Sunday 10/18/09 - "BIG CHANGES"

"BIG CHANGES"

Big changes are coming my way - and they are coming quickly.

My dearest daughter will be moving her furniture and all of her possessions into our house. We have a large home with only two of us living in it at this point. There is room, but I must finally start cleaning out the old to make way for her.

I have only several days to prepare for her to move in. She has arrived at a turning point in her life and by the grace of God she will grow into the person God intended her to be and she will find peace and serenity as she journeys in a new direction. I could use your prayers for her and for hubby and me.

I have postponed, put off, procrastinated at really clearing out the clutter of a lifetime of accumulating material possessions. I am a pack-rat and have things from every era of my life in boxes, chests, drawers, bags, and storage bins all over the house. I have attempted to downsize a few times and have made a tiny bit of progress, but overall the result has been negligible. So, the crunch is on and the time has come for me to start tossing things. Pray I will be successful.

We are about to become a foster family for daughter's dog, Lucky. I love dogs and it has been a long time since we have had the pleasure of man's best friend around here. Dogs are such unconditionally loving animals. I know I will fall in love with him.

Change is also in the air. Hallelujah, hallelujah. Yesterday some cooler air finally arrived. The air conditioning went off and the windows opened. This morning is like heaven. It is 55 degrees out now with a predicted high of 72. I could not ask for anything better.

Pray, pray, pray.
Love, love, love.
Blog, blog, blog.

Prayer Girl

(Photo credit: The Colors of Fall by Elizabeth Pellette)

Thursday 8/13/09 - "WALKING THE HALLWAY OF CHANGE"

"WALKING THE HALLWAY OF CHANGE"

Alcoholics tend to hate change. They also hate being in a rut. What the ----! No wonder we have a tendency to be restless, irritable, and discontented. This makes for being a little nutty, doesn't it? No wonder we need the 2nd step, "Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity."

Being a recovering alcoholic means I must always be changing. If I am not moving forward, I will be falling backward. Standing still is an illusion. I heard this when I first got sober and I still believe it today.

Walking through change usually means walking through pain. Even though I know change is for my good and leads to spiritual growth, I still resist it. In that resistance, I experience the pain.

Sometimes I initiate change, but more often, it is God who pushes me in the direction of something different. He often does this by closing a door. A change happens on the job, a job is lost, a marriage breaks up, a child gets in trouble, a health problem arises, a loving, mutually-satisfying, balanced relationship slowly disintegrates, the ability to follow a profession is ended. These are just a few examples of doors closing.

I have learned over time that when one door closes, another one always opens. However, it can be a long time (in my estimation) for that door to open. Sometimes I hunt for wiggle-room trying to force the closing door back open. This never turns out well. It is trying to force "my will", not allowing "God's will". In the interim I spend time in the hallway.

I have also learned over the years that when the next door opens, it is always into something that is even better than where I was before. The best things that have happened to me, I have rarely had anything to do with.

I hate being in the hallway, but given that in my experience it "always" leads to something even better, it just once again proves to me that I don't know what is best for me. God does.

For all of us who may be standing in the hallways of our lives, I pray God gives us the faith to persevere, to stand patient in prayer till the next door opens. May we wait in hope for God's perfect timing to bring the next best thing into our lives.

Prayer Girl

Tuesday, 4/28/09 - "PROMISES"

"PROMISES"

("5th STEP PROMISES")

I took the 4th and 5th steps within a month or two of finally surrendering to my alcoholism. I wanted to change. I needed to change if I didn't want to drink again. I wanted to feel differently - stop hating myself, quiet the anger, resentment, guilt and shame that had held me in their grip for so long.

I was desperately ready to know the truth about myself. I had, for a long time, known all about what was wrong with "you". I needed to know about myself. I had no hope of changing "you", but I had come to understand that there was hope of changing myself by working and living the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.

I had been in near total denial about everything. I couldn't see and didn't know what was reality and what needed changing. The 4th and 5th steps provided the method to do this.

I had taken the first three steps when I woke up from my last drunk. I admitted my powerlessness, realized how insane my behavior and my life was, and handed it over to God. At that time, God was pretty much you in Alcoholics Anonymous. God restored me to sanity through the working of the rest of the steps.

I took a deep, honest, no-holds-barred look at myself and then shared all that I found with God, myself, and another person. In our Big Book, "Alcoholics Anonymous", p. 75, there are promises associated with taking the 5th step. These promises were not WHY I did the 5th step. But, they are beautiful and a wonderful gift associated with doing the honest work of this step. These promises are contained in the following excerpt:

"We pocket our pride and go to it, illuminating every twist of character, every dark cranny of our past. Once we have taken this step, withholding nothing, we are delighted.
We can look the world in the eye.
We can be alone at perfect peace and ease.
Our fears fall from us.
We begin to feel the nearness of our Creator.
We may have had certain spiritual beliefs, but now we begin to have a spiritual experience.
The feeling that the drink problem has disappeared will often come strongly.
We feel we are on the Broad Highway, walking hand in hand with the Spirit of the Universe."

Some of these promises came quickly, most came more slowly, but there was relief, a great relief. I was so grateful that the pressure-cooker of my mind and body found some release as a result of completing step 5.

Today I am grateful for:
Sleep that washes away the exhaustion of yesterday.
Sleep that takes away the troubles of the prior day.
Sleep that leads into new days with new possibilities.
Healing hands.
Finally writing a blog.
Prayers and their answers

Prayer Girl

(Photo credit: God keeps His promises by Barbara Mock)

Sunday, 4/26/09 - "LOOKING BACK"

"LOOKING BACK"

Sometimes things happen that you just know are 'God's will', even though they represent a huge change that will take a lot of adjusting to and will undoubtedly cause some pain of loss. One such moment is in the process of happening.

