As one who has benefitted from participation in 12-Step Recovery programs for over 28 years, I will first and formost always direct someone who is seeking help with addictions to those resources – with an important caution:

“Be aware that we are as addicted to our pain as we our to our ‘drug of choice’.”

Recovery is about…well, recovery. It is about identifying the problem, dealing with it and moving on. It is not about staying stuck in the past for the rest of our lives.

The 12 Steps offer a clear and conside path for:

• owning the problem, i.e. our particular addiction
• entering into partnership with our own personal concept of Universal Intelligence to overcome that addiction
• clearing away the wreckage of our past addictive behavior
• creating a new life based on honesty, service and a spiritual relationship with ourselves, others and that personal concept of Universal Intelligence.

I know people who have had multiple years of recovery who still spend more time talking about their drunken behavior than they do living in the “NOW.”  Sure, we’re told that we have to remember the past in order to not get drunk (or high) again. BUT THAT DOESN’T MEAN WE HAVE TO LIVE IN IT.

I used because being in the present was too painful. I drank to be “somewhere else” because being conscious wasn’t something I wanted to face. So I opted for “numb” – the no-feeling state. It’s also known as running away. Call it what you like. As far as I’m concerned, any form of refusing to be in “present-time” today in sobriety is a form of that old behavior. If I’m sober but still “running” – still refusing to be conscious because I’m dwelling in the past, what gains do I have to show for my efforts?

The past is over. Done. Finished. Can’t change it. That’s what the Serenity Prayer is about.

Today is the opportunity we have to live differently – better, if you will. We can make smarter choices. We can nurture ourselves and others. We can be of service to our fellows. We can have a new life.

The founders of the Alcholics Anonymous movement referred to themselves and their associates as “recovered alcholics.” They presented a program of 12 simple steps to a new way of life that was designed to deliver alcholics and addicts from their misery, not help them to wallow in it for the rest of what-ever.

If you are in “recovery” today and you’re still miserable – GET OVER IT! Embrace those 12 Seps as the life-preservers they were meant to be.

If you think that moving through life hang-dogged and “handicapped” is part of recovery, I leave you with the wisdom of one Lynne R., who very early in my recovery, made a lasting impression on me.

I was sitting at a table alone at a meeting one night, sulking because I really didn’t want to be there. I wasn’t grateful to be a recovering alcholic, I was pissed! I had my best “don’t you dare come up and talk to me” demeaner eminating from my being. Even so, Lynne, who always looked sharp and had a genuine smile that could warm a glacier, came up to me and said,

“Hey – are you sober?”

Totally offended by her question, I shot back with an ugly retort, “Yeah.”

“Well,” she grinned at me, “Someone forgot to tell you – it’s supposed to be fun!”

I’ll always remember that night. There I was in the midst of laughing, caring people waiting to be my friends, only I was trying to keep this wall of misery around me so no one could get in.

Make sure that you’re not caught up in your own drama. Misery is addicting. Once we get off the drug of our choice – be it substance, behavior, person, whatever – we still have choices about how we think and choose to feel.

Recovery is a choice for freedom from misery. Remember – it’s supposed to be fun! 

-Deborah Adler

©2008 Deborah Adler. All rights reserved.