AA | The Alcoholics Guide to Alcoholism

Keys to Recovery Interview

Posted on July 3, 2018 by alcoholicsguide

I was delighted to be asked and honored to take part in one of the excellent “The Hope Interviews” with Steve Jones for the recovery newspaper “Keys to Recovery” – our interview is on page 9 and it was a experience strength and hope type interview from both a 12 step recovery and a neuro-psychological perspective, showing how these perspectives are very compatible and how we need a spiritual solution to a neuro-psychological problem.

http://www.keystorecoverynewspaper.com/

Acceptance is Always the Key!

Posted on December 3, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

Glad to see other people have the same markings on their Big Book too! I have the same fluorescent yellow marker pen scrolls and deep pen lines across the page and under the words.

I was so desperate not to let a word go by, and to understand everything the Big Book of AA has to teach about alcoholism and the solution to it that I tied my developing understanding to the pages with yellow and black ink lines. Often returning to also add these #s and to note well, NB!

Every time I read it I got new understanding. The longer I have gone on in recovery the more I have seen and understood.

Reading the BB over the years help me see how my brain is recovering as I see things more clearly with every passing years. It reminds me of previous times when I have read it, gives me a memory snapshot of where I was at in previous periods of recovery. What I used to think and feel compared to what i think and feel now. What I agreed with then and what I disagree with now.

How I have healed.

It is strange how I see other things, not underlined, as gaining more in importance as recovery goes on.

This excerpt above is from a “share” or a personal story at the back of the Big Book. The story is known by two names, “Doctor, Alcoholic, Addict” or “Acceptance was the Answer” depending on which edition you bought.

It is referred to so often in meetings that it is almost a supplement to the first 164 pages. It has common sense words of wisdom which can greatly help with your recovery – I keep returning to it over and over again.

Here is a link to it, have a read and hopefully it will help you in the same profound way it helped me and millions of others!

It is the last story in this section – http://www.aa.org/assets/en_US/en_bigbook_personalstories_partII.pdf

Here he is speaking at an AA convention. I have found these “shares” crucial to my own recovery in terms of identifying with other other recovering alcoholics.

It is in listening to their shares that I could see that I am like these people and they act in a way I do, feel in a way I do, think and make decisions in a way I do and even have had experiences throughout their lives and drinking careers which are also so like mine so I guess I figured that I must be a sort of alcoholic like all these people.

Maybe I was an alcoholic too!?

Eureka!

The journey in recovery often starts with identifying with others, their problems and how they have solved their problems.

I hope it does for you too!

My very first meeting I identified with the AAs talking about how difficult they found living life on life’s terms, their emotional disease etc. It was this that convinced me I was like them. Not the drinking or drugging, but the internal spiritual malady, the ISM that goes with the alcohol to create alcoholism.

Identifying with others like me, saved my life and is the reason I have been recovery ten years.

You are not alone.

Out of the Asylum Years!

Posted on August 26, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

An interview here with one of my music idols Tom Waits, about his alcoholism, his fear that the muse was the drink and his relief it wasn’t and also his subsequent recovery via AA.

Alcohol it seems from this interview and from my own extensive collection of Tom Waits’ music was drowning his talent and not fueling it.

“For years, Tom Waits was the booze-soaked bard of the barstool, the keeper of ‘a bad liver and a broken heart’. But Tom was saved by his wife Kathleen. He hasn’t had a drink for more than 20 years and, at 65, is making the best music of his life.

In the early ’70s, every Tom Waits song seemed to be about drinking and losing your way in the fog. His first record was even calledClosing Time, but it sounded more like a lock-in at the loneliest bar in the world. Just Tom in the corner slumped over the piano serenading the last few nighthawks with his slurred songs about heartaches and hangovers, and the girl that got away.

His persona had already been perfected by the time he started living in the Tropicana Motel in Los Angeles in 1975, a faded establishment that also housed a couple of aristocratic junkies and several call girls who worked Sunset Strip. For six albums on Asylum Records, from his aforementioned debut in 1973 to 1980’sHeartattack and Vine, Waits was the gravel-voiced, beer-stained bard of the barstool, a latter-day beatnik with a bad liver and a broken heart.

Tom Waits's origins - Addicaid

As wonderful as many of those early albums are, the act was wearing thin. So, too, was his ambition, and his spirit. In 1977, he fell for the singer Rickie Lee Jones, whose wayward life echoed his own, and whose most famous song, ‘Chuck E’s in Love’, paid homage to their mutual friend Chuck E Weiss. Waits and Weiss were arrested that same year for disturbing the peace in Duke’s Tropicana Coffee Shop. His life was unraveling. ‘I had a problem,’ he says, matter-of-factly. ‘An alcohol problem, which a lot of people consider an occupational hazard. My wife saved my life.’

In 1978, when Waits met Kathleen Brennan, everything changed. Kathleen was the catalyst for the dramatic sea-change in Waits’s music that occurred with the release ofSwordfishtrombones in 1983. ‘I didn’t just marry a beautiful woman,’ he says, ‘I married a record collection.’

She has been his songwriting collaborator for almost 35 years now. When Waits was once asked what his wife brought to the table, he replied, ‘Blood and liquor and guilt.’ Which is handy, because Waits himself hasn’t had a drink for 23 years. When he says that Kathleen saved his life, he means it literally.

‘Oh yeah, for sure,’ he continues, ‘But I had something in me, too. I knew I would not go down the drain, I would not light my hair on fire, I would not put a gun in my mouth. I had something abiding in me that was moving me forward. I was probably drawn to her because I saw that there was a lot of hope there.’

Given that his early songs, his voice and his persona, were so drenched in drink, how hard was it for him to give up? ‘Oh, you know, it was tough. I went to AA. I’m in the program. I’m clean and sober. Hooray. But, it was a struggle.’

Does he miss the odd night-cap? ‘Miss drinking?’ he says, sounding genuinely surprised. ‘Nah. Not the way I was drinking. No, I’m happy to be sober. Happy to be alive. I found myself in some places I can’t believe I made it out of alive. Oh yeah. People with guns. People with gunshot wounds. People with heavy drug problems. People who carried guns everywhere they went, always had a gun. You live like that,’ he says, without a trace of irony, ‘you attract lower company.’

Did he write a different kind of song when he was drinking? Tom thinks about this for an instant, ‘No. I don’t think so. I mean, one is never completely certain when you drink and do drugs whether the spirits that are moving through you are the spirits from the bottle or your own. And, at a certain point, you become afraid of the answer. That’s one of the biggest things that keeps people from getting sober, they’re afraid to find out that it was the liquor talking all along.’

For a while, Waits had that fear himself, the fear that when he finally dried out, the songs would dry up too. He worked through it, though. ‘I was trying to prove something to myself, too,’ he says, revealingly. ‘It was like, “Am I genuinely eccentric? Or am I just wearing a funny hat?” All the big questions come up when you get sober. “What am I made of? What’s left when you drain the pool?”‘

When asked about his ‘First sober album’ he says, ‘Well, if it matters to anybody other than me …I don’t know if I want to answer that. That’s a kind of personal thing.’

When he talks about songs and songwriting, the essential mystery of it all. You can tell he respects his gift, nurtures it, and doesn’t ever take it for granted; that he has a faith in the song that is almost spiritual.

‘Leadbelly died the day after I was born – 8 December 1949,’ says Waits. ‘I always felt like I connected with him somehow. He was going out and I was coming in. And, maybe we passed in the hall. I would love to have seen Leadbelly play, but that’s the great thing about records, you put them on and those guys are right there in the room. They’re back.’

‘I think about that sometimes. Some day I’m gonna be gone and people will be listening to my songs and conjuring me up…”

Reference

http://score.addicaid.com/tom-waits-the-booze-soaked-bard-of-the-barstool-is-sober/

The Discordant Echoes of the Past

Posted on July 30, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

The last six years of research has been dedicated to trying to understand a fundamental part of my illness of addiction, of me. People often say there is more to you than addiction.

To which I normally answer yes, there is also recovery.

I don’t mean to be smart arsed by this but I view recovery not only as a healing in many ways, physiologically, physically, emotionally, cognitively and spiritually but also as a ongoing process of learning about me, the various strands that have contributed to my illness and the various aspects of my recovery which also give insight into what was wrong in the first instance.

If certain aspects improve in recovery there is a fair chance these were impaired in the addiction cycle. I believe there is a lot more to addiction that the end product of addiction, namely chronic pathological addictive behaviour.

Various aspects have contributed to the need to externally manage troublesome and painful internal feeling states.

Recovery according to my wife has made me a nicer person, more loving and considerate and easier to live with. Better company, more mature in my emotional reactions and more responsible. I hasten to add that I have some way to go still in some respects. In simple speak, I have become less selfish, self centred and less me, me me!

These to me seem like the traits of addiction, this self obsession.

Other factors have fed into this manifest self obsession too however.

Recovery has been a continual process of learning how to do life in a more healthy, emotionally mature way, in simple terms. I have had to learn so many things, the things more healthy people take for granted and learnt years ago.

Somehow I never learnt how to do some basics, was never properly taught these basics or always had inherently difficulties with certain basic, developmental skills.

For example my emotional life was a complete failure, continually running away from my feelings, avoiding them as if they were actually injurious to the self!

I have spent years trying to work out why I ran away from my feelings and from a very early age. I have that type of curious head.

In early recovery I was astounded that I could not feel what emotions I was having, could not generate a mental perspective on what emotions I was experiencing, could not identify and label and thus use as a way to make effective decisions. My decisions were always based on the “distress” of not knowing exactly what I was feeling, actions were taken simply to escape this distress.

I had in effect an emotional disorder and that this emotional disorder seemed to precede, initiate and propel by addictions.

Addictions were the place I went to in fleeing me and my negative emotions. They were the tools I used to regulate my negative moods, emotions and negative sense of self.

Me overwhelmed Me – I appeared to need help regulating Me so I chose and used stuff outside of me which seemed to work originally in provide escape but increasingly contributed to this escalating problem of my inability to live with me.

Someone described the spiritual awakening which results from doing the the 12 steps of AA as fundamentally changing how we think and feel about the world and our place in it!

So what do I think and feel about the world and my place in it?

And has this changed in recovery?

Generally I would say I have had a revolution in how I relate to the world, it no longer scares me like it did, I am no longer to ashamed take my rightful place in it.

That does not mean I no longer struggle with fear and shame. In fact the longer I am in recovery I see these two factors as contributing most of the distress I can feel in recovery.

Fear I have always been aware of – we have a fear-based illness it is often shared in AA meetings but shame?

Six years of academic research has clearly shown me that this fear based illness is a distress based disorder. Neuropsychology has shown that the experiential wisdom and insight of 12 step groups has always been correct.

Fear/distress causes me problems via certain avenues such as catastrophic thinking, fear of an uncertain future, distorted /dishonest thinking.

Fear can lead to a wide range of other negative emotions. But honesty is often the first port of call for fear. I find fear leads immediately to distorted dishonest thinking. Honesty comes from the ancient Greek “to be in (one with) God” so I guess dishonesty is not being in God which is the opposite to being in fear. Interestingly the Christian Bible refers to the Devil as the Father of All Lies!

I had not however realise that shame creates just as many emotional difficulties and emotional pain as fear!

Shame and fear certainly effect each other but both can take the lead.

Fear is referred to in the Big Book of AA “This short word somehow touches about every aspect of our lives. It is an evil and corroding thread; the fabric of our existence was shot through with it.” but shame is rarely mentioned!

This is not surprising as there was little research into the effects of shame of illness back then in the 1930s, in fact research into shame is relatively recent, in the last 25 years. Interest in shame came form an academic article which called shame the “master emotion!” which can effect and amplify all other negative emotions. Thus it has just a profound effect on emotional well being as fear!

I was delighted to come across this research recently as I have always been looking for answer to a vexing question, ever since early recovery in fact.

In early recovery, and since, I have always wondered when someone hurts my feelings, intentionally or otherwise, I suddenly have this warm sensation, this spreading dendritic/branching type feeling in my heart which when activated captures my heart and pollutes my head with negative thoughts about me.

I suddenly feel hurt, upset, less than, smaller, weaker, hunched over, feeble, and then I get these other voices suggesting the person who upset me is right, I am worthless helpless, useless. Who the hell was I thinking I was, sure I was kidding myself?

I feel that I have been assailed, my head swoons, I lose my bearings. I am under some seemingly grievous emotional attack!

These feeling and thoughts multiply against the audio soundtrack of my tormenter’s voice which then blends into orchestra with my own and other voices of negative self perception.

I am suddenly strangely paralyzed by this emotional avalanche.

Other negative emotions are detonated such as self pity, the ever present sense of “poor me”.

Eventually other emotions may get activated too like fear and dishonest thinking.

I can work myself into quite a emotional state replaying the scene of my supposed insults via resentment and the re-sending of situations, feeling and thoughts from this and other previous episodes in my life. Other negative mood congruent memory is activated and soon there are other similar memories of similar insults supporting this insult and my increasingly sense of low self esteem and self worth.

I found it impossible for years to stop this spreading emotional feeling and distorted thinking after it was first activated. It simply continued against my will. When activated it takes ages to reduce. In fact the intensity of the emotion always seems to get worse before any hope of it getting any better!

I usually need the help of a loved other to help me through it.

It feels as if there has been an emotion explosion in my heart?

One emotion explodes and it then detonates other emotions is the best way I can explain it.

These leads to increased negative thoughts about self and the reinforcing of a negative self schema ingrained in memory from childhood on.

It seems to confirm all the worse things about myself.

Chastises me for having thought any differently!

All because I took a slight at what someone may have said to me!

Often I have found out afterwards that I had misheard and misinterpreted the words and that no insult was intentionally given in the first instance!

My fear-based misinterpretation led to all these negative emotional reactions and cognitive distortions which all then ran away with themselves.

Now in recovery I feel that shame has just as profound an effect on my negative emotions as fear – in fact shame can lead to fear and vice versa. But to me now, it seems that shame is that negative emotion that detonates the other emotions that spread dendritically across my heart.

I have finally found out what has been at the heart of my emotion dysregulation – shame.

Shame and fear also have similar parents – namely trauma /abuse, insecure attachment as a child to a primary caregiver.

Addiction doesn’t exactly help with shame either!

The trauma incidents I experienced in childhood have led to a fear based responding to the world and what I would call chronic or toxic shame.

A knawing feeling of being less than, not good enough.

An emotional achilles heel.

The above feeling of shame and the resultant negative emotions and thoughts that it detonates are the result of what is perceived as insult and rejection. It is often said in recovery that the recovering person fears nothing more than rejection, as it brings that damning emotion of shame.

At least fear can activates action, shame always paralyses. Fear can embolden, shames weakens.

