Originally published November 10, 2011 I will sometimes, maybe even often, not do something because the idea that I will do it less than perfectly paralyzes me. I’m way better now at allowing myself to make mistakes than I ever have been before. Really, you don’t make the kind of catastrophic mistakes that we serious […]
Author Archives: Chris M.
West of Yesterday, East of Eden
Reprinted from December 13, 2007 “It’s hard to find a lot of “What about me?” in Julie Harris. You can pay her a compliment and she’ll accept it graciously. She just doesn’t seem very interested in [discussing her accomplishments] it. It was the doing that mattered, the striving, the stretching. And the friendships.” – Chip […]
With All Our Might
Our human resources, as marshalled by the will, were not sufficient; they failed utterly. -Alcoholics Anonymous, page 45 For the last 7 months, I have been employed as the Director (of operations – an important distinction) of a recovery community center. When I came to the center it was on life support, though other people […]
and another one gone, and another one gone . . .
I’m sure I’ve said this before, probably in the first incarnation of this record of my journey in recovery, that if you spend any significant part of your life in the company of people who are trying to recover, you see a lot of people die. Addicts, as a class of people (and I’m really […]
Vision and Desire
I started to write this after the new year and never got very far except in my head. You know how life can be. And I started to write it because of the very thing that eventually got in the way of my opportunity to spend time writing. I made a resolution to write every […]
The Chrysalis
“What do you think happens inside a chrysalis?” That’s the question that is at the center of the 3rd story in the “Black Box” (minute 53) episode of Radiolab on my local NPR station today. It’s gruesome. If you open up a 3 day old chrysalis you find nothing resembling either a caterpillar or a […]
Enjoy the Ride
Reprinted from February 29, 2008 I love this picture. I love it on several different levels. It just this second occurred to me, for example, that I’ve never seen any Benedictines on a roller coaster. There isn’t much “ora et labora” in an amusement park. ‘Letting go’ is a concept that Buddhists ‘get’ immediately, viewing attachment as the source […]
The Transitory & The Universal
It’s been a long time since I wrote. Even longer since I wrote honestly and meaningfully. In the early days of this online journal I wrote because I was isolated. I wrote because I was lonely. I wrote because when I first started exploring the idea that permanent recovery might be possible there were no […]
New Socks and Underwear
Reprinted from November 30, 2008 Few other things make me feel as secure and contented as new socks and underwear. Although I’ve had a few new socks and a couple of pair of boxers a couple of times since I got sober, there were none in the 2 years before and no new t-shirts at all. Yesterday I threw […]
The Return of Light
There is a kind of darkness that can descend in the throes of active addiction, inky and thick, that obscures the hope of recovery. I could see it closing in on me. I really should have been pointing myself to inpatient treatment; I was that far gone. I had made some pitiable efforts to reengage […]