One of the things I was thinking about today was faith or the lack of it.
When I came in to this program, I was introduced to the concept of the Second Step. The need to have a power greater than myself. Something I could believe in and depend upon in my beginning down this path to sobriety. And, although my very first concept was the group of sober alcoholics, it has grown since then.
That was the start of having faith. First in the program and then in a God of my own understanding. And that faith grew, as I worked this program, the Twelve Steps, and evolved, as time has gone on.
But there was a hitch I hadn’t counted on. An exception to faith, as I understood it. And that was me. My alcoholism. My being human and having character defects, which sometimes weakened my faith. Especially, when my emotions took over my thinking.
One of those is my anger and my resentments. When I had the spiritual awakening in that Ninth and Tenths Steps, when I stopped fighting everyone and everything, including alcohol, and was restored to sanity, I never thought that all this stuff would come back. I forgot or didn’t understand that my alcoholism was just under the surface, waiting for me to return to a drink. Waiting patiently.
I had learned at one time that, when it came to anger and resentments, I lacked nuance. There was no degrees to my anger. It was just one big emotion. If someone swiped a nickel from me and someone stole my car, I would have the same degree of anger in both cases. All out.
The trouble with me was the emotional surge within me, which took over my thinking. And then I wouldn’t even think of a higher power. Just the fact that I was mad. All reason was gone. I would go from anger into a resentment in a blink of an eye. And I know exactly what the BB says about this process. Cut off from the sunlight of the spirit. Lacking the faith or the will, which my emotions blocked, faith would drop out of sight.
When these things would happen to me, I had to learn to talk to another sober alcoholic. I learned that a problem shared was a problem cut in half. My mind, crowded with the resentment, would be relieved of most of the stress. I could think well enough to return to prayer and be able to put a watch out for destructive emotions. I could once again believe that my higher power could do for me what I could not do for myself. I would be restored to faith again.
Two things I had learned early on came back. One was that I had to put the intellect over the emotions. The “I” over “E”, which the old timers taught me. The other was to hang in and not give up. First comes perseverance, then comes hope, then faith, and then love.In that order. To stick with it and acquire hope, which always led to faith, and eventually love. Not talking about an emotion in the word love, but what I was taught in here, to take action. To work with another alcoholic.
Anyway, this was running through my mind today.