We sufferers of toxic shame thus very vulnerable to this type of “putting us down” or the feeling of being rejected or even “found out”.

We spend our lives constantly guarding against it, although we are often unconscious of this.

I sometimes wonder if the “hole in my soul” was shame-shaped?

This is why shame inspires the constant use of defense mechanisms, the myriad of self defence mechanisms that we use against shame, rejection and which I will discuss next time around.

As for the solution to the above perceived insult, pray for forgiveness or simply forgive the person who allegedly insulted you as it exonerates him/her of being a imperfect human being while doing the same thing for you at the same time.

Accept the gift of our communal and very human imperfection when you can.

You are Enough, We are Enough!

Posted on July 21, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

“The wounded healer” refers to us, who suffer greatly from shame, helping others via love, tolerance and understanding who also suffer greatly from shame.

We can help others and be helped because we all know what it is like to feel the chronic, toxic shame the drives addictive behaviours.

Our understanding of shame is not out of a book it is real, lived experience. We know how it can drive one into chronic addiction and we know how to recovery from the persistent effects of this shame.

The main thing that struck me when I first went to AA was a lack of judgement which was amazing considering I was very jaundiced at the time.

I was accepted in the group without reservation. This greatly helped my damaged sense of belonging, my not feeling part of.

It made me feel that this is the place I need to be. Have always needed to be?

The “shares” or testimonies of other recovering people made we realise they suffered the same shame as me and had worked to overcome it via the steps, via having fellowships, people in their lives who understood and who helped them. They told me of their triumphs over their emotional difficulties, over their chronic lack of self esteem, over not feeling good enough, of feeling less than.

A failure – they talked about me and how I felt about me. How I had always felt about me!?

I had never been in a group of people who had talked so openly about their intimate feelings which was amazing. In doing so they were talking about my intimate feelings too. This gave me a sense of not being alone anymore. They seemed to be shining a light of hope into the dark recesses of of my shameful psyche.

It addressed my sense of isolation right away.

I had spent my life feeling not good enough, bad, l had that knawing feeling of less than, that hole in the sole.

I was like these people. They were like me.

I felt and continue to feel more like these people than I do my own family.

They became my surrogate family, my newly learnt attachment.

They were like me. They had not learnt this stuff out of a book, by professional observation but by having been through this stuff themselves. This was real not learnt.

They had been there. They were here now for me.

They knew what they were talking about.

This was the beginning of my psychic change. A person who was to become by therapist at the local treatment was at my first meeting and he later said that he felt I had a psychic change at that my first meeting.

I had come in utterly beaten, at death’s door and had left with hope.

The journey started with hope.

I had found a portal in the universe – it was Alcoholics Anonymous but from the shares it might have been called Shame sufferers Anonymous.

Shame ran through every share. They say fear is the corrosive thread which ran through our lives but it is equally the case that shame does too and causes just as much distress and damage.

It is difficult to live life when you do not have your own back, believe in yourself as worthy of the good, healthy, things in life. That you are not worthy them. That these things happen to others. Not you as you do not deserve them.

Why recover at all when you are not worth it?

This is how many of us feel? We are not worth it, this recovery.

The truth is the opposite, we are worth it. We do deserve it.

We are heroes who suffered so much and come through so much. We deserve happiness more than most! As a result we have so have so much to offer others. We are all wounded healers.

We are here to help others like ourselves, in a way that only we can!

It was via others, like parents that we have this shame and these negative self schemas.

It is through human relationships that these start to heal. Shame is a social emotion which needs a social treatment.

We need to reconnect to overcome the isolating force of shame.

You are enough! We are enough!

The psychic change as continual behavioural change?

Posted on July 13, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

When I came into AA I remember hearing the words “the need for a psychic change” which was the product of a spiritual awakening (as the result of doing the 12 steps) and that the 12 steps are a program of action!

The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous clearly states this need “The great fact is just this, and nothing less: That we have had deep and effective spiritual experiences* which have revolutionised our whole attitude toward life, towards our fellows and toward God’s universe.”

The question is whether this spiritual change is the result of behavioural change?

As I was told when I came into recovery that if I did not change my actions, and how I acted in this world, my actions would take me back to where my actions had taken me before – back to drinking.

This is the cornerstone of AA recovery; thinking, feeling differently about the world as the result of acting differently in the world, as to when we were active drinkers.

Otherwise one does the same things and ends up in the same places, doing the same things, namely drinking. It is a behavioural revolution; a sea change in how we act.

In line with this thinking, it is we that need to change, not the world.

According to one study (1) which examined whether personality traits were modified during prolonged abstinence in recovering alcoholics, two groups of both recovering and recently detoxified alcoholics were asked via questionnaire to see if they differed significantly from each other in three personality domains: neuroticism, agreeableness and conscientiousness.

The recovering alcoholics were pooled from self help groups and treatment centres and the other group, the recently detoxified drinkers were pooled from various clinics throughout France.

Patients with alcohol problems obtained a high “neuroticism” score (emotions, stress), associated with a low “agreeableness” score (relationship to others).

