The Head Center

I sit here with my age and all my years of hard living hanging on every muscle and impinging on every joint. My insides don't forgive me for the missed check-ups and maintenance visits. My spiritual connection to AA has subsided; I have taken up the mantle of atheism. My physical connection to meetings, though I have gone to two in two days, is slight.

I heard an old coot share tonight. A good old boy I appreciate very much. He had been spared death on numerous occasions, having flown over the handlebars of a motorcycle at high speed and then his liver went sour decades later from the hepatitis he received along with the blood transfusion. I also reconnected with an old coworker and friday beer bash drinking buddy who was at the meeting. The coot's topic was gratitude and though it seemed redundant that a lot of folks were grateful to be sober and such, tonight it struck me and I found myself grateful for precisely that.

I forget sometimes that sobriety and the work of recovery provides for sobriety. I expect and want a whole lot more. If I can settle in and go to AA in order to simply not drink, I might get a lot more out of it.

A sponsee of mine who has been sober for five years called me yesterday. He announced something that he had said to me before on a number of occasions. He said, "I feel like I want to hurt myself." There was a tone in his voice decidedly unlike any prior call he had made of this nature. He was distressed more than usual. He then added something new; he said, "I'm at the hospital. I'm standing in front of the emergency room entrance."

I swallowed hard. I told him to go on in and tell the nurse how he was feeling. He doesn't always do what I say, except when he's in a lot of pain -- then he becomes an extremely good listener and exceedingly obedient, to boot.

Long story short ... he's having a rest now and a few days off of work. He's not in a good head space, he needs to work on a number of issues. He asked me for a pad and he's going to do another fourth step, which he had been putting off. He also said he was really furious with God right now, and that God had failed him utterly on a number of fronts. I told him to make two lists and to define a new higher power. I told him to make a list of traits he wanted his HP to have and traits he did not want his HP to have. I think in the end, he'll end up with the same HP he had before and hopefully he will have a spiritual experience along the way.

I may also. When I saw him hurting this badly, and so scared, and nearly falling apart, and needing so much help, it touched a vulnerability inside me. It scared me because this guy has kept me sober for five years. It also touched the compassionate place inside me that working the steps gave to me. He is not just a sponsee, he is a friend. No, he is a loved one. I felt profoundly sad that this was happening to him.

I'm sure everything will work out. It usually does. My sponsor told me when I had five years, that "you go crazy in your fifth year." I said, "what?!?!?!" He said, don't worry about it, just keep coming back. I don't know what else to say at this point except that the wisdom of the elders is certainly to be respected. That is a spiritual way unto itself and part of my spiritual experience.

"relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Thy will ..."

-- 3rd step prayer

Step 3 was, is, and almost certainly always will be the hardest step for me to understand ... and to undertake. If you talk to a lot of folks in recovery, each might give you a different answer about how they approach their relationship with their higher power and what it is that power is guiding them towards. So I suppose one answer lies in the old adage to each his own.

Early on in my sobriety, I went along, searching and asking and questioning and guessing at what God's will was for me, without much satisfaction and with irregular results.

Finally I realized that I could borrow a simple idea from the big book, and it would apply in almost every situation.

God's will for me became this: to be of maximum service to God and to my fellows ...

This orientation keeps me on course. In this mindset, I can be a human being following a spiritual path. That keeps me right-sized and on target.

God bless you, izzy