Thursday, September 08, 2005

Doubts

I am not sure having this blog is a good idea. I think it may be extremely ego-driven to have an "anonymous alcoholic" blog. Like I am it. The one, the only - THE anonymous alcoholic!

I asked a friend to take a look at it and let me know what he thought. He thought that this isn't about recovery from alcoholism if I say I am only sober by the Grace of God. Boy, talk about something I don't want to get into a debate about! This is my soul here and I don't know if I want to put it out there like this. Really, I might not be cut out to be a blogger at all!

In my other blog, I got into a neat conversation with another sober person. Well, it didn't start out so neat. He was posting comments on my blog and let me say we are polar opposites in most of our beliefs - about politics. But I visited his blog and discovered that he is an AA member. Well, I wanted to talk with him about that but didn't want to put it on my blog because it has my first and last name and I think a blog might be pretty public.

I thought a blog might be a nice place to post thoughts about the life of a sober person. However, although I am sober and I thank God for that, I am NOT the sterling example, the shining beacon, the paragon of sober virtue. I am simply a terrible, terrible drunk who got sober and I absolutely REFUSE to take credit for that. I REFUSE to call the steps "work". I REFUSE to say "it works if you work it". It just works.

Of course, as a sober person, I have found it necessary to follow the simple directions as outlined in the big book. Of course, I go to meetings. Of course, I have a sponsor. Of course, I sponsor others. When I consider the miraculous life I have been given, I hardly think that I somehow earned it by doing this paltry amount of "work."

My home group meets tonight and I usually sit between my sponsor and my sponsee and that is about the best feeling in the world. To know that I am a link in the chain of Alcoholics Anonymous.

2 comments:

Mary Christine said...

Hey Rick!
Thanks so much for the support. I really appreciate it.
I also appreciate your perspective on "choice". I agree that I have to be willing to surrender, and that I can turn my back on God and his grace.
On the other hand, I feel that I have done nearly everything wrong that a person could do in their sobriety and somehow I am still sober today. I guess the one thing I "did" right was always having the desire to do God's will - even though I had some pretty strange ideas of what God's will was. And I never left AA. No matter what was going on, I have always gone to meetings and been in touch with other alcoholics.

Anonymous said...

God Bless us, every one.