In the same vein, low “conscientiousness” scores (determination) were reported in patients who had abstained from alcohol for short periods (6 months to 1 year).

In this study, recently detoxified drinkers scored high on neuroticism. They experienced difficulty in adjusting to events, a dimension which is associated with emotional instability (stress, uncontrolled impulses, irrational ideas, negative affect). Socially, they tend to isolate themselves and to withdraw from social relationships.

This also ties in with what the Big book also says “We were having trouble with personal relationships, we couldn’t control our emotional natures, we were prey to misery and depression, we couldn’t make a living, we had a feeling of uselessness, we were unhappy, we couldn’t seem to be of real help to other people.“

In contrast, regarding neuroticism, they found that recovering persons did not necessarily focus on negative issues. They were not shy in the presence of others and remained in control of their emotions, thus handling frustrations better (thereby enhancing their ability to remain abstinent).

Regarding agreeableness (which ties back into social relationships), the researchers also found that recovering persons cared for, and were interested in, others (altruism). Instead, recently detoxified drinkers’ low self-esteem and narcissism prevented them from enjoying interpersonal exchanges, and led them to withdraw from social relationships.

Finally, regarding conscientiousness, they observed that, over time, recovering persons became more social, enjoyed higher self-esteem (Costa, McCrae, & Dye, 1991), cared for and were interested in others, and wished to help them.

They were able to perform tasks without being distracted, and carefully considered their actions before carrying them out; their determination remained strong regardless of the level of challenge, and their actions are guided by ethical values. Instead, recently detoxified drinkers lacked confidence, rushed into action, proved unreliable and unstable. As a result, lacking sufficient motivation, they experienced difficulty in achieving their objectives.

Recovering persons seemed less nervous, less angry, less depressed, less impulsive and less vulnerable than recently detoxified drinkers. Their level of competence, sense of duty, self-discipline and ability to think before acting increased with time.

The authors of the study concluded that “these results are quite encouraging for alcoholic patients, who may aspire to greater quality of life through long-term abstinence”.

However, in spite of marked differences between groups, their results did not provide clear evidence of personality changes.

While significant behaviour differences between the two groups were revealed, they were more akin to long-term improvements in behavourial adequacy to events than to actual personality changes.

This fits in with the self help group ethos of a change in perception and in “taking action” to resolve issues. In fact, 12 steps groups such as AA are often referred to as utilising a “program of action” in recovering from alcoholism and addiction and in altering attitudes to the world and how they act in it.

The authors also noted the potential for stabilization over time by overcoming previous behaviour weaknesses, i.e. in responding to the world. Hence, this process is ”one of better adequacy of behaviour responses to reality and its changing parameters.”

In fact, treatment-induced behaviour changes showed a decrease in neuroticism and an increase in traits related to responsibility and conscientiousness.

In line with our various blogs which have explained alcoholism in terms of an emotional regulation and processing disorder, as the Big Book says ““We were having trouble with personal relationships, we couldn’t control our emotional natures” the authors here concluded that “rational management of emotions appears to be the single key factor of lasting abstinence”

If we want to to recover from addiction we have to change how we behave. We have to start by following a recovery program of action.

No by thinking about it, or emoting about it but by doing it!

Action is the magic word.

References

Boulze, I., Launay, M., & Nalpas, B. (2014). Prolonged Abstinence and Changes in Alcoholic Personality: A NEO PI-R Study. Psychology, 2014.

Alcoholics Anonymous. (2001). Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition. New York: A.A. World Services.

Finally Found What We Were Looking For

Posted on July 2, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

Quenching that Spiritual Thirst

I have been keeping up my regime of getting more spiritually fit – went to mass and then a meeting.

I have also been doing a lot of walking too (approx 5 miles a day).

Although I still blog on the neuropsychology of addiction on my other blog (kinda alcoholic having two blogs isn’t it?) http://insidethealcoholicbrain.com/ my heart and soul is moving noticeably back into the world of recovery and doing recovery.

My head has been learning what my heart knows already.

Not just turning up at a meeting and sharing my experience and insights but also doing low level service, like always helping clear up after the meeting, stacking chairs, moving tables etc.

I have also enjoyed talking to newcomers. It has been fascinating meeting people where they are at.

Rather than using my memory banks to relate my stories of treatment and recovery, I am more interested in their own spiritual journeys of self discovery. I kinda feel excited for them.

It is always spiritually nourishing to see people suddenly get it, to see the light of recognition and acceptance of their condition start shining a new light in their eyes. The beginnings of psychic change and a spiritual awakening about their condition.

I go to chapel but rarely see this type of transformation. Perhaps the people at mass aren’t as spiritually ill as us? I am not so sure sometimes.

I shared this with an earthling/normie who had some experience of 12 step groups and she agreed most enthusiastically that the conversions one sees in 12 step groups appears more profound than any she experienced in chapel.

It makes one think this – how is is that a hopeless drunk can suddenly be so dramatically altered in his or her views of the world and those in it. How come they can come to accept a higher power in their lives so readily? Almost as if they had some strange disposition towards this?

