Month: March 2013

The Highs and Lows of Recovery

One of the hardest things in recovery is the realization that there isn’t some magic pill that can be taken to make all the pain go away. Whatever form of 12 step recovery one might pursue, the journey is going to be filled with both highs and lows until God has become the center point of their everyday living

When I first walked into AA in 1995, my attitude was such that I thought I just needed to attend meetings. I saw all the people with smiles on their faces and I heard messages about how great people’s lives were. For some reason, I tuned out the middle parts of the stories that I heard. I didn’t hear about the long, arduous road of clearing the muck out from within. I didn’t hear about the journey of reducing the ego and removing self-centeredness. I didn’t comprehend that I needed to seek God’s will and remove self-will. My feeling was that if I just showed up I was doing enough.

Boy was I wrong.

I didn’t last long in AA. I decided it was too stressful and tried to find an easier, softer way that wasn’t going to be with the twelve step process. So instead of twelve steps, I went twelve years searching for something else. While there are a lot of things out there that can guide one closer to God, like the twelve steps are geared for, each of them takes constant vigilance. I wasn’t willing to do that with any of them. My ego, selfishness, fear and deeply imbedded pain had me running from one thing to the next, getting some benefit here and there but never scratching the surface of what ultimately was going on inside of me and driving me to believe there was some magic pill out there.

In September of 2007, I had gone through enough pain.  I decided to give in and begin my journey in AA with 12 years sober and no real recovery. I started to attend as many meetings as I could weekly. I got a sponsor. And I began to read a 3rd edition Alcoholics Anonymous book that I still had from my very first attempt with AA in 1995. Weekly I met with my sponsor delving through page after page after page in the AA book. The first year of my work in AA was extremely difficult. I’m not sure if it was because my ego continued to fight the process and act out in other addictions or if there was just so much pain I was having to face as I walked through the steps. Either way, what I discovered was that there really are a lot of highs and lows in recovery until God became my focal point with everything in it.

When I’m acting out in any addiction such as alcohol, drugs, gambling or sex, what I’m seeking is to stay in the highs and avoid the lows. The highs can be great but the lows are awful. I lived in a life where I sought out addictions on some level for over 22 years and my brain has tried to continue to convince me that it’s possible to avoid the lows altogether.

News flash. It’s not.

It’s only possible to numb the lows with more addictions.

Entering a twelve step program made me face this reality head on. Over past five years I’ve gained a better understanding that life has it’s ups and downs but they don’t have to be as extreme as they once were when I was an active addict. I’ve learned that true recovery and healing means walking through the pain as bad as it may seem, facing all inner demons, and emerging into the light on the other side. Recovery is not about avoiding or walking around pain.

The more that I have placed God at the center of my life and my recovery, the more that those highs and lows have balanced themselves out. I compare it a lot to a ride on a roller coaster. On most roller coasters, the first part of the ride are huge hills and huge dips but as the end of the ride nears, the hills become smaller and smaller and eventually become level. This is how my recovery seems to becoming today. I don’t find myself getting extremely elated and then crashing shortly thereafter. I don’t find myself seeking out quick fixes to make myself feel better anymore. When pain arises, as it still does, I seek out healthy support in AA, consult with my spiritual advisor/sponsor, and I try my best to go to God in prayer and meditation to get through it.

To walk in a door of a twelve step recovery meeting and hope that everything painful will magically disappear is an illusion. To continue to live in that illusion will lead a person away from an amazing path to a God centered life. To lead a person away from that amazing path to a God centered life will ultimately guide one back to addiction seeking, more highs and lows, and a whole heck of a lot more pain.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

Cell Phone 12th Step Recovery?

My previous blog entry discussed my evening at a restaurant with friends that spent their time on a cell phone rather than engaging in communication with the others present at the table. It went on to discuss some of the negative things happening in society that I believe are a direct correlation to how communication is changing with all the advances in technology. This entry focuses more specifically on the use of cell phones during recovery meetings as that too has become a larger problem today.

