Perspective

Several things that occurred last night reminded me of the word “perspective”. meaning a mental view or outlook. Maybe even an attitude. Last night we talked about our old ideas, when things were out of perspective.

All this got me to thinking about my view of others and the world in general. At one time, particularly in my drinking years, but even before that, I felt out of place. I somehow felt like I didn’t fit into any place. I never felt I belonged. Crazy, I know, but that was my thinking. It certainly gave me a bad outlook on life. A bad attitude to say the least.

Then, when I got to the program and got sober, I was introduced to the 12 Steps and a new way of thinking. After an awful lot of arguments with myself and my sponsor, I began to listen. I realized just how far off base I was. No wonder relationships were so difficult. I read in the BB that unless we got rid of our old ideas that I could end up in a lot of trouble. And trouble was what I had brought in with me, when I walked through these doors. When I asked my sponsor what old ideas I needed to get rid of, he said all of them. I asked him what about the good ones. He then told me that I had no “good ones”.

The first thing I had to do I was going to have to learn to trust others. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to, but I really didn’t know how to. Fear of what might happen, if I did, dominated my thinking and my emotions. I listened to what my sponsor and those old timers were saying and realized I was going to have to start somewhere. That was about the time I began to hear about the concept of a higher power. Maybe, I thought, I could begin with that.

That was the beginning for me on this road to a spiritual way of life. I didn’t realize it at the time. I had already prayed to God, not knowing who or what I was praying to, but hoping for the help I needed to get past my alcoholism. I found out later that others, many of whom I didn’t know, had been praying for me to get sober. And the result was that I did. All this almost simultaneously with my begging for help. It made me begin to hope that this way of life, this thinking, this new outlook for me, was the answer to all that had been troubling me.

The result of working to apply these Steps to my life did for me, what years of bumbling and fumbling around in life had never done. Not even all the education I had received had never done. The Steps, along with studying the BB, and listening to others in the program, brought about a change in me. By the time I reached the 9th and 10th Steps, without even knowing it at the time, I began to have a new perspective on life. The change that I needed so desperately to stay sober was beginning to take over. The old ideas, without me really being conscious of it, were starting to slide away.

This process I underwent was not an overnight thing. As amazing as the spiritual awakening in my life has been, it was just the beginning. I often say that it has taken me a long time to get walking around sense in this program. And the process is still going on. Every once in a while I will be conscious of some old idea will pop up unbidden. A reminder that that old drunk is still someplace down within me just waiting for a chance to get back in a barroom.

Thank God for this program and all those people, who helped me to change my mind. My perspective. My thinking. My life. I’m alive and sober today because I was fortunate enough to have been allowed a second chance at life and to be given the directions I needed to get sober. I am grateful.