We never stop progressing.  What is tricky for me is trying to better myself without beating myself up for not being the person I want to be all the time.  I'm still pretty new at all of this, but my saying for the day is "We are all perfectly imperfect."  Working a program of recovery is certainly a challenge.  From my knowledge of psychology, I know that most people have what is called a self-serving bias and they pretty much just go around interpreting things in their own favor so that they feel good about themselves.  Those of us in AA are always working to own our part and know what makes us tick better.  That does make us distinctively different than the average person who just shrugs crap off and doesn't really think that much about how they affect others.  AA is not for wimps right Dave? I appreciate the share and the honesty with what you are still learning about yourself and working on.  I think it's something many of us struggle with and you aren't alone in it for sure.

Morning Dave,

I agree, we will always be a work in Progress......

So what I read in your Post, was mostly aimed at the art of communication, right.

When I was in my first 2nd and 3rd year of recovery, I was looking at, and working on, how I had to un learn just about everything in my behavior and change it. I was so twisted up in people pleasing, so much so, that I had to really study the behavior of co dependency, and re learn how to do this art of communicating with others.

It was critical that I stop doing "the saying what others wanted to hear", and get to my own thoughts and try hard to communicate those, and what I came away with, that seemed to work, then and now, was really try daily to keep my communications to the "I see", "I feel", and "l want", and learning that if I begin any communcation with anyone that began with ""You........" that it automatically puts the other person on the defensive, subconsiously.

Then in Marin where it felt like I did group therapy for 10 years, that being my 6:00 pm AA meeting at the Alano Club in San Rafael, and it was sort of an underlying theme that was born in that meeting, when we talked about keeping our boundaries clear, and our own side of the Street free of Debris, such as unintentiallly, but never the less, hurting others. And the general consensus that I really liked and tried to integrate into my life was "Always do, or say the LOVING thing" Not in a codepentant people pleasing way, just considering how the other will preceive what you are saying in a gentle way, as opposed to a confrontational or too assertive way.

Of course as the years have gone by, I try to keep that in the back of my thoughts and quickly thinking first before responding.

Of course these are ideals, to be lived up to. Just two weeks ago, when I was having a conversation out in my patio with my older Son that was visited, I just blurted out something that really could have been seen as outright thoughtlessness of his feelings, so I had to call him the next day, and tell him just that, that I had made that comment without thinking and apologized if it had offended him in any way.

I believe if we are looking at someone eyes they will reveal how they just took in what you said.

Oh well this conversation on this subject could go on for 4 hours,
so I will say great that you are trying to re learn something, it happens to me all the time too.

We both are still, as you said, works in Progress........, Thanks to our HP, that I choose to call GOD!

Toodles, Toni


-- Edited by toni baloney on Sunday 23rd of August 2009 10:47:39 AM