I think it’s a pretty safe bet to say that every 12th step recovery meeting I’ve attended these days gives a reminder to shut off or place in silent mode any cell phones present before the meeting actually begins. It never fails though, there always seems to be at least one phone, if not more, that goes off in the meeting. But an even more disturbing trend lately is the amount of people that spend their time during meetings texting or surfing the internet.

The first and most important thing I’ve learned today with my own recovery and God centered life is to admit my own guiltiness of this. For many years, I came to recovery meetings for the social aspect. I wasn’t interested in doing the steps. I wasn’t interested is listening to the speakers. And I definitely wasn’t interested in doing God’s will. As the pain got greater in my life, so did my willingness to do what was necessary to focus more on my recovery, on finding God, and on removing my self-centeredness.

For a time there was a great tug-of-war game going on between God and me. I kept trying to do my recovery in my own way. And there were many times that as the cell phones advanced into the smart phone generation, I would spend the meetings surfing the web, texting people, or randomly flipping through my digital photo albums. Meanwhile, in my self-centeredness, I never realized what this might look like or feel like to those who were speaking at the meetings I attended.

Imagine for a moment being at a podium, any podium, in any meeting, recovery related or not. Then imagine speaking in front of a group of people at that podium about something very personal to you. Finally, imagine during those moments of speaking, upon looking out at the audience, that the majority are looking down at their phones busily tapping away on the screens and not listening to you. How does it feel? I can answer it because I’ve been on that side of the coin as well.

It doesn’t feel that great. In fact it feels like what I’m saying doesn’t really matter.

To speak publicly about something so personal to me, such as my journey of recovery and seeking God is hard enough. But to have most people not even pay attention and instead spend the meeting time on their cell phones is even harder. I compare it to the feeling I had as a child when I would bring something important to my parents and they were either too busy watching one of their shows, drinking alcohol, or caught up in one of their own dramas.

Meetings are supposed to be for either speaking about one’s experience, strength, and hope, or listening to someone offer the same. Many years ago, when cell phone technology didn’t exist, people sat through meetings with their cups of coffee and listened much more intently on what was being said. Regardless of whether a speaker is truly charismatic or not, isn’t it important to give them our fullest attention? Wouldn’t each of us want the same if our feet were planted in front of the podium telling our story?

I know the answer for me is yes and I have made the corrections necessary in my life to start showing more respect for all speakers. I think back to the time when Bill and Bob attended meetings and have wondered what they might feel like today if they were to attend a meeting and see the vast majority of people tapping away on cell phones instead of listening to the speaker. The most important thing that has helped me to change my meeting etiquette is to place myself in every speaker’s shoes, to remember my own journey to recovery and salvation, and to know that their testimony is equally important to listen to as to when I’m speaking about mine.

The more that I place God at the center of my life, the more that I find myself steering clear of my self-centered behaviors. The more that I find myself steering clear of my self-centered behaviors, the more I see that using a cell phone during a meeting is self-centered in the first place. The more that I see that using a cell phone during a meeting is self-centered in the first place, the more that I have turned it off or left it in the car before entering any meeting. The more that I have turned my cell phone off or left it in the car before entering meetings, the more that I have gotten out of meetings. The more that I have gotten out of meetings, the more that I have placed God even deeper at the center of my life.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

A Dinner With Cell Phones

A few nights ago I met up with a group of people at a local Bertucci’s to have a good meal as a send-off for a few friends heading on a retreat for the weekend. Being that I normally spend much of my time alone, I looked forward to the interaction with some people I haven’t hung out with in quite awhile. For the hour the meal lasted, instead of catching up with those that I dined with, I got to know better Apple, Samsung, and Nokia. For the majority of the meal, most everyone was either texting, playing Words With Friends, or looking something up on the Internet. When I left, I felt considerably sad that society is beginning to accept these behaviors as a normal way of living. I have begun to wonder how many others are noticing this happening. It seems as if all our technology advances are having a direct correlation to a progression of human interaction going from the very personal to the very impersonal.