Is this part of the gift of desperation? Is it partly an acceptance of seeing it work in others and this encourages one to explore this themselves?

Is it because there is close link about being humiliated by alcohol and the necessary ego deflation which leads to humility (for me humility is tied up with accepting one needs help and then asking for and receiving it)?

When i came to AA I was determined not to do the God thing but I intuitively understood the spiritual thing.

I had been a practicing Buddhist on and off over a decade or more and firmly believed that all suffering comes from an attachment to the self. I still do.

Hadn’t I already been looking for a spiritual solution to my problems?

Both my parents were very religious and both had issues with alcohol (my father before I was born) and drugs (Valium in my mothers case). In fact my parish priest was an alcoholic and my father would have to go the the parish house at least half an hour prior to mass to make sure he was sober enough to take mass. A beautiful man he was too, our local priest but an active alcoholic.

Was I born into this world with a spiritual thirst, a thirst for communion with the infinite, something beyond the self, with the divine in order to escape the often emotionally painful limitations of the self?

Has it always been necessary for me, spirituality? Does in balance my inherent lackings?

Before I went to mass I meditated for half an hour. I used this Christian meditation where I simply lie in a corpse position on my back and wait or God’s Grace. Sometimes I utter the words “Come Holy Spirit Come” and give myself wholly to His Grace.

Then I have this creeping feeling of peace, of stillness, of quiet.

I have some of the thoughts I normally have but they do not effect me, they are no longer exerting any distress and I no longer react to them. They are no longer propelling me out of bed and into some course of action.

They are my thoughts devoid of anxiety, devoid of emotional pain. But they are still mine but cwtched in the comforting embrace of God.

To be an addict about it – it is like an analgesic, a pain killer in a sense. Like an opiate but without the disappearance from reality, instead remaining still but present in the now, in this moment.

The best way I can help explain further is in relation to the video below where Thomas Merton describes contemplation and mystical union with God.

This helped me a great deal this video because when talking of God we have to be careful we are not creating a self construction of God which leaves us still in the finite parameters of self and self delusion.

It is beyond self but it is a realm in which the self communes with that beyond oneself. Thomas Merton explains it better than I ever could!

It is the sense of the infinite, the escape from the attached self, the transcendence that I have always wanted, craved and finally compulsively sought .

Why did I not find it fully before? Why, well I think this is because I had always had this other way of finding transcendence and that was in a bottle or in a drug or in a behaviour.

I could not fully find this divine transcendence until I saw the lies of this chemically created transcendence.

It had always been getting in the way of what I really need, a full God consciousness, full transcendence from self.

After the meeting I stopped and talked with two elderly woman and then walked them up the street to where they were going. We laughing and carrying on, gently making fun of each other, stopping to talk and go on, then stop again and go on, with silly talk and laughter.

We stopped and staggered our talkative ways on the hill to Main Street. Arm in arm with foolish fun. To the outsider we must have looked like we were acting like three drunks would, talking, and excessively gesturing, caught up in waffly exuberance. Slightly intoxicated by our merriment.

I remember thinking this is similar to going out on the town with friends, who mainly were alcoholics too and are mainly now dead.

We could have looked like three drunks who had finally found what they were looking for!

Drink was never the answer, it got in way of the answer but also kept some of us from killing ourselves while we waited for this answer, His Mercy.

God blesses AA!

Progress not Perfection

Posted on June 29, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

When I need a spiritual “tune up” I go back to basics. I up my meditation, go to more AA meetings and go to chapel more regularly.

I have over the last few years drifted away from what I used to do in terms of my recovery.

I took time out from AA to further my ideas into the neurobiology and neuromechanisms of addiction and I have now come up with theories of addiction which satisfy my understanding of addiction. I have done with that in many ways.

These theories of addiction can be found here please read as they may strike a chord with you too and hopefully contribute to your understanding of addictive behaviour.

But this research and time away from AA has had some cost or so may be the case. It depends on how one appraises this and how one appraises the role of mistakes in life, if this was a mistake even?

Are mistakes things to be learnt from, are mistakes also integral to learning a better way of doing things?

In these last few years only going to AA intermittently and nothing like as much as I used to, I have found I have increasingly been living in my head and less in my heart. I have found it difficult to moderate my research. I have become quite obsessive if not addicted to researching addiction, however ironic this may sound.

Now I have taken time out as I want to change course in my life. I have decided I want to work more closely with my fellow alcoholics, I want to use what I have researched along with what I have learnt in AA in a more practical therapeutic way for myself and for others.

To do so requires me getting more spiritually and emotionally fit.

Today I have meditated after waking and then went to chapel then followed by a AA meeting. I have just returned and after this will shop, cook tea, walk my dogs, do the clothes washing etc. All mundane compared to high flying research?

High flying research has it’s place but the spiritual programme I want to live has to come first and has to put others first.

I haven’t been doing that as much in reality as I should.

Throughout my research I have not been living in AA and visiting the world from there, I have been living in the world and barely giving AA any time. The reason I have done what I have in recovery and got what I got in recovery is solely down to AA.

AA does not need to be improved or updated. I do!

I went to this meeting today thinking I will be of help to others to be gobsmacked of how much help these other people are to me.

For an egomaniac self proclaimed genius this was such a humbling experience it was painful.

I have drifted off beam, gotten spiritually flabby.

All the shares I heard today where nuggets of genius on how to stay sober, they were living demonstrations of recovery, living demonstrations of living a spiritual life in a way I am not! It was like sitting around a table of spiritual gurus.

How could I have been so wrong about these people before?

You know why? Because I was too busy being so right about what I thought.

I need to put more work in to get more out of this spiritual way of life.

When I was last in AA in this area I would pronounce that meeting as a sick meeting or that meeting is not doing it properly or that is not AA, or why are they always talking about outside agencies like treatment centres etc…..a controlling madman was what I was looking back.

Today I was completely teachable.

A first!

Everyone who shared was a teacher, everyone is a teacher period. Everyone has something to say, something I can learn from. Everyone!

This is where I am at.

A bit tired, fragile and dealing with the bitter pill of swallowing my false pride and admitting I have been so wrong about so many things.

I really hate to admit it. But there you have it.

There is not a problem out there – it is usually a problem in here, in between my ears, in my head and heart.

Perhaps I needed to step out and then go back?

Who knows? All I know is that I now have a different attitude to when I was last there.

The worse thing which is also the best thing is that after all this research I can really state that I can’t be sure I know anything much.

And that is definitely progress!

How Stories Transform Lives

Posted on June 12, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

When I first came to AA, I wondered how the hell sitting around in a circle listening to one person talking, and the next person talking and …. could have anything to do with my stopping drinking?

It didn’t seem very medical or scientific? Did not seem like any sort of treatment? How could I get sober this way, listening to other people talking?

It didn’t make any sense. Any time I tried to ask a question I was told that we do not ask questions, we simply listen to other recovering alcoholics share what they called their “experience, strength and hope”?

How does this help you recover from one of the most profound disorders known, from chronic alcoholism?

I did not realise that this “experience, strength and hope” in AA parlance, is fundamental in shifting an alcoholic’s self schema from a schema that did not accept one’s own alcoholism, to a self schema that did, a schema that shifts via the content of these shared stories from a addicted self schema to recovering person self schema.

Over the weeks, months and years I have grown to marvel at the transformative power of this story format and watched people change in front of my very eyes over a short period of time via this process of sharing one’s story of alcoholic damage to recovery from alcoholism.

I have seen people transformed from dark despair to the lustre of hope and health.

One of the greatest stories you are ever likely to hear and one I never ever tire of hearing.

Through another person sharing their story they seem to be telling your story at the same time. The power of identification is amplified via this sharing.

If one views A.A. as a spiritually-based community, one quickly observe s that A.A. is brimming with stories.

The majority of A.A.’s primary text (putatively entitled Alcoholics Anonymous but referred to almost universally as “The Big Book,” A.A., 1976) is made up of the stories of its members.

During meetings, successful affiliates tell the story of their recovery. In the course of helping new members through difficult times, sponsors frequently tell parts of their own or others’ stories to make the points they feel a neophyte A.A. member needs to hear. Stories are also circulated in A.A. through the organization’s magazine, Grapevine.

But the most important story form in Alcoholics Anonymous describes personal accounts of descent into alcoholism and recovery through A.A. In the words of A.A. members, explains “what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now.”

Members typically begin telling their story by describing their initial involvement with alcohol, sometimes including a comment about alcoholic parents.

Members often describe early experiences with alcohol positively, and frequently mention that they got a special charge out of drinking that others do not experience. As the story progresses, more mention is made of initial problems with alcohol, such as job loss, marital conflict, or friends expressing concern over the speaker’s drinking.

Members will typically describe having seen such problems as insignificant and may label themselves as having been grandiose or in denial about the alcohol problem. As problems continue to mount, the story often details attempts to control the drinking problem, such as by avoid-ing drinking buddies, moving, drinking only wine or beer, and attempting to stay abstinent for set periods of time.

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The climax of the story occurs when the problems become too severe to deny any longer. A.A. members call this experience “hitting bottom.”

Some examples of hitting bottom that have been related to me include having a psychotic breakdown, being arrested and incarcerated, getting divorced, having convulsions or delirium tremens, attempting suicide, being publicly humiliated due to drinking, having a drinking buddy die, going bankrupt, and being hospitalized for substance abuse or depression.

After members relate this traumatic experience, they will then describe how they came into contact with A.A. or an A.A.-oriented treatment facility…storytellers incorporate aspects of the A.A. world view into their own identity and approach to living.

Composing and sharing one’s story is a form of self-teaching—a way of incorporating the A.A. world view (Cain, 1991). This incorporation is gradual for some members and dramatic for others, but it is almost always experienced as a personal transformation.

