You know something? I should say, do I know something? Apparently not. As my sponsor said, you don’t know that you don’t know. You only think you know.
After all this time I am still learning what I don’t know. Hardly close to knowing what I should, but learning something I should know. And what is that?
The other day someone said that they learned what they needed to know why they had a resentment that was eating at them. They said it was because they didn’t get their way.That part of the spiritual axiom; whenever we’re disturbed there’s something wrong with us. And there was what was wrong.
For the first time in my memory in this program, I could see why things like that happen to someone like me. My self centered thinking goes into denial. I see my anger or resentment based on something someone did to me. Not that I didn’t get my way. But isn’t that often it? Self pity. Feeling sorry for myself. Instead of allowing myself to realize what it is I’m really doing, I deny it and turn it against someone else.
I was talking to a friend today about the spiritual life I try to practice in this program, which is key to my sober life. How I often don’t know how I am really living and staying sober in spite of myself. Especially when my mind is cluttered with my mistakes like the one above.
Another friend called this morning and told me a story about a man, who went and saw a monk.He told the monk he prayed a lot each and every day, but didn’t seem to be getting any results. The monk told him to take a filthy basket he gave to him and go and fill it with water and bring it back to him. The man did this every day for a number of days. In the end he told the monk that it was a waste of time, because there was no water by the time he brought it back to him. The monk then asked the man to look at the basket and tell him what he saw. The man didn’t understand. He simply said that, when he looked, he saw that the basket was really clean.
Often times I don’t see the spiritual awakenings, which come from living this way of life. All I can see are my mistakes. Like the man with the basket I’m not always aware of what it is that is being given to me by my higher power. But, when I stop and consider that I’m still sober in spite of myself, I can see clearly that the basket is really cleaner than it was before the last time I looked. Then I remember it’s progress not perfection.
Anyway, it has been a busy day and I was thinking about staying sober.