In a time period many years before I was ever born, when even the home telephone didn’t exist, people would meet and carry on conversations, build deeper friendships, establish spiritual relationships, and strengthen family bonds. Block parties, family reunions, local festivals, game nights, social clubs and more were all quite prevalent then. But that would soon change. First the home telephone would become commonplace and then eventually, during my generation, Generation X as it was nicknamed, the world would give rise to pagers, then cell phones, and eventually the internet. Although each of these have been great hi-tech developments, they appear to be leading humanity to enjoy spending more time texting, instant messaging, and being on the internet then in developing interpersonal skills. In the last few years, I have intently observed this deterioration of human communication and noticed some disturbing trends.

There are those that continue to try to have romantic relationships using only the Internet and cell phones, many of which profess their undying love before even their first meet and greet. Sending instant messages to each other and trading pics are all great ways to begin a relationship with someone. But what about the things you generally won’t learn about using those modes? There are many online who are not who they say they are. From bad habits, to age inconsistencies, to likes and dislikes, to looks and appearances, it’s sad to say that all too often the whole truth is not revealed. Some even fail to mention they are already married, dating someone else, are former criminals, or suffering from serious health conditions. There are even those too that lie about their gender.

Then there’s text messaging. Is anyone noticing how this seems to be rapidly becoming the preferred method of interaction between people. Some teenagers I know text close to several thousand messages to each other monthly. Don’t get me wrong; typing a sentence on a phone to let someone else know a very quick thing, such as the time and location to meet, can be handy. But on the other hand, it can appear rather unfriendly and rude when one calls another to say hello and carry on a conversation and the response comes back in the form of text or a quick e-mail.

Also unsettling is the effect that both online instant messaging and cell phone text messaging are having on the English language. The use of abbreviations are becoming quite commonplace now because of these modes of exchange. “NYOB, TTYL, LOL, H2CUS, IDK, etc.” are just a few examples of the hundreds that now exist. Sadly, these are now finding their way into school papers, letters, and e-mails and many people like myself don’t even know what most of them stand for.

At first glance, these points might not seem to be that big of a deal. That viewpoint might change though when one considers the subsequent questions that I believe are directly related to this path our communications are heading on.

Why are the number of cases of depression increasing each year? Why is the rate of suicide on the rise every year? Why is it that someone is going on a killing spree and massacring dozens in just a matter of moments weekly these days? Why are anonymous sex and promiscuity increasing at alarming rates? What explains the reason why alcohol and drug abuse are becoming so widespread? Can anyone really explain why the rate of divorce has become so staggering? These are just some of the questions I continue to ask myself and all of them are leading to a domino effect on life, as we know it. All of the following are reportedly now also on the rise too: child neglect and abuse, mass hysteria and fear, AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases, crimes and violence, gangs, etc. Can anything really be done to stop this downward spiral? What I’m really posing here is the question of whether it’s really possible that all of these trends are directly related on some level to texting, instant messaging, and the internet?

There are so many people feeling neglected and unloved these days. In the many years that I felt that way, I sought out alcohol, drugs, gambling, sex, and local gangs to deal with the emptiness. I had many online romances that never materialized. I entered and left many intimate relationships. I even attempted suicide. The more I stared at pixels on a computer screen or at words on a phone during all those years, the less I was able to experience that which drew me closer to others and the less that God was able to create the love that bonded me to any of God’s children. In the past few years, I’ve removed the texting plan from my phone, pulled myself off of internet chat sites, and made it a point to leave the phone in my pocket when I’m out being social with others. The result has been that I’m a lot less depressed. I feel more connected to who and what God wants me to connect to. And I’m not living with toxic addictions or friendships anymore.

All of us face loneliness on some level, but maybe some of it can be prevented? While each of these technological advances in computers, the Internet, cell phones, and more are useful in their own ways, they were never meant to replace direct human interaction and communication like they seem to be doing. So the next time someone calls on the phone, answer it and say hello instead of texting in response. The next time there’s a social engagement with others, keep the cell phone silent and put away. Make it a point to spend quality time in person with those that texting has been the only means of communication.

Maybe then when enough are making these changes, it might just begin to reverse some of the problems that seem to be increasing everywhere in society today.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson