While attempting to meditate today, I remembered something from way way back. Something my sponsor said to me. “Don’t tell me, show me!”
He like a lot of those old timers back then knew that I didn’t know that I didn’t know. I only thought I did. And my sponsor reinforced that. That was a time, when, if you were new, they would tell you to shut up. They told me that I knew how to drink, but that I didn’t know anything about how to stay sober. They told me that if I would keep my mouth shut and listen I would learn. And as hard as it was, I eventually started to listen and learn.
However today in a society of political correctness it is thought rude and intolerable to tell someone to shut up and listen. The only problem with that is that new people, fresh out of rehabs mainly, think they know it all and don’t realize that they don’t know anything. Hard to tell them to be quiet. That the journey they’re on is not an overnight solution. It’s a day at a time and we have much to learn. And that it’s a new way of thinking and doing. And more, it’s not easy. But it’s do-able, as we all have to learn.
I can remember other things I was told, when he wanted evidence that I was putting this program into action. Like, “If you don’t believe, make believe.”, And then, “Act as if”. This last one is often useful, when I run into situations which require that I act the opposite of the way I’m feeling or thinking. In the beginning, when I was struggling and really didn’t know, my sponsor would look at me and say something like “Act like you’re sober.”. Who me? That’s when he would say “Act as if”. And I would try and guess what? Often, if I acted as if, whatever I was trying to achieve would come to fruition. For instance I would be down in the dumps and he would tell me to act as if everything was all right. I would and eventually I found myself feeling all right.
I think what was amazing by those old timers. They actually knew what they were talking about. They knew from their own experiences and struggles how to get sober and stay sober. They didn’t learn about it in some university. It was knuckle down and do what we did and you will achieve sobriety. And like so many I did.
However in the process I had to learn something, which on an ordinary level, is rarely talked about or done. That is the spiritual way of life I had to learn. A lot of that came from the examples I was exposed to. Of course it’s in the BB and the process of the 12 Steps. But it was being exposed to these men and women in the rooms of this program. Hard to describe, but I found that if I’m doing what I was supposed to do, not telling but showing them, I began to become like them. How so? It was subtle. Gradually I found myself, almost naturally, thinking, believing, and doing what I couldn’t do before.
That’s enough for now. And like they were talking about in the meeting today, it’s gratitude I need for all that I have been given. And, as I’ve said so often before, gratitude to me is not so much a description of how I feel. To me it’s an action word. If I’m grateful I will act that way in all that I do. One man told me today how he saw an alcoholic he knew, who was drinking and was in trouble. He said he left because there really wasn’t anything he could do for him. But then he came back and picked him up and took him to a more secure place. He knew he was powerless to help the man get sober, but he did it as an act of kindness. And an act of gratitude for his own sobriety.