What does it mean to be human? Dumb question, huh? Maybe not. I mean here I am an alcoholic and subject to all the faults and failings of someone like me. On the other hand there is the subject of living a spiritual life. Spiritual and human. Seems like a conflict, if ever I saw one.
It came to mind today, as I sat here thinking. Speaking about conflicts, I guess this came up because I have a couple of conflicts in my mind. Hardly spiritual. Most human. There is so much of this stuff in my mind and heart that it is sometimes difficult to sort it out.
I guess that’s where I’m supposed to bring in the spiritual aspect of living a sober life. And that is the thing that amazes me about this program. Here I am, not living in a monastery, and yet having something of the practice of being able live on something of a spiritual level, while still being human, with all that goes with that. Living in a world of human actions, being a part of that, but not being a part of it at the same time. Quite a trick.
When I first saw the 12 Steps of AA, it kind of took me back. I had seen and experienced this before, when I was younger. Yet, because of the life I had led in my drinking it sure didn’t look easy. In a sense it wasn’t. Not easy trying to give up all those things I was living out there in an alcoholic world. Cleaning up ones act is never an easy venture. Yet, as I applied these Steps to my life, I began to experience a change within myself. I started to shed a lot of that old life. Plus I began to add those things, which had been missing, which were essential to living a sober life.
It was the effect of the 12 Steps, which makes it possible for me to being human and spiritual at the same time. I first witnessed this in the old timers I met, when I had been here a while. Especially my sponsor. A regular guy. Yet a man of some quality, which was hard to define, without knowing who and what he was. An alcoholic like myself. Sober and an example of what it meant to be sober to everyone, who met him. Fully human, down to earth, plain spoken, and plain acting. Yet, he exemplified a faith in action. He never talked about spiritual things. He talked about practical every day things, which would help me to stay sober. And he talked about things common to us all. He had all his faults, but he was humble in spite of them. He was probably one of the most spiritual men I ever knew.
What this brings my thoughts to is this: The spiritual life, as I know it, is one of imperfection. That’s not just my own thought. It’s one which some spiritual writers speak about. It means to me that, though I stumble and bumble through life, the very fact of my being sober is the evidence of spirituality, as it was in my sponsor and so many I meet every day in this program. And is mine ever imperfect, spiritual or otherwise.
In the end what’s important is that I am sober. From that I can, with the help of my higher power, strive for a better life. Without sobriety there is nothing.