SUNDAY GRATITUDE EXTRAVAGANZA: DESIGNING YOUR HIGHER POWER
| Designing a Higher Power| The Sober Library: Field Sobriety Guide No. 01 | From the TFLMS Archives: "The Things That Are Supposed to Happen..." | Much, Much More |
I’m grateful for long walks in the park. I’m grateful for a beautiful day. I’m grateful for challenges. I’m grateful that fear gets replaced by faith. I’m grateful to be sober today.
Ummmmmm, did everybody know that Thanksgiving was next week? Someone we know is a bit behind the 8-ball, and actually has an influx of family arriving, which means that actual preparations are involved. My late-night physics classes at YouTube University have revealed that time is indeed moving faster these days (as I suspected). Apparently, the Supermassive black hole at the center of our universe (Saggitarius A) is spinning at close to it’s maximum speed, which is highly unusual for a black hole of this size. This, in turn, is causing pretty huge waves of gravity to roll through the galaxy and distorting space-time in the process.. Of course, this being our first pass at things, no one has any idea what this actually means or what to expect.
And that is roughly the same spot one occupies as a newly-minted recovering alcoholic maybe thinking that Steps One AND Two might be in the rear view mirror. Before we move the wagons to Step Three, where the project will actually be building a Higher Power (it would be cool to use papier mache, but we probably won’t) of our own understanding. One thing I grow very tired of is hearing people complain about Gods they can’t believe in. The whole “God of your understanding” thing, is, in my view, a sop thrown to us over-egoed alcoholics. I think one of the symptoms of the disease is the need to control the world around us, so that it fits with the crazy thoughts being spun out by alcoholic brains.
That is to say, alcoholics and addicts are capable of believing really crazy shit, it just has to be their idea.
So, worry not, thou shalt not be compelled to adopt anyone else’s stupid, offensive and illogical conception of a Higher Power. You get to do it yourself. Before we launch into the DIY project that maybe is the Third Step, it might be worth reviewing the first two steps, because I think there are some design specs hidden in there that need to be called out now. I think from a review of Steps One and Two, the Higher Power that we will shortly be deciding to turn our will and life over to, needs to have a few capabilities:
Must be a Higher Power. This means the Power has to actually be greater than myself. This means admitting that I am logically not capable of controlling this Power—no matter what I try.
Must have sanity-restoring powers. I can’t control my drinking and my life, as a consequence, had become quite unmanageable, insane, even. Since I can’t control my drinking, I’m going to need help with this.
Must be capable of communication. A number of the later steps involve efforts to establish communications with this Higher Power, so get ready to learn doorknob-ese, if that’s your thing.
Here’s where it makes sense to me to stop and take a slightly broader view for a moment. We drank or used because there was a problem with our lives. A problem that we thought could be resolved or somehow made better by drinking. The drinking, for sure, is part of that problem and exacerbated that problem greatly. But the drinking was not the cause of the problem. This is why the inventory steps are coming, because once we establish this relationship with the Higher Power, we’re going to have to get help with everything that’s connected to the drinking and the using.
Maybe some mini-inventories and writing prompts might help scope out further specs and requirements for the Design-Your-Higher-Power Project. Here’s a good one:
Write as much as you can remember about the very first drink. Do you remember how it made you feel? What did you do after you drank?
I might have had some sips of beer here and there, but I got drunk for the first time at Deak Rummelhart’s house in the 10th grade. We drank Everclear with Kool-Aid mix, we called it “Pink Jesus Punch,” and it did. Deak had a trampoline in his backyard and I can remember bouncing crazily, thinking I might actually be able to fly, that’s how free I felt. Even after Deak completely missed the trampoline with an attempted flip and landed face down on the ground and we thought he might be dead for a second, I kept going. I mostly felt free.
That’s not about glorifying drinking, that’s a clue to what drove the drinking. So pay attention to your answer. Here’s another exercise, it can be thought or written, but written is always better. If you’re like me, drinking might not have been the only thing I thought was a problem in my life. This is different than the 4th and 5th Step inventories, this is a chance to be whiny and complain if you want to,
Make a list of the things that are “wrong” in your life or that you’d like to change or improve. There is no wrong answer here and no will judge you (too much) for your answers. Do not censor yourself. If you could change people, places, things, including yourself, what would you fix and why?
A bit of a spoiler alert, at some point in the future, it’s possible that one will look at this list and perhaps see a list of symptoms and outlooks that kind of made things worse. These might possibly be seen in the future as resentment factories, but it’s good to get them out there now.
It might be fair to describe the process that comes next in Step Three as a bit of an engineering problem. What are we trying to fix and how are we going to do it?The last couple of prompts are designed to flesh that out a bit. What’s really wrong with life? Even if drinking is the thing that is ruining literally everything, it’s not the only thing that has to be fixed or resolved.
A Higher Power that just stops the drinking or the snorting is not going to be enough.
