i'm relieved you are back, and i'm glad you are sticking with aa. and i'm proud of you for your 12 days c&s.

Come on back girl ... stay with us ... let us know what's up.

hey dani. i just got back from a women's stag meeting. i like this particular meeting a lot, though i should be embarrassed to show my face there because of the frequent nodding out. also, i keep showing up as a newcomer and it's a small meeting... well, people know i'm struggling. there's this other chick there named "dani" and we became fast friends because she's sincere... she has this "Laverne & Shirley" vibe that i dig. she noticed when i dropped out for awhile... and last week i just walked out of the meeting right in the middle, lol. but the cool thing is, she didn't guilt me about it. tonight i stuck around and she introduced me to a few gals. things are beginning to thaw for me. not so much shame, more love creeping in.

the speaker in the meeting tonight was real young, this tough tomboy. she only had 177 days. everyone in the room knew her, they had been working forever to convert her. she had famously called her coke dealer in the middle of a "burning desire" and left the meeting to relapse. but she came back... she described being wasted at the end and just staring up at the sky, wondering if anything else existed.

as she spoke, it seemed like she was just beginning to realize what was going on. she could hardly believe her actions and there was pain, and something resembling shame. she kept mentioning that prior recovery attempts were made for other people, that this time around she was trying to do things for herself.

i feel like i'm in the same position. before xmas, i cleaned up to be there for my family... and there have been times where i've wondered whether i'm desperately trying to stay clean to please my new AA mentors and friends. it just sucks that there is this whole pack of people out there that only accept me as a sober person. *grumble* lol, the point is, i need to get past this self loathing and stay clean for reasons of my own.

************

about my previous post-- yea, my sponsor said all those things, but i'm taking the 3 cruelest things she's ever said to me, and throwing them all out of context. she spent some time last week helping me draft an email to my father. heck, even taking my distraught, angry call was such a favor. at that point, i was pretty mad at the program and was yelling directly at her. she was able to turn it all around, and by the end of the conversation, we were laughing.

i know that a lot of the shame is coming from inside me and not from the meetings themselves... but 90% of my life is me identifying as a failed recovering addict. it just doesn't seem healthy, i'm so much more than that. and i try to voice this, and what i get back is... "we all have career failures and regrets, you are selfish for thinking you're special..." and i know with my track record, it's stupid to think people would respect and believe in me... and i really shouldn't give a **** what people think, anyway.

ahhhhhh, enough negativity.

guess what? i started a rock n' roll band, and i'm learning to play bass guitar. our drummer is teaching me, but i'm up to about an hour of solo (sober) practice each day. i would never have done this if i was still a drunk. and being in a band has always been a private dream. so wonderful to watch myself slowly improve. we have a big gig coming up in 5 weeks, opening up for another band. i'm nervous as hell to be up on stage, because my band has no guitar to drown out my mistakes.... but at the same, it's thrilling. so there's my first sober action, i started a rock band, lol.

and

when i was walking home from practice with my bass on my back, these chicks cornered me, and insisted that i come play with their all girl band. they've modeled themselves after "The Runaways" and they needed a chick bassist. i insisted that i suck, but they say that it's more about the look, and they can teach me once we're in the studio, blah blah...

so

i'm telling my father not to worry about my narcotic addiction + finances, because i'm gonna be a rock star. music is a lucrative profession where nobody has ever had a drug problem, right?

i have 14 days clean...

EDIT-- i forgot to say, i've decided to refuse to do 90/90. while AA has been an overwhelmingly positive force in my life, i need to also develop my identity as a non-addict. so i'm going to stand up to my sponsor about this... ummm, you guys think this is a good idea?

[scotch and coke just flew over computer in complete surprise] - trigger is musical? excellent cool. my band days are over I am afraid but acoustic and electric are still a feature in my house to the dismay of the wife (what does she know anyway&^&%%&**(&&) (or perhaps delight of my neighbours)) (guitars are an excellent collectable _when pawn is not considered an option)...never went for bass myself but you should yubetube the performance right here on the site...and don't let the tomboyish thing get you down-go to the barbar or sometrhing! if even anything will save my soul it's music/guitars-my last great passion.

good luck

to me...the whole '90/90' gig is a crock of sh+t. I do think its advisable to go to many meetings early on (hell, I ONLY felt comfortable sitting in a meeting for the first few weeks), but there is no magic in 90/90. it wasn't asked of me....and I don't ask it of any women I sponsor.

but....she IS your sponsor. there IS something to be said about taking direction and not running the show anymore....(at least for awhile...heh.)

peace
j

90/90 is just a way to develop good habits for recovery. To learn to make a priority of recovery by being in attendance each day. I hate when people say " you need 90/90" sure I do, they do whatever.
I like it for the discipline and routine of it. For me the more meetings I went to the more I REALLY internalized and understood what was being offered there. If it is being suggested by someone who " has what you want from recovery" well, that speaks for itself. I am writing a fourth step now. Lord knows I have started and not finished a zillion times..This time I mean business. I saythis cuz mySponsor asked me to write out a First step exercise lately..took me a couple of hours. I did not want to take the focus off my fourth, however, he has what I want, so I take his suggestions..Don't think, just do helps me alot with recovery!

__________________
PEACE

one person's crock of sh!t is another person's jar of jam.

each master uses her tools in different ways.

nowhere in the big book does it say how many meetings we have to go to. but i agree with sluggo... she IS your sponsor, and there IS something to be said for taking direction and not running the show.

i have spent half a lifetime closing my mind against new ideas and people, because they might hurt me. when i take direction, it waters the seeds of willingness in me and pries open my mind to allow all kinds of good things to enter.

below: a pic i took with you in mind, trigger.

rock on. love, g

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LesPaul2.jpg (87.0 KB, 9 views)

Well I think yoga is a crock of sh!t but I don't usually come out and say it

Yeah, different places and areas use the tools differently. When I went to NA in the Allentown PA area, the 90 in 90 was a big thing. And if you relapsed, or had any major difficulty, they'd suggest you do another one.

Other areas I've attended meetings in weren't as "strict" as they were in Allentown. But for me, I felt the more that was suggested for me, the better. I was a pretty hopeless addict and had failed at recovery several times before. So yeah, for me it was a case of following direction.

I made up my mind I was going to do what was asked of me. Rebelling, and trying to do it my way never worked, so when a 90 in 90 was suggested, I did it. When my sponsor suggested service to me I raised my hand and volunteered to make coffee at my home group, and also chaired a meeting once a week at the local detox.

Like I said, I was a pretty hopeless addict, but these actions, hitting the meetings, taking a service commitment, etc became a series of little successes, and started turning my life around. After a while I began to think I just might make it this time.

Dave

heee. this made me laugh, i dunno why. yoga being "a crock of sh!t." because i love yoga so much. but i realize i really don't care what anyone else thinks about it. that makes me laugh.



i had coffee last week with a woman whose lead i'd heard the week before. strong woman, just my age. got sober at 24. she reminded me so much of my alanon sponsor, who is just so unbelievably sober, that i asked her out within three days of her lead. ... so this woman has like 20 years. i asked her whether she meditates. she said, "i wish i had time." she has two kids, one of which has a disability, a husband, a house, and a new job. gardens; active in her community. strong and free and happy.

"so how do you practice step 11?" i asked. because she had said in her lead that she was working steps 10 and 11 more rigorously than ever and that it was bearing real clarity.

she talked about how the program is supposed to restore our sense of direction. we sat in panera's and read the second half of p. 86 and the top half of p. 87 together. "on page 86--that's prayer," she said. "prayer is talking to higher power. and the rest of it, that's meditation--listening. that's all they meant. those guys who wrote this book didn't sit in meditation for hours. they were talking about asking for direction, and then listening."

of course at the bottom of p. 87 it says, "there are many helpful books also." some people get benefits from sitting or walking meditation. other people might practice sewing or drawing or religious or yoga or surfing or strumming or drumming meditation (bonita used to drum! and dance)... pretty soon i'm interviewing a woman who teaches recovering addicts in the bronx how to use knitting and crochet as meditation.



trigger, i re-read your post carefully. you say rather definitely that you have "decided" to "stand up to" your sponsor and "refuse" to do 90/90, and then you give a bunch of reasons. very strong, tough language. then you ask, "umm... you guys think this is a good idea?"

i just think it's interesting, the contrast in language between the outright "refusal" and the hesitation of your "umm."

if you'd tried everything your sponsor suggested and you drank/used anyway, or if your sponsor was obviously not sober (as mine was not), then that might point definitively away from her suggestions. ... just thought that inconsistency might indicate a conflict inside yourself that might come clear once it's recognized. --g

Well, to tell the truth, I don't really think it's a crock of sh!t, I just figured it would get a rise out of you guys

peacenik, i agree with you, yoga sux.

didn't you refuse 90/90, g?

fyi, i was unable to "refuse" 90/90, 'cause i'm a wuss in real life. i know you guys see me as this willful, confrontational chick... but in real life, i'm like every other junky that takes the path of least resistance. sooo i said i would "try" my best to do 7/7 for the next week. i realized today that i want to take a pass on every order i've been given... 90/90=pass, drunk log=pass, call sponsor everyday=pass. i am trying to be more flexible. if someone is willing to sell their drunk log, please let me know.

and guinevere-- do you really call your sponsor, "master?" that's pretty funny.

for me, the sponsor/sponsee relationship breaks down when it becomes this alpha/beta thing. it works best with my sponsor when we operate as friends. her history is so different from mine that i was nervous to confide at first. i had to grill her with a million questions about her past before i would spill anything about mine. i just got off the phone with her. believe me, the conversation was just as much about her struggles as it was about mine.

you know why i dig her?

because even though she's working a high profile job / living in beverly hills / driving a mercedes, blah blah.... even though she's all that, she's still this flawed person. she still craves an easy answer on a basic human level. with 5 years drug free, chemicals don't call out to her often... but she sure has a tendency to hide out with some boyfriend. she's working with her own sponsor to correct this. i really identify with her struggle.

and she's been so adamant about me not dating right now. seriously, i call her before i hang out with ex-boyfriends, lol. since my opiate downfall had everything to do with failed relationships, it's great to have this influence in my life. btw-- i'm not white knuckling celibacy. so weird, but i'm glad to have nothing to nurture or answer to right now. i do miss Mr. Heroin... his absence means more to me than most people's presence...

tangents!

i was trying to make a point about willingness... because i know you guys are like-- "cluck, cluck, Trigger doesn't have willingness..."

well

this powerless thing that's mentioned in step 1 + 2... you do realize that it's a paradox, right? it's funny, the bb mentions this paradox. it says that society will ridicule the man of faith, because blind faith and reliance on a higher power is viewed as weak willed or easy. in reality, we all know that this faith requires great personal strength.

Noah Levine explains this paradox brilliantly, using buddhist principles. he states that one retains all their power, up to a point. when you decide to partake in "just one" thinking that you can control it... well, that's when you render yourself powerless.

this is interesting to me.

to answer your questions... i b!tched and moaned about 90/90, accused my sponsor (who was entirely new to me then) of "punishing" me for confessing that i wanted to drink one day, complained to other people that my sponsor had ordered me to do 90/90 until she pointed out that talking about her with other people was gossip and very unproductive... just considering her suggestion brought out a lot of my character flaws. she strongly suggested that if i didn't want to take her direction, maybe i should work with somebody else. i very much wanted to work with this person at the time--i wanted what she had--so i took direction.

i committed to it not just on a weekly basis; i had it mapped out in my calendar from september to december of last year. i managed about 75 or 80 in 90. some days i just needed to prioritize other things, which was also part of the learning. ... it was an important exercise (for me). it gave me two things: the habit of prioritizing recovery activity in my life; and a community of people who became used to seeing my face, and i theirs. now people call me when my schedule gets turned around and i can't make meetings. they wonder where i am, and this is a very good feeling for me. ... also, people call on me to chair and do other work. they trust me.

it also taught me that, for me, meetings are not the center of my recovery. but they're a very important part. ... the center is working the steps in a dedicated way and making contact with other people (getting out of my own head and helping).

while i was doing 90/90, i bumped into an old friend in the rooms and heard her talk about how she was in the middle of a month of practicing surrender and acceptance for every single thing that happened in her life. part of the practice was doing 30/30.



no, i don't call my sponsor "master." i was thinking of the I Ching, where it talks about the master using her tools. and how a beginner can hurt herself with the tools because she doesn't know how to use them yet.

very interesting that you want to pass on every suggestion. good information.

your discourse is willful and confrontational. having known you since september, it seems to me that those characteristics may be a cover for a great tenderness. but that's maybe me taking some kind of inventory on you... so maybe it's not good practice for me to make that observation. it's just what i see in you.

--g

G, did I tell you I made a sign of this and put it in my classroom today? No $hit. I explained it as not only a vivid comparison but also as tantalizing figurative language. That's a good one though. I laughed like hell when I saw it.

Trigger friend: I'm going to the gym but will be posting later. I miss posting here.

love
dani

it did kinda give me a "bad taste in my mouth" after i wrote it though.

i miss the rolling-laughing-head-icon-thingy.

--g

p.s. are you allowed to put the word "sh!t" on your classroom wall? cool.

learning to play the bass to fill the void of addiction well if you got my disease i imagine a young cliff burton having problems keeping up soon. ~ . Cliff Em All. peace. brian.