Yes this is a follow up on yesterday’s post but it is also a way to frame the results of my meeting my sponsee today. We both agree he is good at pushing away things that might be helpful. In this case he has a real reluctance to meet with me regularly. Since this is something I explained to him from the start is what I need to have happen, it is a problem. My being his sponsor is contingent on my being able to meet up with him. He was free from the start to say no, this was not something he wants.

I must say I was happy to say he did agree to meet with me again next week. Of his own volition he also offered up that not showing up then would be a clear statement on his part. His absence would demonstrate he was not willing to committ to our working together in a way that I felt had to happen.

I really hope he shows up. I want to help him and meeting with someone is the way I have found works best for me. I simply cannot effectively sponsor someone without regular face to face contact. Just one of the many, many limitations I have come to understand about myself since I have become sober.

I do believe that people can have a sponsor-sponsee relationship without regular meetings too, so this is not a case of my way is the only way this can work for everyone. I have also learned in sobriety that there are very few absolutes.

This is a jumbled post but there you have it.

All the best in your sobriety,

AA blogger

I am meeting with a sponsee tomorrow that I have not seen in months. He does some things real well, like going to meetings and calling me most days. Yet he is really balking at working the steps. He has had a lot of challenges. Things like operations are in fact fairly big deals for most people. Even with all this I still feel like he should be moving along into his fourth step. The important thing is I realize this is simply what I think.

I truly don’t know what is best for anyone. The best thing I can do is to try to do what seems to be the right thing. Hence I pray, and sometimes fret, over what I should or should not do. I am getting a growing sense that anything I can do to try to push this fellow into doing the steps would be just that. Me pushing. It is his decision to do or not do the things that are laid out in the big book as the necessary steps to recovery. His choice. I need to at least make that clear to him tomorrow.

My gut is telling me I also need to tell him to stop calling me every day. I feel my job as his sponsor is to guide him through the steps. The rest is whistling dixie. I am sure he enjoys the regular contact but unless he is moving forward with his step work, our daily conversations are just shooting the breeze. Even if a lot of the talking is about his meeting attendance and things around that topic. In some sense it is like talking about the weather. Its fun, and easy to talk about, but its not really substantive.

It may seem a bit harsh to be so stuck on the step work but for me, this is largely what my role as a sponsor is about. I even told him that from the start so this is not a surprise to anyone I am blessed to work with.

Tomorrow should be an interesting meeting. I wonder what I will be shown, both in terms of what to do and also what this meeting will end up meaning for both of us.

All the best,

AA Blogger

We have not once sought to be one in a family, to be a friend among friends, to be a worker among workers, to be a useful member of society. Always we tried to struggle to the top of the heap, or to hide underneath it. This self-centered behavior blocked a partnership relation with any of those about us. Of true brotherhood we had small comprehension.

page 53, from the 12 x 12.

I really like this passage but when it does come to mind, I generally forget where it is in our literature. This was the lead in passage from the daily reflections for today. Great to see it and great to now know exactly where it is!

I have a hard time doing things sometimes. I just need to do the best I can, call it good and move on. This morning I had to write a few emails. Instead of say, about 20 minutes and done, it took over an hour. Even an hour I feel happy with actually. That is an improvement over some of the stuff I can get going on with writing a simple letter. Perfectionism (it has to be right), self-esteem (if it is not just right, someone will think I am a dolt) and fear of commitment are all a part of this. Another funny aspect of this is that these two letters, and this is as often the case as not, are for good things. One is a talk I have to give this summer and the other was to report on some volunteer work I did for someone.

I think I need to pay more attention to this problem of mine. Prayer, asking God to remove those aforementioned character defects, and asking for clarity to know my path is the right one, will do wonders. I like that I already feel better about this in just writing this out.

I spoke to my sponsor a few days ago. It was good to talk to him and to hear his good practical advice. Get my ass to more meetings. Take some time to get together with him. Two important things I really do need to do. We talked about many other things too. My sponsee, for one. This guy is not wanting to work the steps but for now, well I have nothing else going on in terms of working with anyone. So there is no reason for me to not fill the role of sponsor for him for now. As long as I am talking to him regularly I can also keep reminding him that the goal is to work the twelve steps.

