. One thing my sponsor keep trying to get me to remember "To Thine Own Self Be True".
Thanks for the responses :) I think it is true that I am noticing things about me and things I do now that I am no longer in ultra self-hate mode about...just like, Why the hell do I do that? I hated so many things about myself earlier on in this journey because I didn't really think I could change most of them. A lot the defects have just lessened and others I am accepting of having them and I notice them without leaping into complete self-bashing. I also noticed that I do feel like crap after everyone's had their typical bitchfest and complainathon after weekly work meetings (more crappy if I joined in). I was at work the other day trying to be negative and talk about how unfair crap is, how some people don't do any work and shove it off on others, how some people take 3 hour lunches while I don't take lunch at all...ever. I used to complain like that every day. Then I was like "Wait...um nobody is really listening to this, nobody cares, I am adding to this negative complaining/bitching work culture, and this crap has been going on since the minute I started working here" I literally said, "I can't be so negative" and stopped. Within an hour I was back to focusing on my own work, my own kids on my caseload and it didn't matter once again. Now smoking...that one is going to be a lot harder to drop because it's a true addiction and a way more powerful crutch. Not even sure I'm ready to drop it even though it's clearly apparent to me that 90 percent of the behavior is to alleviate (or try to) loneliness or to be part of the group AND that it is BS cuz nobody ever got kicked out of a group for NOT smoking, and cigarettes are not my friend. I guess I'll talk to god more about that one and the willingness to quit will kick in for real soon. P.S. I took on a 6 month secretary committment for the newcomer's meeting that was the 2nd meeting I ever went to. Actually, I got elected that by group conscious/vote. Progress progress. I've always had to be trusted to get a lot done at work, but never have done service or felt like what I was doing of my own free will was worthy of trust and being "a leader" of sorts.
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
One of my favorite sayings, not an AA saying, but still seems to apply to much in my own life, and has over the years.
"WHEN WE 'Know Better...., We DO BETTER"
Impossible to change a character defect, in my own case, until I can go to God, and really "see" it as a block to my own Spiritual growth.
These Twelve Steps just keep on keeping on......
We can grow a new character defect, just as fast as this little tomatoe plant outside grows these adorable little tomatoes, but that is not really a comparison, as a new character defect is far from being anything that is adorable.
Toodles, Toni
-- Edited by toni baloney on Sunday 19th of July 2009 01:50:40 PM
I end up feeling sick to my stomach after it's all said and done. 
