Minding My Own Business

Focusing on you is so much easier than focusing on me. Pointing out what I think "you" need to do to improve your life is so much easier than asking myself what "I" need to do. Why is that? Keeping track of others shortcomings is second nature for me. I assume it's because I grew up learning how to judge others. I don't remember my parents outwardly judging others but what I do remember is my father expecting me to be "perfect." In order to be "perfect" I must have learned to judge others so that I knew what not to do. It really doesn't matter "why" I judge, the fact is that I do and I want to stop. We are all on a journey and we all come from different backgrounds and have different needs and wants. Loving others and accepting them just as they are is the answer to my judgement. I can recover and I can believe what I want to believe even if you believe something different. My recovery isn't tied to what you think.

I am worthy of love. I am ok. I am on my own journey. I do enough. I am enough. I am not better than you or less than you. We are all the same. Our personalities may be different but inside we are all the same. Love and understanding is all that is required for me to be ok with you (and with me).

I would guess fear is behind my judgement. One acronym for fear is face everything and recover. Keep the focus on myself. I have plenty to focus on, I don't need to focus on you.

Today I will live and let live. I will stand for myself but not against you. I will accept you just the way you are today. I will focus on me and my recovery. All is well. My higher power will show me the way. I just need to ask. Then I relax and do the next right thing. If I make a mistake, I forgive myself and I ask again. I begin again. I choose again. I keep moving forward. If I hurt someone, I make an amend. If someone hurts me, I forgive. I don't take things personally. No one is out to "get" me. It's ok.

Everything is ok.

Special

What is it that makes me think I'm "better" than or "less" than someone else? Why do I think I'm so "special"? My arrogance can be so strong sometimes it's suffocating. I've learned that my arrogance (my ego/disease) is so strong that when I'm in fear or feel threatened it comes out with guns blazing. But here's the thing, I don't feel fear or that I'm being threatened. It's an unconscious feeling for me most of the time. It takes a lot of work for me to pierce the barrier between my arrogance to get to my true feelings. I've been in recovery for a very long time and it's still a struggle to really know what my true feelings are and identify my defects. You see being arrogant isn't loving. It isn't kind. It isn't patient. It isn't accepting. It isn't tolerant. Arrogance is isolating. When I'm being arrogant I'm separating myself from you. Arrogance protects me from getting hurt. Feeling pain, sadness, loneliness, fear, weakness is so difficult that I push those feelings away by whatever means necessary. And arrogance is my shield against any painful feeling. It's also a prison because it keeps me from truly being a part of the world. It prevents me from being myself and getting to know you. It's safe and it's lonely.

Knowing this about myself and knowing that arrogance is a defect isn't enough to stop being arrogant. I don't know when I started using arrogance as a protection. It really doesn't matter. I can blame and "figure" it out but that won't help me stop being arrogant. Recovery, 12 steps, is the answer. It's my solution. And it takes a long time.

I am softening. I am asking my Higher Power for help. I am surrendering. It doesn't happen in a flash some days it doesn't happen at all but I keep working at it and I keep choosing recovery. I keep coming back and practice being kind to myself and forgive myself when I fall back into old patterns of behavior. It is not easy.

It's hard practicing behaviors that feel strange. It's hard to change and not tell everyone about it. It's hard to trust myself that it's ok to change and try new behaviors without letting others know what I'm doing. I don't need your approval. I don't need your "buy in" I don't need you to tell me it's ok to change. I can trust myself.

I can do hard things.