That is about it for now. Time to get to work.

All the best and God Bless,

AA Blogger

My son is a little over five weeks old today. He is sleeping in a bassinet basket by my side. This experience of having a son, a child, is so very interesting. I could not imagine for a moment what it would be like to be drunk and oblivious to him and to myself. There would be so much to miss.

All of this side of life is so new to me. As my baby boy is different every day, so I find myself in my actions and reactions to him and even now to my wife.  Things are richer and more complex but that is not always what is the most obvious about what has occurred within this change. What is most apparent is that things are not the same. I feel better about myself, and this is something that seems apart from even thinking about my son.

I understand it is possible for me to get a bit more mature and a bit wiser day by day, and I do believe this does happen for me more days than not. Yet there are moments when I seem to feel the weight of all the change that has accumulated and I know I have really grown. I experienced that on a mountainside in Montana when I was about to move from there. I felt it when I stood on a hill in the adobe desert in Colorado. I had heard the day before, via email, that I had been awarded my Ph.D. Both of these were celebratory turns of feeling the impact of having reached a significant milestone. With it came a humility and understanding of how fortunate and blessed I am. To be alive, and to be thriving.

That is what this feels like. I am seemingly suddenly more grown-up. And I like it.

Best,

AA Blogger

I am married to a woman I love, and she loves me. I have a wonderful job. It is relatively unique and it is a tremendous gift to have.

Right now I am wanting for nothing and I am happily sober.

To add to all this, my first child was born about three weeks ago. I am amazed.

God Bless,

AABlogger

My active drinking career, which I pray is over, come to a slow but sure nasty bottom. I went beyond just being brought to my knees with my last drunk. My last debacle found me splayed out on the bathroom floor and in dire medical straits. I was revived, brought to the hospital and spent a night in intensive care. I knew, this time, I was defeated. I was figuratively brought to my knees in realizing my powerless. I was different, at least in realizing it was simply was not possible for me to whip this drinking problem. I also knew – finally it was absolutely clear – my drinking was a big problem. I did not just have a bad night or was unlucky. I then did something strange. I sincerely asked for help.

Today I am brought to my knees by all kinds of situations. Asking God for help in my daily life, praying about how grateful I am to have the life I have today and many other reasons. All this is now a very good thing instead of the humiliation of what my drinking drove me to become.

One funny thing about all this is I did not believe in God before I was felled by my powerlessness. I felt people who had faith in God were weak and simple minded. It says in the Twelve and twelve (and as quoted in the daily reflections book): Some of us won’t believe in God, others can’t, and still others who do believe that God exists have no faith whatever He will perform this miracle.

I am glad I am on the other side of the fence on this issue today. I know and appreciate that God does exist. He can work miracles in my life. And I can be brought to my knees on a regular basis by my faith.

The philosophical argument about self-will versus determinism has been raging for much longer than our lifetimes. Modern ideas put new twists into this but the idea is the same. It is an argument that I am pretty sure will not be solved in my lifetime. So what to do, and what to say, when bad things happen? What was/is God’s role in such matters?

I have faced this in my own life and in trying to help others. Rape, murder, car accidents and the like are some of examples of bad things that happen. Is this all parts of “God’s plan?”

I want to believe this is not the direct doings of God. In my spiritual world these are things that happen, regardless of what God wants or is able to do for me, or for anyone else.

Self-determinism is what I believe in. I believe God wants the best for me but I am free to choose. I am a drunk. Good for me or not, if I am not vigilant and taking care of myself than I am capable of drinking. And drinking for me leads to very bad things for me and for others. On the other hand my life is pretty darn good when I am sober. This is more what I think God wants for me. So when bad things happen I don’t blame blame God. It is not necessarily his fault or his doing.

