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Love

Romantic love is a fine thing, especially at the
movies, but love is not about dependence: ‘I can’t
live without you’ amounts to codependency. Love is
essentially what you do for another person. It is an
activity, not a feeling. That is what makes it so
powerful – if we all have love in our hearts, we are
actively working to help each other. Morgan Scott
Peck, author of The Road Less Travelled, said
exactly this. It came as a shock to some people. Do I
understand that real love is unselfish?

Step Eight is about brotherly love. It is the time
when we stop focusing on ourselves and look at the
damage we have done to others and what we can do
about it. Making amends is about honesty, courage,
forgiveness – and love. It is asking myself: What can
I do for this other person that I have hurt? It does
not matter how painful it is to make amends, we
have to be rigorously honest in all our affairs. The
truth will set us free, though it may hurt a bit too. If
we are going to truly love ourselves and our fellow
human beings, we must take this Step in courage
and humility. Today I ask to show true love.

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Remember Mindfulness – send positive thoughts

Denial

Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to
change the world. Today I am wise, so I
am changing myself. Rumi.
Feeling that we were clever and able to get away
with bad behaviour simply led us further down the
slippery slope of addiction. It may seem clever to
us during the bad times to change our job, our
location, our doctor or even our spouse – anything
in fact, except to change ourselves – the one thing we
really needed to change. That is not the behaviour
of a clever person but of somebody blinded by
selfishness and denial. How clever am I ?

Denial is the refuge where we hide from reality, and
it takes courage and humility to come out and admit
we were wrong. Years of denial turn us into people
‘constitutionally incapable of being honest with
themselves’ that are mentioned in Chapter Five of the
AA Big Book. We should not expect to turn that
around easily, it may take time. If we can identify
the problem and commit to doing something about
it honestly, then we have made a start. Today I ask
for honesty to face reality.

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Remember Mindfulness – relax your whole body gradually

Integrity

In normal life we hardly realise how much more
we receive than we give, and life cannot be rich without
such gratitude. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who
wrote these words while in prison awaiting
execution by the Nazis, was unusual in returning
from America to Germany in 1939, at a time when
others were fleeing. He saw his duty to oppose
Hitler and later died as a result. A brave man who
listened to his conscience and stood up for his
beliefs. True integrity is surely to do just that. Am I
ready to follow my conscience and stand up for my
beliefs?

I can live a perfectly normal life once I accept that
my life is never going to be perfectly normal.
Ceasing my previous insane behaviour is a start.
When I was regularly repeating the self-destructive
cycle of addiction, there was no normality at all. I
now attempt to make the right choices on the basis
of sensible criteria, even if I don’t always get things
right. I will not dwell on the past. Today I ask that I
may give as much as I am able, because it is in
giving that we receive.

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Remember Mindfulness – review expectations
Sharing problems
Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil
the law of Christ. St Paul, Galatians.
Getting into recovery does not mean that we won’t
have challenges ahead. The message is that a
problem shared is a problem halved. Connection
and sharing are the answer to so many of life’s
problems. Letting go of the burdens of the past will
help us too. Am I ready to let go of the past and
share today’s problems, because that is the sensible
and human thing to do?
I used to think that I should be able to handle my
problems myself and that asking for help was a
sign of weakness. But self-reliance isolates us, and
society does not work well like that. Helping
others should be a pleasure and if we avoid help,
we may be denying others the chance of self-improvement
and the self-respect that comes from
giving. Today I will ask for help when I need it,
because realism is honesty and asking for help is
connecting.