Yo-Yo

Almost 3 1/2 years since my last post. Life is such a journey. I've been in recovery for an eating disorder (what I like to call it today) since April 12, 2015. It's definitely not my first time trying a 12 step program to address my food issues. I've tried before but I decided I didn't need a 12 step program to focus on my food issues I could use any 12 step program, they are all the same, right? Not exactly. Perhaps if I was more spiritually fit I could use any 12 step program to address my specific issue at the time, but I am not there yet. I still need to use "the" 12 step program to combat my "obsession" du jour. I suffer from multiple addictions. Meaning once I recover from one addiction/obsession another one pops up. Some of my addictions/obsessions include alcohol, drugs, nicotine, food, shopping, binge watching TV, reading, sleeping, controlling others, anger, depression, dieting, being healthy, recovery, you name it, I've used it. See my disease/ego/addiction (whatever you want to call it) is cunning baffling and powerful and will fight to the death to win. That tells me that this will be a lifelong journey. The finish line is the coffin, as my sponsor once told me. I am on a spiritual journey and it will last my lifetime if I choose to stay on this particular journey. I don't have to but if I want to be happy, joyous, and free I choose to be in recovery.

I admit I am still ashamed at times that I am in recovery. I'm ashamed because society still doesn't understand addiction and recovery. The majority of society thinks addiction is a bad thing and that addicts are weak and just can't "get their life together". I am so affected by what people "think" of me that I am afraid to let people (not in recovery) know that I am in recovery. And that alone is an oxymoron because recovery is the best thing thats ever happened to me. I wouldn't be where I am today if it weren't for 12 steps. I want nothing more than for everyone to use the 12 steps. The 12 steps are a design for living. It's not easy, in fact it's very hard. If it were easy everyone would be living by the 12 steps and the world would be a much better place.  It's hard not leading an authentic life. It's hard protecting my anonymity. It's hard living around people not in recovery. I feel like a fraud because I am so fearful to be the real me around people not in recovery. Am I protecting myself or am I making excuses? Is my ego still running the show?

Nothing I write here is original (except for my specific life experiences). The beauty of recovery is that we all get to recover at our own pace. We make mistakes and we try again. It's like a yo-yo (term I stole from a meeting). I go in and out of living the 12 steps in my daily life. I'm human and my ego pulls me back into the disease of fear which distracts me from my purpose of living from a place of love. Love is the answer. It's aways the answer. And when I think it's not the answer, I'm living in fear. Does it mean if I live from a place of love that all will be ok? No! It means that living from a place of love I will not add to the problem I will be part of the solution. It means I won't react from my ego/disease but I will act from love. I will be at peace no matter what is going on around me.

A quote I found online states "It's not that some people have a willpower and some don't. It's that some people are ready to change and others are not." This is so hard for me to accept. Why wouldn't someone want to change for the better? Perhaps they do but fear has taken over and they can't break free. Most days I am very grateful that I was ready to change. Other days I'm angry that the "light" was turned on, and I realized there was another way to live and I made the choice to live in recovery. Why am I angry? Because recovery is hard work. It's hard living among people that are still "asleep" still not aware that their is a better way to live. I choose recovery and I want to change and yet I still use bad behaviors and fall back into old patterns. How can I expect others to change overnight if I am slow to change after being in recovery for 18 years?? I'm told I'm to hard on myself that I need to "take it easy" that I need to relax and live one day at a time. I want to I really do. I guess that's the reason why they say "keep coming back" because more will be revealed and this is a journey not a destination. Every day is part of the journey. The journey will never end.

I've been saying for years (even before recovery) that I want to write a book. I want to be famous. I want to make a difference. I want to help others. I want to be in the spot light. I want to be like all these other women (Glennon Doyle, Elizabeth Gilbert, Jen Hatmaker, Sara Beck, Kristen Howerton, and many more)  I've seen come out of no-where and speak their truth. I want to be in the club. But I'm scared. What if I try and I fail? What if I "peek" out and I get hurt? What if I tell the truth and it ends up hurting me and I've bared my soul and now I have to live with everyone knowing the "real" me? What if people don't "like" me anymore? What if it changes your mind about who you think I am? Can I risk some of you not accepting me?

I don't know if I can risk it?

P.S. Is it the "real authentic" me that wants to step out into the world or is it my ego playing games?