For all I know God is doing these things, perhaps for reasons I do not need to be privy to. Yet I am not God so I am not the person to understand everything. I can live with that too. I don’t need to think I know or understand everything anymore.  Drinking and getting sober beat that egotistical malarkey out of me.

Having been sober for a few decades I can deduce and live with philosophical and spiritual perspectives that support my life. I can now see things in a way that allows me to be happy (God is good) instead of bitter (why did God allow xxxx to happen?). In working with others I can share my perspectives and suggest them as useful ways to see and deal with things. I don’t pretend I am right, just that this does work. Yet sometimes there needs to be something more added to all this.

The other day one of my sponsees told me something that I thought was wonderful. It come to him via another AA member who had suffered a loss and was told this by someone else. Rather than wondering why or what God’s role in the thing that you lost was, imagine that God felt the same pain that you did or still do in relation to your loss.

An empathetic God explained in way that is personal and touching.

Happy New Year. 2010. It will be the best year ever.

Today I was told I would be offered an exciting new job I had been hoping I would get. It is a few years of work, with some of the top people in my field. One of them is a world class scientist, with lots of awards and even a Pulitizer for a book he wrote. Not only should this work be good but it will also set me up quite well to get a permanent position once this experience is completed.

Sobriety is a strange and wonderous journey, especially when you give in to giving up and letting God. My experience with this job has been like a number of others. It was serious and yes, it was a big deal. So much so that I got my panties in a wad for quite awhile. Only in the last few months have I worked really hard at letting God into what I was busy doing on my own.

I had been waiting on this deal to come down for over a year and was able to spin my wheels doing other things to bide my time. It got to the point where I was getting fearful, anxious and could not see as easily that life is and will be good. Regardless of work or no work. Some of my old thinking was starting to come back, in no small part because now I am married and things seem so much more serious these days. My wife is even pregnant for gosh sakes.

Finally I got earnest and honest in my prayers. I began to ask God to help me be on and be happy with a path that would support me and my family in a prosperous way. To realize, accept and honor whatever that was to be. Over time I came to realize I was no longer waiting for something to happen. It was happening and I was on the right path. I just did not know what was up around the next bend. This change in my perception and sense of things began to get me right again. A greater shift occured when I felt like I did not care what the outcome of getting the job I wanted, I was just curious to know what was going to be next. Like the curiousity of a child, not one of the fearful adult I was a few months ago. I just began to know now that all was well, and right. It also seemed that an answer, the next thing that would be, was coming to the fore soon.

Today the email came. I have a lunch date on Wednesday to meet with the people I will be working with. With this new job I will be: working at one of the top universities in the world, working with one of the top scientists in my field and I will be able to commute to work by taking a bus that is a three minute walk from my front door.

One of my best friends in the world was with me when I was just beginning my journey in science. I was a few years sober, he was just getting started. His first few years of sobriety were mental health hell but he stuck with it and I with him. I was best man at his wedding a few years ago. Last year he was part of my wedding. Even way back when, in the mid 90’s, I was talking to him about this guy that I am going to soon be working with. I called that friend today and we both marveled that I am where I am today.

It occurs to me to end this post by mentioning that none of what I have done in this area of my life would have happened if I made all my own decisions. I just wanted to be left alone. Instead I followed what I thought I was being directed to do, each step of the way. Even though at times it was a seemingly scary, unknown course that God put me on. Those scary God directions always opened up into wondrous vistas that held beauty and joy. Today is another one of those and I am so grateful to be alive and sober.

Wishing you all the best in your sobriety…

I got word this evening that a decision will be made, as soon as Monday, about hiring someone for a job I want to have. This position is something I have been waiting to hear about for a long time. I also know I am in the running for getting the job.

I have been praying about my work situation a lot. Asking to be shown what my direction should be and the courage to walk on the path I am shown is the right one. I do have enough sense to not pray to get this job. At least that is what I have come to learn about prayer, careful how you go about things and what you ask for.

So I will wait. Try not to get to anxious. Abide by the decision the best way I can.

Whatever happens my life is about to change in a macro way soon. This job or another – something has to give soon.