I personally prefer the Higher Powers that aren’t useless or weak, so mine actually has the ability to help me improve all sorts of things about my life, not just avoiding barstools and Sauvignon Blanc. So, making lists of the things that need to be fixed, the insanities that must be cured, is pretty important. Step Three is partly an exercise in coming to understand and trust the powers of our Higher Power. It’s not too early to start listing out the powers you think your Higher Power might need or the characteristics they might possess. If you’d like this to be a little like the old “Mystery Date” thing and dream up who you hope will be ringing the doorbell, that’s certainly cool.
Write about your conception of a Higher Power? What do you already understand? What would you like to know? What can your Higher Power do for you? What will your Higher Power expect of you?
For me, it was writing things like this, or working with my Sponsees on work like this, that set me free. Reading the Big Book, working the Steps, not just talking about them, that’s what finally helped me get and stay sober.
Another thing that helps me stay sober is knowing that none of the Steps are ever in the rear view mirror. Maybe it’s the former professional cross-examiner in me, but I think establishing a framework of questions that I ask myself, on a near-constant basis, is how I establish and maintain connection with my Higher Power. I think those questions that came from the Steps, the ones I need to ask myself regularly and answer truthfully, are what keeps me sober.
People get themselves all bunched up over the recovering vs. recovered thing. Yes, the old ‘we’re only granted a one-day reprieve thing.” Like a lot of what gets said at AA meetings, I think it puts too much focus on the negative. That “one day reprieve” thing felt to me like I was walking on a ledge between windows, trying not to look down, definitely terrified of falling and it’s really windy. If I don’t do exactly what I’m being told, I will fall of this ledge right now and die. Every single day. I’m sorry, that’s pretty much exactly the storyline that drove me to drink.
I think reframing is the central skill of sobriety, and I’d like to reframe that idea. As long as I’m incorporating the principles of the Program in my life to the best of my ability, as long as I’m asking myself those questions and trying to give truthful answers, well, that’s going to be enough. When I wake up, drink my coffee and write my very non-dangerous gratitude list, well, it doesn’t feel at all like I’m teetering on a precipice. There’s no drama, no yelling “hang on” as we prepare for a sober crash landing. It’s just a moment and a place where I’ve come to expect to find my Higher Power waiting.
I think that’s the actual objective of the First and Second Steps, learning where to find your Higher Power. There’s not just one path or one location, so your journey there has to be your own. You’ll be encountering a God of your own understanding, so there’s only so much other people can or should be telling you about this God or where he/she/it hangs out.
The last thing on this topic: This is where imagination and inspiration and other witchy, beautiful things are going to start happening. My struggles getting sober were connected to not being able to imagine a life that I could actually live without drinking. Here’s the last writing prompt for today:
Write about a life beyond imagination, beyond your wildest dreams. That’s what the Big Book promise: A life of freedom and ease and peace that we alcoholics have a hard time believing can actually exist. So this would be the time to start building out that imagination/inspiration muscle, it’s pretty critical to sobriety. Be expansive, be bold, think about what it would feel like to be free.
For me, writing these things, sharing them, thinking some more about them and then writing them again, is what got me sober. It’s also what connected me to a Higher Power that was capable of restoring me to sanity. There is room for differing opinions on how that project is actually going, but I haven’t had a drink in four years and I wake up in the mornings with peace, love and faith in my heart, not fear and regret. If you want what I’ve got…
The TFLMS Pyramid of Support
Perhaps you enjoy reading what we write or the podcast or whatever, and maybe you were even thinking, “Gee, I wonder if there is something I could do to help. The good news is that there is. Like the famed game show of legend, “The $20,000 Dollar Pyramid,” there is something similar at work here. If you really like us and read us every day, maybe it would be cool to upgrade your subscription, or you can get your friends to pay, or you can just share what share with you. It’s all cool and it’s all very much appreciated, and without further ado:
It’s the TFLMS Pyramid of Support:
For us, reading and writing have been a big part of recovery and sobriety. We thought we’d start sharing some of our favorite books on the topic of recovery, addiction and general happiness and telling you how they helped us! If you have ideas, thoughts, comments, suggestions or if there are some books that you’d like to chat about, well, we’d love to do that with you. 1
Now, here’s something new. You may have heard me mention something about writing your story in the style of Bill W’s: and this is where we are going to do it. If you want to write your story and share it, I’ll be happy to put it here for other folks to read. If you’d like to record yourself reading your own story (I highly, highly recommend this), I’ll put it here, too:
The “Anyone Anywhere” Meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous
It’s the “Anyone Anywhere” meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, this Tuesday evening at 7pm. We’re ready to go and hope you can join us this Tuesday! It’s 1/2 AA Meeting, 1/2 Alcoholic Book Club and 1/2 something else we haven’t figured out yet. We’ve been reading the “Stories from the Back of the Book,” and they are all so great. It’s a fun way to learn more about the Big Book and reading these stories out loud is a little like listening to the legends of AA share.
Hope you can join us!
From the TFLMS Archives:
Seriously, write a book review (or we might expand into movies!) and we’ll probably put it up.