One of the foundations of my recovery from alcoholism/addiction and major depression is the belief that things can get better, and it must be a sustainable belief – a belief that can stand against the winds of chaos and disorder that come and go throughout life. Whether I’ve been in recovery or out of recovery, alcoholism and depression have been the dominant factors running my life. In early recovery, I needed the hope that ‘things’ could get better, and they did – but the hope I received in early recovery was not sustainable when I began to again experience the natural ups and downs of life. Simply being alcohol/drug free and relatively depression free at times did not suddenly give me the qualities of resilience, persistence, and wisdom; in other words, brief respites from my illness did not give me the ability to handle that which I never knew how to adequately handle before. I needed more – a lot more. I hope to share through the next few paragraphs how glimmers of hope in my life evolved into some faith, then belief, and then into a deep knowing – a deep knowing that not only is recovery very possible, but also that life is good, I have a place in this life, and that the Universe supports not only my journey in recovery, but my journey to my highest good. Might be a bit much for just a few paragraphs, but we’ll give it a try and see what happens.
My life has been all about alcoholism and mental illness. I have started and stopped recovery more times than I can probably remember. But there have been positive constants throughout as well, and the two major ones are hope and good people. There have always been angels who have shown up to guide me back to a place of hopefulness, where I could get back on the path toward wellness. Sometimes my angels wore badges and sidearms; often they wore stethoscopes and scrubs; but most just wore plain clothes and caring hearts. In early recovery, we look to people and things outside ourselves to help or make ourselves get better. That’s a good start, but today I believe that eventually I must find my recovery from within, if I am going to reside permanently in recovery. The thing that held me back for so many years was the fear of looking within. I knew that I could not bear to take a good honest look at the ugliness and darkness that was within me. I knew that examining my insides would overwhelm me and kill me. Hope is a nice thing, a great thing sometimes, but it was never big enough or strong enough to break through that wall.
My hope had to turn into faith – some sort of faith that somebody or something could help me. I developed a faith in institutions, such as the mental health industry and mutual aid recovery organizations. I also developed a spiritual faith, and my mainline for that was through New Thought Christianity organizations – specifically Unity and Religious Science/Science of Mind. My involvement with these organizations, and my independent spiritual studies, were helpful in offering me a different, better, more positive outlook on myself, life, and the Universe. However, despite all my involvement over the years with spiritual people and spiritual organizations, I was not able to develop a faith that worked for me in the long run. As I mentioned in my post Life Doesn't Get Any Better, I had (still have!) tons of helpful knowledge and experience that never traversed the 18” distance from my head to my heart. My faith was head-faith – intellectually, I know that we live in a Universe that supports Life. It’s that simple, really. We would not be here if the Universe didn’t support Life. But when that head faith tried to turn into heart faith, it always ran into the wall of existing belief, and could not get over it or through it.
That existing belief was built, as all our existing beliefs are, in childhood through various learning experiences. My existing belief (and please forgive me for beating a thankfully dead horse) was that I was bad, I was defective, I was unlovable, and I wasn’t capable of being even close to good enough and I really didn’t deserve to live. Yes, the conscious part of my brain knew, knows, that that’s all complete bullshit. But the part of me (us) that matters, the part that governs up to 95% of my life choices, my subconscious, did not know that. (This is one of the reasons I’m an over-thinker – my conscious brain has had to race to keep up with my subconscious, and many times it just gave up).
So how was I able to begin breaking down that wall of existing belief, and begin the process of turning my intellectual knowing into a deep knowing that could actually serve me in life?
At the time, I wasn’t really aware of the process, but in retrospect, I see that I did begin to really understand that I’m at the end of the road. I’m going to die soon, anyway, so what’s the point of protecting that dark ugliness within anymore? And I had the opportunity about two years ago in therapy to experience EMDR(Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) Therapy. EMDR is for those of us whose mental health has been adversely affected by traumatic experiences. Now the important part of this for me is I had and still have absolutely no idea how this stuff works – it’s a mystery to me. Every other therapy I’ve experienced I’ve been able to cognitively grasp – at one point or another, it made sense to me. I can’t cognitively explain why EMDR should work – but it did. It began to break through that subconscious, granite wall that was there, and I found myself beginning to be able to actually apply the other tools I had learned over the years to let myself heal. And because it’s still an absolute mystery to me, it began to clear the path from my head down to my heart. I have begun to replace the beliefs with which I started this lifetime with healthy beliefs. This, in turn, has instilled new hope and a stronger faith within me that no longer has to battle daily just to stay alive.
And because I am now beginning to clearly see and know that those initial beliefs – that dark, scary ugliness – is not the truth about me, I have less fear, more courage, and more reason to connect with others in a very real way – I am able to let others in and share the ugliness I see within when I need to. My last relapse gave me the courage to start developing real, honest connections with others. Let me tell you, there is a huge difference in me sharing my most vulnerable parts with loved ones whom I love, care about, and respect than there is with someone whom I pay to listen to me. I risk losing people I truly love and care about when I share those things within that make me want to lose myself. So far, nobody has kicked me to the curb for sharing that I am a less-than-perfect human being. In fact, it seems to me that every step I take toward being real actually draws others closer to me. Who knew?
To be clear, the damage I created in my life, in me, is not totally healed or repaired. Every day I must practice – I must use the tools I’ve learned and accepted in my heart in order to continue to heal. But the good news is that nowadays life is tons easier and more enjoyable than it was when I was struggling to stay ahead of a subconscious that just did not work anymore.
So that’s where Infinite Possibility comes from – if I am possible, and I certainly seem to be, then absolutely anything is possible, including you! When I listen to people telling me their challenges, my human mind wants to find ways to fix them, and often comes up short. Practical suggestions are great, and I openly share all I’ve learned in that regard; but when I listen with my heart and respond with love, support and encouragement, I help open the door for others to find where the answers truly are – inside.
Namasté,
Ken
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