I attended an AA meeting a few weeks ago where I heard a man ask during his share when his guilt and shame would go away in sobriety. He had already completed the 5th step where one shares their 4th Step inventory with another and was frustrated with these uncomfortable feelings he still felt inside. While I do believe the answer to his question will vary for every individual in recovery, those uncomfortable feelings never left me until I stopped taking my will back and engaging in toxic behaviors.
By the time I completed my first fifth step, I too still felt a lot of guilt and shame in my life. At the time, I never attributed it to the notion that maybe I was still living in a lot of self-will run riot. In fact my life was riddled then with toxicity and anyone could see it in the friends I was hanging out with, the negativity I demonstrated daily, the gossip I participated in frequently, and the various substitute addictions I kept succumbing to. Many of my actions back then were unhealthy and some were even immoral, yet I kept doing them. So although I might have been clean and sober from alcohol and drugs at that point in time for over 13 years, my disease continued to maintain a very strong hold over me. When it comes right down to it, I didn’t give the majority of my will and life over to a Higher Power until several years later. And because of it, I truly suffered with guilt and shame, as well as many other painful emotions for far longer than I needed to. It took me having to experience a lot more discomfort and anguish for me to wake up and realize this. Thankfully, I eventually did.
Today, I’m doing everything I can to give 100% of my will and life over to my Higher Power and I’m also not engaging in any of those toxic behaviors any longer. The result of that has been a life free from feeling that guilt and shame. But that’s only because I’m not doing any of those things that once caused me to feel those terrible feelings in the first place.
The fact of the matter is this. Sobriety is so much more than just removing the substance of an addiction from our lives. It involves a complete transformation of the mind, body, and soul and it takes the removal of one’s self-will to get there. So the only answer I believe I can offer that man from the AA meeting a few weeks is that he works on turning more and more of his will over to the care of his Higher Power every single day. I know in doing so, that he will begin to find himself living less and less in any of those toxic behaviors, as they really do nothing more for a person than cause that guilt and shame, and any of the other uncomfortable feelings that may arise in recovery.
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson