One of the things, which keeps popping up, are thoughts about hope. I can’t forget, nor do I want to, what hope meant to me when I surrendered to the First Step.
Over the years I was drinking alcohol I lost all hope. I ran out of hope early on, but just couldn’t stop drinking. In fact my drinking increased in all those years, until I was drinking almost all the time. I had tried to stop over and over, but just couldn’t. And I finally reached that point, where everything within me was totally black. I was getting deeper and deeper into despair. Finally I made up my mind to kill myself. I just couldn’t go on.
I have never forgotten that last day drinking. I was in a bar in downtown Wash. DC on a Sat. I kept ordering drinks and drinking and I felt that nothing was happening. I remember looking in a mirror at the back of the bar and seeing myself for the first time. I could see that I had become a drunken bum. That I was a drunken and lousy husband and father. That I was an immature teenager in my forties. I had never grown up. And the list grew longer, as I looked at myself. I was totally hopeless as far as I was concerned.
It was then that I made the decision to get off that bar stool and go out and kill myself. I knew the buses on this street went by this block at almost thirty-five miles an hour and I was going to go out and step in front of one. As I turned and started to get off the bar stool, the bartender grabbed my wrist and asked if he could help me. I think I must have been saying something to someone. Not sure. But he went and got a friend of mine from next door where I worked. A man I drank with frequently.
And that was the man who put hope into my life. I can see the whole scene so clearly. He had met a man the day before, who had talked to him about his drinking. He called the man and came back and told me that there was a place where men and women met and stayed sober together and that if I wanted to go there he would take me.
When he said that a light went off inside of me. I could see how dark it had been in there. And that bright light was hope. It was the first step for me on the way to my getting sober. I never even thought of that before. I went home and prayed and asked the God of my understanding to help me stop drinking and living the life I had been living and I would do anything he wanted me to do. And that was the end of my drinking alcohol.
Five days later I came to my first meeting. When I walked through the door I felt like I had come home for the first time in my life. And when I listened to the people in that room I was once again filled with hope.
I know that I have been gifted with hope by my Higher Power in this program. And those moments have led to faith. Some kind of inspiration in here from time to time. I know that it led me to always think that I never ever wanted to drink again. And as time has gone on it has led to the promises in this program. The restoration to sanity and the spiritual awakening.
Anyway I was thinking about hope today and my being able to stay sober a day at a time. Makes me grateful for all I have been given in here. Need to thank my Higher Power and so many people who have played a role in my getting and staying sober. Thanks.