i actually lived and here for a year back in 1999 while finishing my bm in organ and sacred music. it is kind of an urban area with a lot of historic interest, george washington and all..... lots of caves for spurlunking and rivers for white water rafting and trails for walking. gorgeous and natural and peaceful.
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ah yes the meeting last night was very well attended and it was incredible. the palpable presence of everyone's hp is inspiring and peaceful and healing and reassuring. one of the topics that came up was on acceptance, just what i needed, since i have been working on this for the past couple of weeks.
this recovery chapter feels so unlike what i had come to understand recovery to mean for the past 23 years.
my first foray into recovery was in aa. then i got into oa, and attended a few isa [at the time it was called incest survivors anonymous], but my main interest was stopping compulsive drinking. i was willing to go to any lengths to do so, and the meetings and the slogans and the recovery culture kept me afloat. little did i know for the past 23 years, that i was in it for the wrong reasons. i was in it to make me feel good about myself; to alleviate my guilt and make myself more socially acceptable subject. little did i realize that all i was doing was an attempt to deny and erase the shadow cast on me by my early experiences with being sexually abused: first by my older bro, and when raped on 4 separate occasions while in the navy, once with a knife at my neck. i was using 'sobriety' for the wrong reasons, and so i did not achieve any significant recovery. yes i learned to let myself cry, and i worked the steps, but i was never brought to the place where i could stop blaming myself, and as a result, my whole recovery became an act of continued self-victimization.
what makes this all so surreal, is that for today, each time that i encounter words and cliches in recovery literature that used to have certain meaning and significance, i find that those understandings not longer apply. i no longer look for evidence of self-verification and affirmation in them. now i find that i am looking for real meaning: trying to allow the words to strike a chord in me that i am out of touch with. i need guidance in order to allow that to happen. and i am getting it with the group i am affiliated with. this is recovery unlike what i have experienced it to be in the past.
something in me is making me over in such a way that is not 'end gaining' oriented, but rather process oriented. my ego is not in the drivers seat this chapter. this is scary, and exciting at the same time. but the scary-ness is not rife with tension and anxiety. i think at this point, this chapter in my recovery, my life, i am finally beginning to take the first step.
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