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Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Does life suck or do we suck at life?

When i get messages like this (attached below) from friends in the program, i know they aren't getting it.
   I could be wrong, maybe I'm the one not getting it. And i mean no disrespect to them. They are awesome guys and i love them.
   But these messages, though at first sound really awesome, don't really apply. At least not to an addict. Maybe they do to "normal" people that have problems, but not addictions.
   When life starts to suck, it doesn't always mean there are "good" things in store. By definition, an addict's life sucks. At least it does in the beginning of working toward recovery, and after who knows how long, it doesn't suck all the time but never does it never ever suck. At least that's what I'm told.
   My life has pretty much sucked more often than not while i was IN my addiction. That's guaranteed. And it didn't mean that i was bound for great and amazing things. It meant i was going to DIE MISERABLY.
   Granted, unexpected things happen and we have to decide how to handle them. But at least for me, most of the times life doesn't make things hard for me, i make things hard for me.

    Ok i kind of went off on a little tangent. I just was thinking about how many times we use "good" quotes or other things to help us escape the reality of our  predicament. I have to think (actively) to myself if I'm liking what is said because it helps me come to grips with what is going on, or do i like it because in some twisted way it helps me ignore or avoid reality and helps me shift off the guilt i SHOULD feel.
   There have been plunty of times i liked something because it helped me keep doing wrong what i was doing wrong. I first read the quote my friend sent me and thought, "yeah, life is hard sometimes, but it just means Satan is trying hard to get me to feel bad. But if i stay strong it's going to propel me in the right direction."
    When, after i thought about it more, the reality was; no, my life was feeling sucky and it was because i wasn't sharing my feelings with anyone and was holding untruthful resentments and i wasn't being vulnerable with my wife.
    We are addicts and our perception of reality is distorted, and we will try (usually at all costs) even when trying to do the right thing, that we are hiding details from ourselves that are imperative to recovery.
   When life starts to suck i need to stop thinking, "why is this happening to me?!" And start thinking, "am i honestly doing anything to cause this?"

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