Mapping Meaningful Connection

inspired by the book - 'Aºtlas of The Heart' by Brené Brown

"You can't scare me, my life's based on Fear."

from my Gifts of Imperfection Art Journal

1990

FIVE YEARS SOBER

Dear Me,
How are you doing today?

{No answer.}

The older sponsor looked at the young woman seated across from her and asked,

"So what are you afraid of? What is your greatest fear?"

I replied, "Life."

The wizened elder raised her penciled eyebrows into arches, pursed her magenta colored lips, shifted in her chair, and replied,

"Can we break it [life] down a bit - maybe into bite size pieces?"

Pinterest

Step One. "We admitted that we were powerless over alcohol and our lives had become unmanageable."

No matter how long one has been sober, getting a new sponsor means working the 12 steps {again}. So starting at the beginning, Step One: "We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable."

Five years prior, my first sponsor asked whether I had taken the first three steps. I let her know that I had taken all twelve. She was quite surprised but asked me how that had gone. I told her I had taken them all in one night. She asked me to elaborate. I told her I had read each one carefully, and I agreed with each step.

I soon found out that reading and agreeing is part of working the steps, but not taking the steps.

And, with my first sponsor we actually started at the Preamble {where the only requirement for membership is the desire to stop drinking}. I didn't want to stop drinking. I was in what is called No Man's Land: where one is not stopping drinking but is desiring of sobriety. It's a terrible place to be.

So I began to pray for the desire to be sober.

Step Two. "Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity."

Restored? I could not recall being sane.

Being born an alcoholic, I had whiskey in my baby bottle for long church services, for car rides, and for anytime I was 'fussy'. The family bar was open almost every evening and little samples of the night's concoction were shared liberally. Like clockwork, the family meal on Friday evening included red wine. Toothaches, body pains, headaches - any illness was remedied with alcohol or an alcoholic drink.

Step Two was not relatable for me.

My sponsor had me focus instead on the 'Coming to believe' part because I had a big problem with God. This step I took on my sponsor’s say-so. It would just have to work out in me.

My first ‘Power greater than myself’ was the big oak tree right outside the meeting room door. It was bigger than me. It was at the meeting.

The most important thing that happened to me in early sobriety was hearing the stories. I was told that one day I would hear my story told. So I listened attentively. We are the center of our universe after all. And I continued to listen.

I heard the insanity of alcoholism. I heard the stories. I heard the person tell about taking a drink when everything in a person's body said, "No! I will not take another drink today." And they would end up taking a drink against their own willpower.

Willpower has nothing to do with not drinking. A true alcoholic drinks against their own willpower, taking a drink despite their willpower to not drink. This is the nature of alcoholism: a compulsion of the mind + a physical allergy + and a spiritual disorder.

Speaker Meeting. The woman speaker told her story of crawling like an animal from the front of her trailer to the back, searching desperately for another bottle she had hid, too drunk to stand upright. Finding that drink was the center of her existence.

And this I could relate to. The insanity of my own behavior. Not only was I an alcoholic, but I suffered from eating disorders that morphed back and forth. I would go on eating binges then purge then starve.

A college student, a music performer, and carrying a dark, hidden secret.

Step Three. "Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him."

My first sponsor and my second sponsor had me kneel with them and say my Third Step Prayer aloud. It was a public testimony and witness of my surrender of my will, a turning of my will over to the care of God, and seeking His Will for my life on a daily basis.

The Third Step is the foundational step of the twelve step program. Get this step right and progress is amazing, rewarding, and can be described as ‘getting rocketed into the fourth dimension.’ I wanted that.

This is a surrender to win program of recovery.

the compass co. on Etsy

I'm out with lanterns looking for myself.

~ Emily Dickenson

Set your Destination.

One step of a journey taken consistently will guarantee arrival at a destination.

Set your Speed.

The enjoyment of the journey is in the progress not the perfection.

Set your Rhythm.

The ebb and flow of the journey is the tide that lifts and moves.

Set your Balance.

The constellation mapping of the journey is light and dark.

Mapping Meaningful Connections

The DSRB {Destination, Speed, Rhythm, Balance} is adapted from learning to ride Dressage - Doing Something Really Beautiful.

The journey of recovery is like a mapping route of a beautiful constellation of stars. The intertwining of lives which otherwise would never have met. The sharing of stories to add brightness and light illuminating the lives of the listeners as well as the storytellers. An encircling of this vast universe with the oneness of God by aligning ourselves with gratitude, His grace, and His great love.

This is what long-term recovery looks like for me.

THE PRESENT

Dear Me,
How are you doing today?

"No complaints whatsoever."

God bless those who are sober and may God bless those who are destined to become sober.

G.S.