Slaves To Our Emotions.

A recovery speaker likened his thoughts to "trains going through the station - do I climb on board and ride that sucker for hours, days, weeks? Or do I just watch it go through the station?"

Great analogy. I thought, pre-Al-Anon, that I had to ride every train going through the station, I didn't realise, (or when told, believe at first)  that I could just watch them go by. I also didn't know, as I do now, that I could change stations if I worked my program diligently and with sincerity, rather than only giving it lip service when I was in a pleasant frame of mind, and disposing of it as soon as my mood changed.

I was a "slave to my emotions," and due to my immaturity, my emotions were in a continual state of change, rising and falling at the smallest of successes and difficulties. Drama and crisis were mainstays, and I couldn't self-soothe.

So, back to the train station of our minds - we can stand back from the platform's edge, and watch the trains come in - where's this one going?  High-speed train to anger and frustration, no stops along the way; think I'll wait for a later one. Here comes a poky old steam train going to serenity and peace, with many stops to allow others to board, takes a scenic route - this train I'm going to ride.

Acceptance.

I've been struggling with this the last 24 hours, having to time and again turn my mind to positive thoughts, and ask my HP to help me, for a couple of reasons, one being that my friend has been diagosed with colon cancer.

My little dog is a good indicator of how well I'm doing in my attitude, because she senses it, and responds accordingly - last night, after receiving the bad news, I wandered around the house for a few minutes, with her close at my heels, giving me little nudges with her nose when I stopped to gaze out the front window. Glancing down, I saw in her body language the mirror of my own distress, and going to the kitchen, picked up the phone and called a dear friend, telling her what I'd just learned, asked if she'd like to go for a dog walk. She agreed, and within 20 minutes was at my door, hugging me; we gathered up dogs and leashes and went out for a long walk. I talked about the diagnosis, and my fears, and my friend gave comfort through her willingness to walk with me, and give me the gift of allowing free expression of all my feelings, the joyous, and the painful.

This morning, I realised that I've been fighting off tears ever since my friend called to tell me that he's been diagnosed with cancer. This is old behavior, rooted in childhood, this not allowing myself to truly feel my feelings, trying instead to surmount them. I've expended enormous energy in my life, doing this - going through my days with sorrow half-choking me, because at some point I had lost the ability to release the pain through tears, and then when I regained it, I didn't want to submit to weeping, to surrender.

I have no control over this. It will be what it will be, and I will go with it, because when it comes to life and my powerlessness, I'm a twig going over Niagara Falls. My only choice is in my attitude - am I going over screaming in fear and anger, or am I going in peace, knowing that I have the precious gifts of friendship and love in my life? I am truly blessed with the people in my life - fascinating, witty, generous people - and I am blessed to have had a family doctor all those years ago, who kept telling me, "I think you need to go to Al-Anon." I had no concept then, of the love and growth I would be offered, or the healing. I went to my first meeting seeking a way to stop my alcoholic from drinking, and here I am, so far from that day in time and place, with a gratitude I cannot begin to express for all of those who've helped me along the way.

I've gone from a bitter, furious, resentful woman who hadn't cried in years, to someone who knows how to get through anything. Reach out, ask for help and support, and then when it's offered, accept it.
Let the tears flow, let the pain out, ask my HP for serenity, and be willing to let it all go. Give back to others what was so generously given to me by the women at my first meeting, and every Al-Anon meeting since - love.

Common Denominators - Self-Absorbed.

I believe this is a characteristic we share with the alcoholic, an endless loop in our mind continually returning our attention back to ... us.

No matter where the conversation may roam, some people will always arrive at the destination of self.

Some of us are not very socially skilled when we come into Al-Anon, and this is one of the reasons that we can have trouble making friends - do you like to listen to someone go on forever about themselves? I know I don't, and never have, but that was who I was years ago, a person unable to wrench my mind from my own troubles, worries, stresses, etc, for long enough to allow for any space in a friendship for the other person. It was all about me. I wasn't much, but I was all I thought about.

This is why 12-Step encourages us to work with others - when we are giving of ourselves to another person, not only are we passing on this wonderful program, but we are also granted time out of the madhouse between our own ears. Being a good listener requires paying attention. Paying attention requires that we listen. Not sit in silence waiting for them to stop talking so that we can start up again, but really listen. Engage our entire self in being present for this person. Listen for what's being said, and what's left unsaid. Learn to read facial expressions so that we may be even more available. Be loving in our gift of our time, and our attention.

Yes, there are going to be times when we'll be taken hostage by another newcomer totally absorbed in themselves, but this is the ebb and flow of a relationship - some days it's more for me, some days it's more for you - vulnerability and strength shifts and moves. I'm not always feeling full of patience, and there will be times when I have less to give my sponsees or another program friend who calls, but the very least I can do, is listen, and stay in the moment with them, and that much I can do even when I'm feeling depleted through fatigue and physical discomfort. When I really have not a darn thing left to give, I don't answer the phone. I know they have the phone list, and they can find another member with whom to share.

I'm clear on what's mine, and what isn't. It's not up to me as someone's sponsor, to keep them entertained. I can walk beside them as they take those first scary steps into being more social, and I can be there afterwards when they need to figure out what happened and how they felt. I can rejoice with them when they begin to get newcomers calling them for help, and the cycle begins all over again.

This week, I went to visit my old sponsor in the last place we lived, and then for tea with another friend, and when I was driving the hour or so back to the city, I was content. I have so much for which I feel a boundless, leaping ,joyful gratitude. Life is good.

