An Anniversary Nears

03/31/2021 6:42 PM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

Easter, I “celebrate” several years of sobriety. My surrender came when I was finally ready, when I finally realized I couldn’t get “enough,“ that I was tired of the damage to myself and others. My early months in the Program were filled with work, and study, and prayer5 noon meetings a week, an evening meeting or two, writing a 365 day-by-day volume of meditations.

The hard part was what preceded that day when I threw in the towel. Since 1974, I’d had a couple long periods of continuous sobriety. But all I’d done was “white-knuckled it.”. I went to one meeting a week (that should be enough), did a bit of service work (that was hard since I knew my tenure in the Program was on very shaky ground). The price I paid for this false action was my anger, depression and self-centeredness “self-shame), and so forth.

This time around, I honestly believed I’d had enough and was willing to follow the necessary action. My noon meeting was a priority. I found a counselor to help with a couple difficulties. I studied the Steps and read and re-read the Big Book and Twelve & Twelve. I participated at discussion meetings. Importantly, I didn’t shout from the roof tops to anyone that I finally “got the Program.” I had more or less done that before, and it hurt them and myself greatly when I had to admit I had “gone back out.”

This time around, I was surprised with the ease with which I buried myself in the Program. I think that one of the key decisions I made was to attend discussion meetings as much as possible, not as I had done before when I only availed myself of lead meetings (about 5 or 6 months passed before I said a word during the discussions). [More about that in later submissions to Red Door.]

In hindsight, I think this concentration on discussion meetings made all the difference. I could hear folks talk about their problems, which I saw were not all that different from mine. I could see progressthey kept “coming back.”

Yes, my anniversary date is a time I give special thought to, not to glorify it, but to quietly recall those times I was learning how to handle sobriety.

So, “Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, Happy...”

Jim A. St X Noon. Cincinnati