A dear, sweet girl, Zoe, who I have known and sponsored for more than a few years is moving. I met her at the first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting she attended after she got out of a local treatment program. I have had the privilege and honor to sponsor Zoe and watch God transform an emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual wreck into a woman of dignity and beauty.

She has met and successfully dealt with one challenge after another in those years. The years I have known her amount to a decent chunk of time yet feels in this moment like the length of time it would take me to inhale and blow out a quick breath of air.

I remember that very first meeting when this girl ended up sitting next to me. (There are no mistakes in God's world.) She was frightened, nervous - her leg swinging back and forth in constant rhythmic motion. Her eyes were cast down toward the floor and she looked ready to bolt and run, but I could tell that she was firmly resolved to stay in her seat for that entire hour.

She had been told by the counselor at the local treatment center that she needed to get a sponsor. A guy at this meeting who knew she just got out of treatment, had seen her at one of the meetings they hold at the center, and may have had a thought in his head to "hit on her", came up at the end of the meeting to remind her to get a sponsor. BUT I had already seen the need this girl had, reached out my hand to her including my phone number, and like a mother bird - sent this guy "packing" with a few simple words - kind but direct.

In our Big Book, "Alcoholics Anonymous", there is a portion read at almost every meeting I've ever gone to from, "How it Works", p. 58 that goes like this:

"There are those, too, who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders, but many of them do recovery if they have the capacity to be honest."

I always thought I was one of those people, but over the years have come to realize I'm luckier than those I believe this statement is talking about. Zoe is one of these people referred to in this sentence. She fights for sobriety and soundness of mind on many fronts.

Thank God she has the capacity to be honest. It has been a difficult struggle to maintain that honesty, her sobriety and her mental health, but she is succeeding. She has no idea how far she has actually come and that is part of the reason I am writing this. She is a miracle. Despite the constant challenges she faces and always will, she ultimately perseveres by applying Honesty, Open-mindedness, and Willingness and asking God and her sponsor for help.

Today she has a hand that has been trained to pick up the phone and keep her sponsor informed. She listens when I suggest more meditation and prayer or that she should make a call to her doctor. She listens when I have to say things she does not want to hear. Moving will present large problems for her.

This move will bring many blessings to her and her family despite the challenges it presents. She will face the realities of having to find a new sponsor, a new doctor, new home group, new sober friends. I truly believe God's will is being worked out here and that He will not take her this far just to desert her. God will see that her needs are met.

I love Zoe with all my heart and soul. Our sponsor-sponsee relationship etched a deep groove in our lives. We were able to mutually share very private things with each other. She was also one of the first people God led me to place my hands on in a healing way. He passed healing of mind, body, and spirit to her.

I will be praying with all my might for her sobriety, mental health, and total well-being. I am reaching out to my blogging community to ask for your prayers for this beautiful soul. I ask you all to keep Zoe in your prayers.

A large change like this tends to bring up old memories, generate fears, and generally set one a little off center. This has happened to her and has provided me an opportunity to remind her that she is not the person she used to be, is certainly not the person I met at that first meeting, and that she lives a totally different life today.

Thanks for keeping her in your prayers along side of mine.

Prayer Girl

(Photo credit: Life''s Journey by commanderlewis)

Friday, 3/27/09 - "DOES IT WORK?"

"DOES IT WORK?"

"....an utterly simple and universally applicable test for Truth. It is a test that any man or woman of any kind, anywhere, can easily apply for himself. It is as simple and direct as the acid test for gold. It is the simple question - DOES IT WORK? This test is so staggeringly simple that most clever people have passed it over as not worth considering, forgetting that all the great elemental things of life are simple."
(From: "The Sermon on the Mount" by Emmet Fox, p. 132-133)

When I first arrived at the doors of Alcoholics Anonymous, nothing was simple for me. I was in such chaos, confusion, and pain that I was desperate to find a solution. I had tried many other solutions to no avail (churches, ministers, psychiatrists, counselors, doctors, medications, etc.). I simply could not stop drinking. Once I finally did stop drinking (through the help of a sponsor in AA), I discovered I needed a solution to the overwhelming difficulties of "living".

I have had many desperate people beg me for reassurance that there is a way out of the pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization they find themselves in - both in AA and Al-Anon. The only reason I am able to offer any reassurance is because I have asked myself the question - DOES IT WORK? (AA and Al-Anon) - and have been able to answer, YES!

People often then move beyond the simple DOES IT WORK? YES! to complicating it and asking HOW? But luckily, the program has provided answers to this too. The simplest of answers is:

H - Honesty
O - Open-mindedness
W - Willingness

If we have a willingness to be as honest as we can be, follow the program laid out before us, and have even the smallest amount of open-mindedness, then God can enter into the narrowest of places within us, and create the necessary CHANGE.

The change comes about one-day-at-a-time, one step at a time, slowly - with patience, persistence, and hope. At first, I had very little of that, my hope came from other members of AA and Al-Anon who had found the solution before me and had enough hope and faith to share. They supported and guided me till I found my own.

Today, I share this hope, belief, faith, and trust with those who have not yet found their own and with those who, like all of us, have our 'step backward' days.

I have had enough chaos, stress, conflict, desperation, anger, misunderstanding, emotional/mental/physical pain, and confusion for this lifetime. It is easy to be overwhelmed by it all. That is why I choose to share the hope, calm, peace, serenity, emotional sobriety, health, and wholeness I have found in AA and Al-Anon.

Thank God for AA and Al-Anon, for other recovering people I see face to face, and for all you cherished bloggers.

Prayer Girl

(Photo credit: Mother Nature's Valentine by Ranger Mark)