If anything is an invitation to drink again, it’s got to be anger and resentments. Particularly justifiable anger, which the BB warns us against. It also tells me that it will cut me off from the sunlight of the spirit. And then what? I’m on my own and that’s no place for someone like me to be, who needs others to help me stay sober.
I can remember one time, when I was at a meeting, a long time ago, and we were discussing the Ninth Step and making amends. I had to make an amends to a company I represented, and when discussing it, the word “hate” came out of my mouth. That was the first time in my life that I came to terms with that form of anger. Hate! All those resentments on my Eight Step list.
I received a lot of help from my sponsor and those old timers back then. Hopefully I have adopted what they taught me into my life. One of those was what my sponsor told me about me. Insecure, immature, and oversensitive. That definitely described me. Didn’t take me much to lose it. Full of fear, definitely a child in my emotions, and too easily wounded by others. Touchy to say the least.
I learned that I had no nuance to my anger. Those subtle differences or degrees. My anger would be the same, if someone took a penny from me, or a million dollars. And I had to learn to get a thick skin, to control my emotions, and develop a new attitude toward life.
Attitudes are everything, I learned. They’re more important than facts. In fact they can change the facts. I needed to get a positive attitude toward life instead of a negative one.
And I definitely need to pay attention to the Tenth Step and spiritual axiom. That whenever I’m disturbed there’s something wrong with me. That takes a lot of hard honesty on my part. Willingness to not let myself off the hook. When I’m wrong I’m wrong. And that will cut me down to size and stop the anger and resentments, when I can see the truth to what set me off.
I’ve had too many people through the years tell me how anger and resentments took them back out. Their emotions blinded them to what was going on. I definitely don’t want to go there. Sobriety has given me a new way of living. A good way. The best thing that ever happened to me and I don’t want to throw it away. I won’t, if I continue to depend on my higher power and the members of the group to teach me how to handle and control my emotions and my feelings.