Pain. Now that’s something no one wants to hear or think about. When I look back at my drinking, I now know that I used alcohol to avoid feeling any kind of pain. Especially emotional pain. Yet here I am, living without alcohol to deaden the pain I often find in my life.
I couldn’t avoid thinking about this today. When I recall how much turmoil I have gone through in this program, and there was a lot, particularly in my early development in this program, it was truly painful. First there was my resistance to so much of what this program wanted me to do. I caused myself so much pain in this. There were the changes I went through, which all of us are faced with. My thinking, which I had to give up. Letting go of my old ways, my habits, with which I was “comfortable”, and on and on. My attitudes, which were my way of viewing life and “reality”. My motives, which were fueled by anger, fear, and resentments. None of this went easily. It literally caused me a lot of grief. There were times, when I was restless, irritable, and discontented. Times I hated what I was hearing, because it meant I’d have to change. And also, times of just utter confusion, when my ego and pride wouldn’t allow me to ask a question or ask for help.
But then, when I go to the 12&12 and read the 10th Step, I begin to see what’s behind all of this. It’s the spiritual life. The growing pains, which are so necessary, if I want to stay sober. What does it say? It tells me that pain is the touchstone of all spiritual progress. Doesn’t say some, or a little, but all. And then it reminds me that I had to go through the pain of a bottom in order to get sober, and emotional turmoil before serenity. It even points out how our failures (pain) can be turned into assets to push us on to better things.
What I have learned through this way of living is that pain is the disciplinarian, along with love, which can keep me on track. I know that pain is often a necessity. It gets my attention, whenever I begin to waver or wander. Pain can get me to open my mouth and share with another what’s really going on with me. How often anger, which was once my faithful companion in my drinking life, has now become a source of not just mental and emotional pain, but it causes me physical pain.
But there is a solution to all pain like this. It is spiritual. Moving out of the problems we seem to face and into another realm of living and thinking and feeling. Moving into a deeper dependency on my higher power. To allow my relation with the God of my understanding to grow. Often this is available by just opening up and allowing what is inside to be brought out into the sunlight of the spirit where it can die a natural death. Often it comes in my surrender and acceptance. Getting my pride to unbend; my ego to deflate. Letting go of my self centered fears. A process which is available to me, when I am willing to talk to another alcoholic.
If I really mean that I don’t want to ever drink again and remain sober, I will remember the words in the 9th Step in the BB: the spiritual life is not a theory; it has to be lived. It often reminds me of what a neophyte I am in the spiritual life. When I came here my spiritual muscles had become atrophied with disuse. The spiritual exercises I need often are painful to undergo. I’m still learning. Despite the pain, which sometimes comes, I find myself more willing than when I first came to the program.