When confronted with something I don’t want to do, I find it much easier to whip up some drama about a person, place or thing that I can’t control. There must be some outside reason why my insides hurt.
Step 12: having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
I still get sad. I fill my mind with justifications for my self-pity, even if the justifications need to be fabricated. That’s right; I’m lying to myself in order to feel bad. My confidence goes out the window, and I wonder what my purpose on this planet is. Is there one? Do people commit suicide out of laziness? It seems pretty silly, writing a note that says, “I knew what I needed to do, but it was a lot of work, and it just seemed like most days I didn’t feel like it.” But it’s not silly. It’s fucking horrifying. That’s addictive thinking at its core: creating impossible ultimatums that used to leave me no sane choice.
Am I still sick and tired of being sick and tired? Do I need to be? Once that notion wears off, I move on to the theory that not caring is the way to go. But that only works on the stuff I really to care about, and with the opposite intended effect. Then, finally, comes despondency and isolation, and I’m right back to where I was at the height of my drinking, minus the drinking.
There are days when I feel like I’ve pushed past all the thoughts and words into some kind of numbing void. Well, feeling nothing is better than feeling bad, correct? Because to this alcoholic, it can be murder.
It’s the curse of ordinary time. What’s the point of living unless there’s something to get all excited about? The problem is that my bad to good excitement ratio is something like 3:1. And to make matters worse, any good drama is almost always followed by a bad drama, aka the letdown of the buildup.
Today: Celebrate the drama reduction. It’s amazing how much falls away when I remember to loosen my grip.
12 the hard way 