7/13
Yesterday I attended an AA meeting in a tiny village at Alert Bay, BC. It was a wonderful reminder of a lot of important things. First, a reminder that I need to continue to be willing to go to any length. I had already tried unsuccessfully to look for AA in Alert Bay online with no luck so was not holding any hope for a meeting while there. Then as we were walking outside of town I saw a woman drive by in a van with the name and logo for Alert Bay Treatment center. My mind stuttered over it but figured I had blown any chance as I watched her drive away. A few minutes later Bill said, "there it is again...I know your dying to stop her....go ahead...." So, I waved my arms to flag her down. (This is a tiny town ) She pulled right over, a little startled I think and I said I was visiting from Seattle and wondered if there was any AA in town. It turned out she was only borrowing the van and had no affiliation with the treatment center but she knew where the "AA house" was. She rattled off some directions and we happily seyt off. Unfortunately following directions in an unfamiliar place given y a local has never been my forte I proceeded to get a bit lost. Somehow though I stumbled over the treatment center so I just walked up to the door to ask. There was a woman on the pay phone by the front door who told us that the Sundays AA had been a few hours ago but that Monday at 7pm there would be one at "Sunshine House" and pointed us in the right direction. Shoot and darn. We were planning to leave the next morning.
The next day their was a high wind warning in the Strait so we decided to stay another day. I was able to ask the Harbor Master if he knew where Sunshine House was and turned out he had worked for years for the little hospital across the street form there and knew exactly where it was. Armed with better directions at 630pm I was off walking through town to find my AA meeting.
The other important reminder was that I need to be open to where God would lead me in this new phase of my recovery. The Sunshine house had no AA sign or symbol and no one was there when I arrived. After waiting in the weedy lot for 20 minutes a young native woman walked up, singing with her head plugged into an ipod. I walked over and asked if I was at the right place for an AA meeting. She smiled and I knew I had found it! The members slowly trickled in and began taking seats in a circle of old tattered chairs in a nearly empty house.
I was the only non native person in attendance. I was also one of four people over the age of 25. There were two old native men and two middle aged native women and everyone else was young and currently enrolled in a 6week inpatient program. Turned out that Alert Bay is the only native treatment center in the whole of BC. These "kids" were from reservations from all over BC.
They were very welcoming if a bit shy. I didn't ask but I got the distinct feeling that they rarely if ever get visitors. The topic of the meeting was fears and there was a great deal of discussion regarding the fears of getting out soon and going home to friends and family who would still be drinking and using. Fears I could of course relate to and having been through inpatient myself 4 times!!! i had plenty of experience strength and hope I could readily share.
I was very impressed with the way members of the group were actively combining a traditional AA program with their heritage of naive customs and spirituality. There was a great deal of reference to family connection and the impact of alcoholism and drug addiction culturally and generationally. They were actively relying on main stream AA along with traditional native spirituality to find strength in their own fellowship and within their own communities. The eldest member was some sort of leader though I am not sure of the capacity. He may have worked for the center but it seemed more like he was from the local neighborhood. There was reference to his leadership of their spiritual practices of sweating and of a cleansing done in a course of days by being washed in the waters of Alert Bay at 5am! Brrrrrrrrr. It seemed like it was an optional exercise and there was a lot of reverence to it.
It was a great meeting and as always I walked away from it richer than I had arrived, proud of AA and more aware of the ability of AA to transcend beliefs and differences. I thought with great gratitude of the richness of Seatles' 1000+ meetings and was reassured that i they can find recovery with just three meetings a week then for me too all is possible. AA miraculously transcends borders of time and place for me and countless others.
Love, kat
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
फ़ारस
Fears........today I am enmeshed in Step 4. The place where I first realized my life has been full of fear based decisions, thoughts and reactions, and am still continuing to suddenly and often open my eyes to discovering again, and again. Today I am a little more understanding of this phenomena of my life but it still creeps in in so many forms that it is often impossible to recognize.
We have now been cruising for two full months. The reality of that is in the last 61 days I have spent 61 days, 24/7 within shouting distance of my husband. The only time I have spent time alone in the entire 61 days was once in Juneau when I borrowed the use of a washer and dryer from a new friend and once in Ketchikan when I went to the laundry mat for a couple of hours. It is confusing to my mind to have spent so long, years, planning and getting ready for this trip and then to find fault with it. But sheesh, have you ever spent 61 days with your significant other (or anyone for that matter) without time to shop or drive or go to work or get to a meeting or take a hot bath while alone or....)
What does this mean in reference to step four? Well i believe that my resentments are all fear based. That when I find myself filled with anger or frustration or resentment or any number of the more negative emotions it is always a manifestation of some fear I have inside. Sometimes they are old familiar fears like fear of abandonment or fear of not being good enough. But most often they are fears that remain lost in the emotion. Those are the times I find myself drowning in what the other person is or isn't doing.
In the last two months I have found myself so mired in what He is or isn't doing that all I can see is anger. My feeling getting hurt again and again while i struggle to dissect each emotion and fear like an insane surgeon. I lay in bed replaying what was said or done over and over again and rearranging what I said or did or what i should have said or did. I have come so close too many times to just shrieking that's it This is not going to work take me home!
Which fills me with a new level of fear....take me home to what? I have nothing there. No car, no home, no job, no dog, no possessions. What exactly would I do to recreate my life with the huge void where these years of preparation and transformation to boat life has been? And how exactly would I explain to everyone I know and love that all this came crashing down in less than a season? My ego steps in and I am sure I can not possibly give up. And I cannot possibly start over and I can not possibly fail in front of every one...and damn it i cannot possibly give up before I get to the dream part (see tropics, warm winds, days filled with diving and snorkeling and reading a god book in the shade while filled with bliss and love and serenity")
Sometimes ego is a good thing because it has served me in the past by forcing me to stick things out rather than giving up. Sometimes ego is life threatening when my thoughts go to the impossibleness (is that a word?) of failing and the need for a dark quiet place away from the loud shouting in my head. The sureness and belief that there is only one way to fix this and that is by not being at all. Mostly I am able to stay away from that place but my pain has been deep enough in these 61 days to visit there again for the first time in a long time.
Then there are the other days. The days I am weller. The days I can pick through my part and let go of his. The days when practicing tradition ten in my everyday life allows me to be and experience and accept without having an opinion that devours me. That is a place I recognized a long time ago and have done a great deal of work on. Yet having an opinion is dangerous to me. When I cling to my opinion I don't leave a lot of room for my feelings and my hopes and my dreams of life. When i get so emotionally attached to my opinion I forget that it isn't my place to be right it is only my place to be of service. In the grand scheme of things not having my opinion taken as the end all be all has never been the point. Life is haring and life for me is being happy joyous and free. Not right.
So let me try and explain. If you are in the car with someone and you think you should take I-5 north, then drop off and follow old state route 623 south east, then stop and have a chicken sandwich at about 100pm then continue on and stay in the holiday Inn off route 66. But someone else wants to take I-5 north, then take 842 east, then stop and have fried chicken and take a nap. Then hook up on the clover leave with the back end of 623 and drive till late before finding a room at Motel 6 to save a few bucks. In the end you are still full and tired and ready for bed and tomorrow you will awake and do it all over again. Everyday is a choice. When I think back on every single fight I have ever had with someone I love the reason for the fight itself is either impossible to remember or in retrospect made no significant impact on the rest of my life. It was a moot point at best and a waste of time and energy and possibly the loss of a relationship at worst.
So, what is most important? To love Bill and myself. To experience the world around me and the people and places I will find along the way. It wont matter if he was wrong....or I was right. it will matter though if we love each other and it will matter if I can find respect and compassion and love for him...and me in everything I do.
Don't worry, be happy. And don't worry, all of this is just microscopic dissection of my life and not nearly as serious as I stir it up to be. The trip is good. The experience is wonderful and the good well out ways the bad. But, it helps me to be aware of my character defects and remember that when some person place o thing is a problem for me it is always me and not them that i need to look at. Love, kat
We have now been cruising for two full months. The reality of that is in the last 61 days I have spent 61 days, 24/7 within shouting distance of my husband. The only time I have spent time alone in the entire 61 days was once in Juneau when I borrowed the use of a washer and dryer from a new friend and once in Ketchikan when I went to the laundry mat for a couple of hours. It is confusing to my mind to have spent so long, years, planning and getting ready for this trip and then to find fault with it. But sheesh, have you ever spent 61 days with your significant other (or anyone for that matter) without time to shop or drive or go to work or get to a meeting or take a hot bath while alone or....)
What does this mean in reference to step four? Well i believe that my resentments are all fear based. That when I find myself filled with anger or frustration or resentment or any number of the more negative emotions it is always a manifestation of some fear I have inside. Sometimes they are old familiar fears like fear of abandonment or fear of not being good enough. But most often they are fears that remain lost in the emotion. Those are the times I find myself drowning in what the other person is or isn't doing.
In the last two months I have found myself so mired in what He is or isn't doing that all I can see is anger. My feeling getting hurt again and again while i struggle to dissect each emotion and fear like an insane surgeon. I lay in bed replaying what was said or done over and over again and rearranging what I said or did or what i should have said or did. I have come so close too many times to just shrieking that's it This is not going to work take me home!
Which fills me with a new level of fear....take me home to what? I have nothing there. No car, no home, no job, no dog, no possessions. What exactly would I do to recreate my life with the huge void where these years of preparation and transformation to boat life has been? And how exactly would I explain to everyone I know and love that all this came crashing down in less than a season? My ego steps in and I am sure I can not possibly give up. And I cannot possibly start over and I can not possibly fail in front of every one...and damn it i cannot possibly give up before I get to the dream part (see tropics, warm winds, days filled with diving and snorkeling and reading a god book in the shade while filled with bliss and love and serenity")
Sometimes ego is a good thing because it has served me in the past by forcing me to stick things out rather than giving up. Sometimes ego is life threatening when my thoughts go to the impossibleness (is that a word?) of failing and the need for a dark quiet place away from the loud shouting in my head. The sureness and belief that there is only one way to fix this and that is by not being at all. Mostly I am able to stay away from that place but my pain has been deep enough in these 61 days to visit there again for the first time in a long time.
Then there are the other days. The days I am weller. The days I can pick through my part and let go of his. The days when practicing tradition ten in my everyday life allows me to be and experience and accept without having an opinion that devours me. That is a place I recognized a long time ago and have done a great deal of work on. Yet having an opinion is dangerous to me. When I cling to my opinion I don't leave a lot of room for my feelings and my hopes and my dreams of life. When i get so emotionally attached to my opinion I forget that it isn't my place to be right it is only my place to be of service. In the grand scheme of things not having my opinion taken as the end all be all has never been the point. Life is haring and life for me is being happy joyous and free. Not right.
So let me try and explain. If you are in the car with someone and you think you should take I-5 north, then drop off and follow old state route 623 south east, then stop and have a chicken sandwich at about 100pm then continue on and stay in the holiday Inn off route 66. But someone else wants to take I-5 north, then take 842 east, then stop and have fried chicken and take a nap. Then hook up on the clover leave with the back end of 623 and drive till late before finding a room at Motel 6 to save a few bucks. In the end you are still full and tired and ready for bed and tomorrow you will awake and do it all over again. Everyday is a choice. When I think back on every single fight I have ever had with someone I love the reason for the fight itself is either impossible to remember or in retrospect made no significant impact on the rest of my life. It was a moot point at best and a waste of time and energy and possibly the loss of a relationship at worst.
So, what is most important? To love Bill and myself. To experience the world around me and the people and places I will find along the way. It wont matter if he was wrong....or I was right. it will matter though if we love each other and it will matter if I can find respect and compassion and love for him...and me in everything I do.
Don't worry, be happy. And don't worry, all of this is just microscopic dissection of my life and not nearly as serious as I stir it up to be. The trip is good. The experience is wonderful and the good well out ways the bad. But, it helps me to be aware of my character defects and remember that when some person place o thing is a problem for me it is always me and not them that i need to look at. Love, kat
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