tapestry

When I first got sober I remember reading in the big book, we can’t think our way into right actions, but act our way into right thinking.  I remember reading it an not really making the connection that I probably should have, but then you remember those first days when you are literally coming out of the ether?  Nothing and everything made sense, you could hear things and sort of understand the implications but there was a part of you that either didn’t want to get it or couldn’t for some particular reason.

If your recovery has been anything like mine and still is today, I used to try to think through everything, and in fact sometimes that process alone paralyzes me.  I have a tendency to go over and over the same information, situation or event until I have exhausted each and every path of the decision or thought.  And then I am exhausted and wonder why I am?

When you are faced with an opportunity to do something different today how do you respond?  When it feels like you have been in this situation before, do you think about it an then act or to you act and then think.  I think for those of us in recovery both are important.  I know that in my past I used to respond to most situations, I thought the first person in the arguement with the biggest words won.  And now I realize that isn’t the case.  I also used to think that I could have a “right life” if I thought about it.  What I have come to learn is that sometimes doing the right thing lends itself to right living.  So what is right living?  The Aramaic definition of sin is “off the mark”, notice that doesn’t say wrong, bad or disgusting, rather we didn’t hit the target.  The target in each situation we are faced with can be different.  But the target in most instances I think is doing the right thing so that we don’t hurt others, that we find compassion for each other and the path our lives has taken, and being mindful of any new karma we might create for ourselves and others.

Recently I have been given a chance to act my way into right living, and honestly I would give myself a D-.  I have been given an opportunity to revisit a lesson that I should have gotten in my early 20’s.  I guess I could say I didn’t see it coming, or the person that showed up to teach me the lessons felt and looked much different that the experience I had 30 years ago.  All of those things are true in this case, but the lesson is still the lesson and I haven’t done a very good job at learning.  I spent a good two weeks trying to think through it, ponder the hows and the whys, and the details.  But what I have come to learn in the last few days is that I can only change the way I act in response to the situation to find my center again.  Because you see what I think we each were looking for in our addiction is that “peace that surpasses understanding”, that inner place I talked about last weekend.

So the thoughts I would leave you to ponder today are:

• Have you noticed your thinking lately?
• Has your thought process brought you anxiety or peace?
• Who are you blaming for your situation today, could you act different and remove the blame?
• If people saw your thoughts what would they make of them?
• Are your actions in alignment with your words, in other words, are you congruent?

I finally reached this place toward the end of this past week.  I believe that when we get the clutter of our thoughts out of the way we are able to really hear the voice of God in the situation.  The reason why something happened or the reason why we might have failed the test again is because we don’t take the time to hear what god wants us to know.  What I got  this week when I finally allowed the voice of spirit to come into the mix was to hear and get to the place where I could begin to act in a way that felt right to me.