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| Part 1 |
I'd like to think my parents did the best they could with raising me, yet somehow I still feel as if I was raised by a pack of wolves. Left to fend for myself, I did what I was taught. Year after year of continuing to to trod down the same beaten and worn down path.
I belive I was dying when I got to the rooms of AA. I was spiritually dead. Emotionally and psychologically I was incapable of having a relationship with myself or anyone else for that matter. And physically I was just plain either going to drink myself to death or kill myself because the alcohol wasn't working fast enough. I have written about getting clean and sober some years ago and while I believe I did the best I could, with the tools that were taught and shared with me generously by the AA community, deep down inside, I still was never enough. I was never good enough, lovable enough, worthy enough. The rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous however gave me the foundation I needed to do the continuing work. And that is where I dance today. I dared to take the first step into the darkness of the unknown a couple of weekends ago, and I do believe with all of my being that the foundation I had help in creating with my tribe, has been the something solid I have been standing on. And now it is time to be taught how to fly.
First I had to become aware. There is something like a poison deep, deep inside of me. A disease of sorts. I heard many years ago, that disease, could simply be broken down into dis/ease. The dis ease of being in my body. Why I am not physically dead sometimes boggles my mind. Maybe it is the sheer need to first survive this shit, then grow and share with other's the sometimes painful transformation of ego centered self to that of living and loving from a place of Divine Source. From within there we find redemption and finally transcendence. And the redemption I speak of here is not for the transgressors of the trauma inflicted on me, rather the lack of forgiveness for myself.For while unspeakable acts happened, I heaped piles of unspeakable trauma first on myself and then those all around me. My sponsor always use to say to me, they may have won the battle, but why are you still letting them win the war? Because I knew no better? Bullshit! I knew I was taking hostages, and shredding people with the shrapnel from my explosive anger. And there was a part of me that liked it. I was talking to a friend this weekend when I admitted that. How can we say we don't like it? It's powerful to be justifiably angry. Yet I was so blinded by the powerful surges of what I thought was control that I couldn't see that my lack of control, was far more damaging not only to me, but to the people I love the most. And underneath it was grief and this unimaginable sadness and it was consuming me and killing me. Slowly and painfully. I believe unresolved anger, sadness and un-forgiveness just stays in the body, and eventually it will manifest itself in one form or another. Cancer, heart disease (does the term broken hearted mean anything to you)or any disease. This shit has to come out somehow. A group of brave, courageous people I get to work with, call this archaic work. And I have always known about it, yet I never wanted to commit to doing this intensive of work. I have tried other forms of therapy, and it continued to propel me along this path. I do some work, and when the work got painful and to difficult to walk through, I would just walked away. Maybe it was self-preservation. Maybe it was all that I could do, with what I had in that moment. I do know with all of my heart, I could have not done this level of work when I first got sober. I think it would have killed me. But now...
Now I consciously choose to do this tango with death. Maybe somedays it will be like a waltz and others a samba or a rumba. Either way, for the first time I am truly ready for this next step. To finally hold myself responsible and accountable for this incredibly beautiful and blessed life I have. And then to share that with all those around me. We all have an incredible capacity to love and transcend from our unspeakable past. To step from the edge of light into the unknown darkness and back into the light. May love and compassion light my way.
Namaste
I belive I was dying when I got to the rooms of AA. I was spiritually dead. Emotionally and psychologically I was incapable of having a relationship with myself or anyone else for that matter. And physically I was just plain either going to drink myself to death or kill myself because the alcohol wasn't working fast enough. I have written about getting clean and sober some years ago and while I believe I did the best I could, with the tools that were taught and shared with me generously by the AA community, deep down inside, I still was never enough. I was never good enough, lovable enough, worthy enough. The rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous however gave me the foundation I needed to do the continuing work. And that is where I dance today. I dared to take the first step into the darkness of the unknown a couple of weekends ago, and I do believe with all of my being that the foundation I had help in creating with my tribe, has been the something solid I have been standing on. And now it is time to be taught how to fly.
First I had to become aware. There is something like a poison deep, deep inside of me. A disease of sorts. I heard many years ago, that disease, could simply be broken down into dis/ease. The dis ease of being in my body. Why I am not physically dead sometimes boggles my mind. Maybe it is the sheer need to first survive this shit, then grow and share with other's the sometimes painful transformation of ego centered self to that of living and loving from a place of Divine Source. From within there we find redemption and finally transcendence. And the redemption I speak of here is not for the transgressors of the trauma inflicted on me, rather the lack of forgiveness for myself.For while unspeakable acts happened, I heaped piles of unspeakable trauma first on myself and then those all around me. My sponsor always use to say to me, they may have won the battle, but why are you still letting them win the war? Because I knew no better? Bullshit! I knew I was taking hostages, and shredding people with the shrapnel from my explosive anger. And there was a part of me that liked it. I was talking to a friend this weekend when I admitted that. How can we say we don't like it? It's powerful to be justifiably angry. Yet I was so blinded by the powerful surges of what I thought was control that I couldn't see that my lack of control, was far more damaging not only to me, but to the people I love the most. And underneath it was grief and this unimaginable sadness and it was consuming me and killing me. Slowly and painfully. I believe unresolved anger, sadness and un-forgiveness just stays in the body, and eventually it will manifest itself in one form or another. Cancer, heart disease (does the term broken hearted mean anything to you)or any disease. This shit has to come out somehow. A group of brave, courageous people I get to work with, call this archaic work. And I have always known about it, yet I never wanted to commit to doing this intensive of work. I have tried other forms of therapy, and it continued to propel me along this path. I do some work, and when the work got painful and to difficult to walk through, I would just walked away. Maybe it was self-preservation. Maybe it was all that I could do, with what I had in that moment. I do know with all of my heart, I could have not done this level of work when I first got sober. I think it would have killed me. But now...
Now I consciously choose to do this tango with death. Maybe somedays it will be like a waltz and others a samba or a rumba. Either way, for the first time I am truly ready for this next step. To finally hold myself responsible and accountable for this incredibly beautiful and blessed life I have. And then to share that with all those around me. We all have an incredible capacity to love and transcend from our unspeakable past. To step from the edge of light into the unknown darkness and back into the light. May love and compassion light my way.
Namaste
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