So before we do the 12 steps we start by accepting step one – We admitted we were powerless over alcohol——that out lives had become unmanageable – and by listening to and sharing stories which give many expamples of this loss of control or powerlessness over drinking. .

Sharing our stories also allows us to stat comprehending the insanity or out of contolness (unmanageability) of our drinking and steps us up for considering step 2 – Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity – through to step three, so the storeies not only help us change self schema they set us on the way to treating our alcoholism via the 12 steps.

In these stories we accept our alcoholsimm and the need for persoanl, emotional and spirtual transformation. The need to be born anew, as a person in recovery.

Reference

1. Humphreys, K. (2000). Community narratives and personal stories in Alcoholics Anonymous. Journal of community psychology, 28(5), 495-506.

WE

Posted on June 11, 2015 by alcoholicsguide

This week saw Alcoholics Anonymous celebrate it’s 80th Birthday.

Many media outlets have stated that AA was founded 80 years ago but this is not correct.

AA was co-founded 80 years ago when Bill Wilson passed on a message of hope to Dr Bob, or Dr Robert Smith to give his full name.

Dr Bob like Bill Wilson had intermittently stayed sober via involvement with the Oxford Group but they had always relapsed back to drinking.

When Bill Wilson first met Dr Bob he convinced him that he had a spiritual malady coupled with a abnormal reaction to alcohol, which meant he could not control the amount he would drink and could not control when he was going to drink, he had, in effect, become powerless over alcohol and only help from a power greater than himself could help him.

The original power greater than himself, as for millions of alcoholics over the last 80 years (and for some it stays this way) is another alcoholic. One recovering alcoholic or a group of recovering alcoholics is a power greater than oneself.

The message of recovery is usually from someone who has recovered from alcoholism, this is a power greater than yourself as he/she has used certain tools to recover and this is now being passed on to you, as they were passed onto him or her. The solution to your alcoholism is the same as the solution to their alcoholism.

There are no individualistic programs or people simply doing their own thing, it is a collective program of action.

Thus at the heart of AA is one alcoholic helping another get sober. It is a reciprocal relationship. Helping other get sober helps us stay sober too.

It is the most perfect win-win situation.

The wounded healer principle personified.

Bill Wilson had got this idea of abnormal, or allergic reaction to alcohol, from a physician, Dr Silkworth, who had treated him at Towns Hospital. It seemed to account for his uncontrolled drinking.

Dr Bob did however relapse again soon after receiving the message from Bill Wilson, briefly, and this only served to reinforce his view that Bill Wilson was correct about this abnormal reaction to alcohol and his inability to continue not drinking under his own steam.

Today this would be termed “despite negative consequences”.

Hence his first day of sobriety is taken as the first day of AA, although the AA organisation as we know it today took longer to come in to being.

It symbolizes that this was the day when one alcoholic helped another alcoholic achieve lasting sobriety.

Dr Bob, it is aid, went on to help over 5,000 alcoholics achieve sobriety and died sober.

The basic tenet of this, is that it takes one alcoholic to help another alcoholic achieve sobriety. This has been borne out in millions of cases around the world.

Millions of lives have been saved not to mention the lasting benefits it has brought to families, and societies once harmed by alcoholism.

When asked what he thought was the greatest accomplishment of the 20th century, Henry Kissenger replied, “Alcoholics Anonymous.”

AA saved my life and I can never put into words the gratitude I have for AA. I cannot express how happy it has allowed my wife, family and friends to become.

I can never properly describe the chrysalis effect it has had on me and on everyone close to me.

The age of miracles is still my us, our recoveries prove that. It is a gift that keeps giving, freely.

Thus my original point is not semantic, AA was not founded by one person, it was co-founded as we alcoholics achieve sobriety with the help of other alcoholics.

It is “we” of Alcoholics Anonymous, as the very first line of the Big Book of AA states.

In the twelve-step groups the focus is not on the individual self, but on the group or the community. Mutual aid and equality are the core principles of the twelve-step groups. Each member of AA help themselves by helping others who are in the same situation.

Essentially as one academic put it, The «power»
referred to in several of the twelve steps is therefore unrelated to religion; it refers to the potentially healing power inherent in interpersonal relationships based on reciprocity and equality.

Most active ingredients accounting for AA’s benefit are social in nature, such as attending meetings, and the 12 steps mention “we” 6 times but not “I” once.

AA’s 12 steps are a spiritual program of recovery but at the heart of that spirituality is the role of sponsoring.

Sponsorship embodies the fellowship’s altruistic orientation, reflecting a “helping and helper therapy principle” . Sponsorship plays an important role in the recovery process.

High sponsor involvement over time has been found to predict longer recovery .

Although social support is key to early engagement in the Twelve-Step membership, over time, spiritual issues emerge as increasingly important and helping others achieve recovery is at the heart of this.

The spirituality of AA is exemplified in helping others, it creates a feeling of wholeness and connectedness with others.

This is why we celebrate this great anniversary, this co-founding of AA, as it is the start of this therapeutic and spiritual connectedenss with other alcoholics needing help and giving help and with the wider world.

Thank God For AA!

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