The Wild Windstorm That Wasn't.

Weather forecasters apparently were warning of a "wild windstorm" which was supposed to hit us yesterday  - you couldn't call the wind we received more than a "slight breeze" and even that sounds like an exaggeration.

My husband likes to watch the weather channel so that he knows what's in the forecast; seems to me that that all he accomplishes is to be warned about weather which never arrives. Snowstorms which turn out to last for ten minutes and then all evidence vanishes in the hot sun which follows - big storms which don't materialise, serious warnings given by grave-faced weather people who sound so certain, and can be completely wrong time and again, yet people still wait to hear their pronouncements.

Rain has a scent before it arrives, and I can tell when it's going to snow by the appearance of the clouds, they have a smooth, flat look. The birds become active before the wind, and the dogs are restless. Other than that, I tell the weather by gazing out my window.

Human beings want to know what's coming - we kid ourselves that knowing ahead of time helps us to prepare for it, but that's not how it works it real life. When the event actually arrives, and we're in the midst of it, all the advance preparation in the world doesn't ameliorate one moment of the feelings we go through. Life has to be lived in the present moment, and my serenity is undisturbed when I am undisturbed by the happenings of daily life - when I roll with the punches, they don't hurt any less, but I recover my equilibrium much more quickly..

Facing What Life Deals Out.

A good friend dropped by yesterday to tell me that the testing had shown that he has a "mass" in his stomach. He's been having problems off and on for 8-9 months now, has lost 45 pounds, and does not look well.

He's a lovely man, my friend, generous, caring, imaginative, and wildly funny. He's dealt with cancer once in his life already with his partner, who was deathly ill and pulled through after treatment. They are bonded in the way that only 20-some years together bonds a couple, and are each other's support and comfort. He's got a great support system of friends around to help him though whatever this turns out to be.

That has to be enough, because in the end, that's all there is. Love, and people.

Tonight I'm going to see a play with another friend, whose daughter is in the cast, so that should be fun. I've been looking forward to it. I don't have much to say today, because I'm feeling balanced and content. I wish for all who read this, an excellent and serene weekend.

Anticipating Trouble.

When I was new to Al-Anon, one old-timer in my home group had a few stock phrases which used to make me gnash my teeth in silent irritation. (I've become so much less irritable, that I might almost be a different species than the frightened, anxious, angry woman who first entered an Al-Anon meeting 26 years ago.)

One of this member's pet phrases was: "Don't awfulise."  I found this supremely annoying when I was the recipient, because I believed that anticipating trouble was nothing more than careful planning. I didn't understand that she was simply trying to offer the crazed newcomer that I was, a way to find some serenity from the madhouse between my ears. I understood it to mean that she thought I was exaggerating, and I felt offended. I thought she was oversimplifying, and that my life was far too complicated for little two-word phrases to be of any help.

Now, as is the way in 12-Step, I say to my sponsees, when they begin to get themselves worked up about what might happen if this, or that, or even that takes place, "I think you're awfulising. Try to stay in the moment."

Staying in the moment means that I must completely, willingly, with gratitude, give up all of the mental tortures with which I occupied so much of my time. Anticipating trouble took up a great deal of my waking hours. I could work out huge long interconnected horrifying possibilities, and create much misery for myself doing it. I'd imagine a terrible outcome, and then feel depressed about it.

That's insanity, to be feeling upset and depressed about an imaginary outcome. My first sponsor pointed out that these outcomes were never positive, only and always negative. I was scaring the dickens out of myself with things that might never happen. She taught me to pay attention to my internal dialogue, and when I started up anticipating trouble, to "switch channels" to the one in which my Higher Power was taking good care of me, and I could just go for a dogwalk and relax.


"I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened."

                                                                                         Mark Twain



Some of your hurts you have cured,
And the sharpest you still have survived,
But what torments of grief you endured
From the evil which never arrived.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Busy And Tired.

An interesting combination, since the first requires energy to fufill my obligations, and the second makes me think longingly of sleep. I've been having less than refreshing nights for a couple of weeks now, and the exhaustion is cumulative. One good night, and I could feel rejuvenated, but I'm not getting one. I get up every morning feeling as tired as I did when I fell into bed the night before.

Being this fatigued strips life down to the essentials - do what must be done, and let the rest go by unremarked. No energy to complain, obsess, worry, stress, argue, or even think very well, which is why no posts for so long - I'd be sitting in front of the computer staring at the screen, mind completely blank.

Today isn't much better, but I was struck by a phrase in today's reading in One Day At A Time In Al-Anon:
"my own limited ideas."

So much of my problem in life before Al-Anon was just that - my limited ideas. Not only the limits of my thinking, but my inability to recognise those limitations, admit to them, accept them, and be open-minded to receiving new ideas from any source. I was a closed system, forever going around on the familiar cicuits of my thinking, unable to break free.

Accepting new ideas can be very difficult to begin with - we don't like change, and we don't want to have to make any changes, because the old and the familiar feel safe. They may not be working very well, they may be causing distress and discomfort and distance in all our relationships, but we can still be reluctant to let them go.

My first sponsor said I should work to accept one new idea every day. When I asked where was I supposed to get all these new ideas, she suggested I start reading the literature of Al-Anon every day - many new and helpful ideas contained in the Al-Anon books. I began with not much willingness, and grew to love these daily readers. They've helped me enormously, and continue to help me. For that, I'm deeply grateful.