I made it, Shawn...................

Last night I got my one year sobriety chip. I have been clean and sober for a year three times, but I never got a chip before. The first time, almost 20 years ago, I got beyond the constant obsession to drink, quit going to meeting or doing anything suggested for recovery and transferred my obsession into workaholism, sex addictions, co-dependency, and a myriad of other compulsive obsessions. That kept me away from drugs and alcohol for about 13 years. The problem was my obsessions became stronger and stronger, keeping me from that next drink or drug. Finally I gave in to the anxiety and pressure and started smoking pot, "to relax". That eventually led me to a drink, which led me to a drunk. Once I got drunk, it was like the alcoholism had me by the throat. It quickly took me to other drugs and the decision to give up, get loaded, stay loaded and let it take me to my grave.

By God's grace and the love of Ellen, I saw I had a choice. I could choose to seek recovery. I had nothing to lose. I let go of everything, my marriage, my job, any dreams and goals. I went into a recovery facility, which led me to AA. I had a year of doing as best I could at what I was shown. The night before I was to get my chip, I went out on amphetamines. I was the most scared I have ever been. I wanted to stay clean, I thought I was working my recovery to the best of my ability. This was a blessing in disguise. What was missing was a deflation of my ego, a necessary process in recovery. I was at the abyss. I prayed, put my trust in God, and let go and stepped out into that abyss. What has happened since, I cannot explain. I could tell you a story about the events, but what happened inside of me, I don't comprehend. All I can say is, as a result of giving myself up to a simple process of the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, and surrendering my will to God, I am living in a inward place that is new and unfamiliar. Perhaps this is the beginning of serenity. Perhaps this is a glimpse into the fourth dimension. For most of the two years I suffered from chronic depression, and anxiety attacks. For a good part of the first year I would be in bed for several days at a time, afraid to be in the world. Every time something that I had been holding onto out of fear was taken from me I would suffer from anxiety of living without the familiar. What began to fill the void that was left, was a presence of God, in me and in my life.

For the last few months the anxiety has gone, replaced by a knowing that a Spiritual intelligence is guiding me. I still don't know where it is taking me, but I know it is where I need to be to do the work I am in this life to do. These are critical times in the evolution of human consciousness. Our role in that spiritual process is what is of importance. What we have been taught to value, by our culture is a delusion, keeping us from the task at hand. I pray that we all find our ways to fulfillment of our karmic destinies.

One of the books I have been learning much from is "Witness to the Fire--Creativity & the Veil of Addiction" by Linda Schierse Leonard. I have learned so much about who I am and why I have made many of the choices that I have. For my sobriety birthday present to myself, I am going to share this excerpt from pages 199 and 200. I hope that by so doing I can give back a little of what you all have given me.


"This is The Abyss--the abyss not only of the individual soul but of the world's soul in its historical addictive decline. We do not even know we have fallen into it. In this context, the denial experienced by the individual addict is a microcosm of the denial experienced by our addictive age. In commenting upon The Abyss from this perspective, Heidegger points out that the German word for abyss, Abgrund, means originally the soil and ground that is undermost. As such it is the ground toward which a thing tends in its downward course of growth. For there in the ground, in the soil, it is possible to "strike a root and to stand." In our age Heidegger says, the ground is absent. And thus our entire age hangs in The Abyss. In order for a fundamental turn to take place in our time, in order for a spiritual transformation to occur, there must be those who venture into The Abyss and encounter it. Otherwise, who will be there to receive the revelation? The ground must be prepared for the divine radiance to shine and be seen. Heidegger writes:

In the age of the world's night, the abyss of the world must be experienced and endured. But for this it is necessary that there be those who reach into the abyss. The turning of the age does not take place by some new god, or the old one renewed, bursting into the world from ambush at some time or other. Where would he turn on his return if men had not first prepared an abode for him? How could there ever be for the god an abode fit for a god, if a divine radiance did not first begin to shine in everything that is? The gods who "were once there, " "return" only at the "right time"--that is, when there has been a turn among men in the right place in the right way.

The Abyss must be entered, and we must prepare to receive the divine. Addicts who have reached the bottom and who, whether in the despair of quiet or in the wailing, have cried out in humility to be released from the depths to which their addiction has taken them know the truth of the turning point."


Peace and Joy,

Alan