I hope people don't mind the positive posts (positive people used to drive me nuts when I was struggling!!) but I experienced another gift of recovery this week. It's absolutely a 180-degree turnaround from how I would have approached things 5 years ago.
This week, I didn't get a really interesting job that I applied for, because they wanted someone with experience I was lean on (totally understandable). But I had been really excited about it. Additionally, on Sunday, I had a great first date with someone who ended it with "I'd really like to get together again, I'll call you" and I never heard from him.
Mid-week I experienced a lot of anxiety along the lines of (1) "I'll never get another job! I'll end up homeless! Life will be over!" and (2) "UGH why do men say they're going to call and then don't? How hard is it to just say, "It was great talking with you, enjoy the rest of your weekend bye." I'll NEVER meet someone I cared about like [ex-BF]."
The difference NOW is that I was able to arrest those thoughts, stop catastrophizing, talk to friends both in and out of the program to help bring myself back to reality, and count my blessings: I'm working on a 6-month contract at a great company; I've got plenty of savings; this employer's reason for rejecting me was very specific, reasonable, and irrelevant to other opportunities I might get; I'll meet someone new to date soon, and even if I don't, I have a ton of friends and hobbies and a happy life -- and I live in the most amazing city in the country! I feel crummy right now, but those feelings will change, I just have to be patient.
What a HUGE difference from when I was still drinking, when between numbering those crazy feelings with booze I would have been convincing myself that EVERYTHING was going wrong for me that I would feel awful FOREVER. What a great incentive to stay sober.
(And BTW, the guy called last night, he had been really sick and was very apologetic!)
So anyway, I just had to share. Staying sober is sometimes challenging, but the results are SO worth it. I'm so grateful for the attitude and life that I have now.
Thanks for your post. I'm sorry to hear about that job prospect. Something, I'm all too familiar with. I too, lost many job prospects over the years, some with regret and some not. I hope you find the job of your dreams real soon.
I'm also sorry to hear about that date. If he only knew? My wife didn't take the bait at first, but she did warm up to me -6 months later, I may add. I hope your next date goes off without a hitch.
As far as sobriety goes, I think you hit the nail on the head when you said: "The difference NOW is that I was able to arrest those thoughts, stop projecting, talk to friends both in and out of the program to help bring myself back to reality, and count my blessings". Amen...that's gratitude for you.
When I feel worn down and weary, the first thing I do is write a gratitude list. That puts everything back into perspective, doesn't it? At least for me it does. Gratitude...can change our attitude, just look at us. If you keep gratitude first and foremost in your sobriety, you will experience many more magnificent realizations for years to come. We promise...
Oh...one last thing. I hope your sad days can be put on hold as the prospect of a better life starts to take hold. I pray that you continue to enjoy life in its entire splendor, as you begin to fully realize your God given potential.
~God bless~
-- Edited by Mr_David on Friday 26th of August 2011 11:42:15 PM
In my life, I always found that whenever something did not work out according to my plan, it was for a very good reason. I will only be able to see it in retrospect, sometimes years later. In the beginning I used to be disappointed. I learned to pray about it until I got peace & serenity on the issue concerned. I try to do it without rationalising or justifying.
Over the years as I practiced this over & over again, I have become less anxious & worried. Right now our company is going through a change of season. It is not very clear where we are heading, but if we knew, then where is there place for faith. My sponsor had a strange way of encouraging me whenever I went to him for advice. He would simply ask me to pass it on or ask what are you going to give back.
Hi GG, absolutely,now ,with the work we put in,we can seek to find a "learning lesson" in the situations of life on life's terms.We will get in a funk,but like you said,we are now able to dig ourselves out compared to times during the 'war" when any setback was a possible reservation to pick up...Thanks for positive message of hope and freedom...
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Selfishness-self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles.
Wow...a new found ability to handle life on life's terms. I can identify with this. I used to be ready to throw the towel in and give up at the slightest disappointments. It is enjoyable to live life without every thing being so crushing and so dramatic...
Granted....I still have a ways to go but it's getting there.
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
Thanks for the replies -- yeah for me the 3rd step is about realizing I can never see the whole picture and I can't know how not getting what I want might ultimately be the best thing. More will be revealed!
Suzuki Roshi said something along the lines of "Patience isn't waiting for something to change but learning how to accept what is"
One of the most "insidious" of my "old operating systems" is the "if only this then that" as in "if I can just get a girl I will be happy" or "if I can just get this job I will be happier" and I've learned people live their entire lives based on this principal, and as Yoda said "always looking to the future, never paying attention to the here and now" When i am living in the future and putting conditions on my future happiness I am not in the here and now, I am not in acceptance, by definition I can't have "conditional future happiness" and serenity at the same time
One of the things I have learned by doing the steps a few times is I don't know what's best for me, but if I start accepting the "here and now" it changes, it comes under the old Sufi saying "renounce the garment of the Lord and receive it back as your gift" when I no longer need something to make me happy it appears in my life, that's why Bill says in the Big Book "for us spiritual fitness always precedes material fitness" and what the old timers mean when they say "learn how to get of your own way"
like how do we do that, get out of our own way? by accepting "what is" rather then "what we want" and allowing live to be, like even one step beyond "accept life on life's terms" which to me feels like "learn to accept bitter disappointment gracefully" to "embrace life" to embrace whats given to me without trying to change it and it changes of it's own accord, when I let go of trying to find or fix or force a relationship someone "appears" in my life who exceeds my wildest hopes and dreams, when I let go of chasing money, opportunities appear as if by magic.
I've spent the last few years rebuilding my life from the ground up, from couch surfing homeless and jobless to having a great place (2 br, hardwood floors, big front yard and backyard, trees, flowers, birds, squirrels), it was dirt outside and a construction zone inside, just a gutted hulk inside when I moved in, 2 cars I LOVE, one of which was "dead" when I got it, I just started wrenching on it, took a few months and I never thought it would ever run quite frankly, a 1972 Mercedes Benz 350 SL Convertible in incredible shape, I'm seeing an incredible girl, she is SO nice, I work in flurries, make great money then get time off, like a week
Everything I have that's good in my life just "appeared" and the journey has been the gift, spending years working on the yard and watching it unfold, spending months working on the car and then having it start one day, getting to know this girl and allowing it to unfold, learning how to enjoy the experience and let go of the destination, and a few weeks ago I realized "I have arrived at this destination that I had been working so hard for" but in every single ...like thing....that constitutes this "destination" it was a gift from God
once I learned how to get out of my own way, enjoy the now, do the next right thing, and stop trying to put square pegs in round holes, and enjoy the journey, all my dreams came true
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it's not the change that's painful, it's the resistance to change that is painful
once I learned how to get out of my own way, enjoy the now, do the next right thing, and stop trying to put square pegs in round holes, and enjoy the journey, all my dreams came true
So great -- thank you. I agree that I never realized how much I was trying to shoehorn my life into what I thought it "should" be -- and spending so much time and emotional energy on doing so -- until I was able to stop doing it. What a relief.
One of my favorite quotes that I have prominently posted where I will see it often is: "We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to accept the life that is waiting for us." - Joseph Campbell
