Comments on: If You Lived Here You’d Be Home Now

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 17:35:09 +0000

it’s definitely not serenity. it’s definitely a backward slide. i’ve decided to start from scratch with a new sponsor.

thanks though. i appreciate the encouragement and the ‘glass half-full’ perspective.

love you.

By: warrior scout

warrior scout — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 14:10:18 +0000

hey chris- i’ve found out that it’s okay to do things that i’m not feeling totally good about. after all, for years, i kept getting loaded even though i didn’t want to. i go to work sometimes when i feel like playing hooky. i eat sometimes when i really don’t feel hungry, because i know i need the nourishment.

the book does specifically call for service work in times just like this. the concern for the echoes in our heads goes away when we are focused on the service to another.

and what if this “not feeling it” thing is actually serenity? or a part of it? what if there is no drama and we need to make some up?

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 06:40:23 +0000

I love the new sign, Marc. I think the difference in our perspective is largely semantic. I recognize that the “becoming” is before the “become” and that one’s becoming involves practice. Practicing, however, involves conscious effort. (”many times I haven’t felt the brotherly love, but that did not stop me from acting lovingly to my brother” and “fake it till you make it” -both functions of “becoming” rather than “being”)

I really appreciate your input though. And I wholly agree that “God is in the journey”, or the path.

There is actually much more to what is going on than I’ve shared here, some of which I only put together tonight and which I’ll undoubtedly unload on you poor souls, but the self bashing is driven out of something actually being wrong and my not “do[ing] what we do”.

Thanks to all of you for your support.

By: Marc

Marc — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 01:53:52 +0000

The signs now reads: “If you lived here, you’d be homeless.” No kidding, it’s an add for an advocacy organization.

By: Marc

Marc — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 01:51:44 +0000

“I cannot practice principles before I am principled. I cannot exercise faith before I become faithful. I cannot demonstrate brotherly love before I love my brother. I cannot have courage before I become courageous.” I have to disagree. Whatever happened to “fake it till you make it,” and “You can’t think your way into right acting, you have to act your way into right thinking?” I know many times I haven’t felt the brotherly love, but that did not stop me from acting lovingly to my brother, and I often pray with my fundamental agnosticism intact. That, for me, is what makes faith so powerful, that I practice it within and accompanied by all my doubts.
I think the Buddha quote speaks to the idea that the path is what you do, not what you think; God is in the journey, not the destination. It sounds to me as you’re doing a little self-bashing because you think you should be “feeling it” as well as “doing it.” This alignment ebbs and flows, you’re allowed to be a doubting, judgy bitch on the inside all you want. That too shall pass.

By: BoyGrowsUp

BoyGrowsUp — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 00:01:30 +0000

“I’m coming to understand that, at least in recovery, I cannot practice principles before I am principled.”

The spiritual “waking up” I’ve experienced the past few months has driven home exactly this point. The main realization I have had goes something like this:

“If you in the very slightest have required the world to possess the virtue you seek before you feel compelled to possess it as well, then you never will possess it.”

Which is another way of saying that there is no substitute for doing the hard work regardless of whether a single other person in the universe is doing it as well.

By: ginnie

ginnie — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 23:49:20 +0000

Yes, I get discouraged when the meetings turn into religious rantings. But I remember that the meetings have saved me too. There was a time when I thought I would never be able to live in the “real” world but that has passed and I can thank AA for bringing me back to that point. I try to keep my program real simple and keep a sense of humor.

By: bobbie

bobbie — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 21:04:06 +0000

well said, thank you.