What is it? What is it that I’m powerless over? It’s the disease. Alcoholism. When the first step comes up, the premise that I’m powerless over alcohol, it means just that.
I hear people at meetings sometimes say that they don’t understand what it means to be powerless. To me it means that without the solution I found in here, I will drink again and that alcohol will kill me. How do I know that? Because when I was drinking I was drinking against my own will. I really couldn’t stop drinking. I would make all these promises to myself, I would ask for all kinds of help (not from AA which I knew nothing about) and would walk right into a bar and find myself drinking and wondered how and why I was there. It happened over and over again. This went on for years, until I found this program. To me that’s being powerless.
I would tell myself that it was because I was angry at my boss, but that wasn’t true. I said it was because of my wife, but that wasn’t true. I said it was because I felt bad, but that wasn’t true. No matter what I said or thought, it was never true. The truth was that I drank because I’m an alcoholic. I drank because I had to drink. Period. I had a mental obsession for alcohol, because I had a physical compulsion to drink, which was always accompanied by a craving for alcohol. And, like the good doctor in the BB said, it is only in the class of people we know as alcoholics we find this phenomenon of craving.
For me, drinking was not a choice. That’s something the non alcoholic can’t understand. Just like the non alcoholic can’t understand why the alcoholic goes to meetings all the time. Why medical doctors are often prone to say something like this, “if you’re not drinking you must not be an alcoholic”. Like Bill said, “Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic”. Just look at what happens to the alcoholic, who stops working the program.
We designate the person who goes back out as having a “slip”, but it’s not that really. I heard someone say the other day that they “planned” to drink again. I never “planned” to drink ever. I just drank. I think that the alcoholic thinks that, but it’s their alcoholism. It’s hard for us to think that alcohol has such a hold on us that we can’t help but drink. Especially if we value our intellect and think we have control over our lives. And if we think that way, we’re probably already condemned to the next drink, because we are our higher power. And our dependence on a higher power is the solution.
I don’t think about the a drink. Does that make me immune from drinking again? No. Deep down the drink is just waiting for me. It will always be there waiting. Alcohol we are told is a subtle foe. How do I know? For one thing all I have to do is witness how many of us return to drinking. Another is that even though I never think about a drink, I have had drinking dreams. That tells me that subconciously the drink is still there.
And the solution to all of this is in the 12 steps of AA. If I am faithful to adhering to the solution I hopefully will never pick up a drink again. It works.
As my sponsor and all the old timers told me, it works if I work it. It’s worked for me up to now and I know it will continue to work, if I am willing to work it. I still have that memory within of what happened and what is was like when I was drinking. I remember my bottom. As long as I do, I know I will do anything not to drink again.
Anyway, I was thinking about this today. To me it is one of the most important things I can think about. It’s about my primary purpose. It’s about priorities. This is at the top of my list and I pray it will always be. And it makes me grateful in a way I can’t describe.