- Drugs
Perhaps my most ingrained character defect has been my fear of the unknown and change of any kind. Changes I experienced led me to carry around resentment and bitterness so heavy it’s amazing I’m still 5’5”. I have fought, resisted and run from change ever since I can remember. If asked to make a choice between something I knew I hated and something I didn’t know anything about, I took the option I knew I’d hate.
I met several people who contributed to landmark moments along my path of recovery. One was a fellow resident in no better shape than myself, and he embodied the cliché of, “Do as I say and not as I do.” However that time I was listening rather than justifying ignoring good advice because of a lack of example. He told me that I always have the choice to change the things I don’t like about myself, my situation, my life and the immediate surroundings of my present being.
I’ve become a being of change. Instead of fighting change, I now embrace it absolutely and take it in stride in every encounter. Throughout my life I have believed in heroes. I only have a couple that I give my everlasting respect to for their parts in my life, yet my higher power in this program is not based upon belief in one god but in the belief that any time I need a hero, the universe will present me with its best offering to get me through.
There were a couple of people that helped me make the decision to get clean. I didn’t deserve the graceful approach the first person took to help me through my roughest times, but he offered it to me out of love. The other person provided an example of everything I never wanted to become or have any common ground with. Because of their help, I decided I was going to become a better person.
I arrived at rehab ready to change. I was open to ideas and willing to apply them. During my first six weeks in rehab, I was excited about every change I was making. The next six weeks were spent in a different rehab program that allowed me to be reunited with my four-year-old. This is where I met the aforementioned client who changed my entire perspective. I ended up leaving that rehab program months early, but I did take his one lesson with me, and I have used it as my most powerful weapon against who I used to be.
When you connect to any person you love or hate in some way, what you are connecting to is the part of them that mirrors that same part of you. Things you don’t love about someone are things you don’t love about yourself. I used this idea to create my new, centered self. If a person, place or thing grabs my attention, I first divide it between good and evil. Did it spark my attention because I was inspired by it, or was I offended or turned off by it? I decide which part of me is reacting: my new, better self or the old self that I’m trying to shed. Is it a part of me I want to maintain, or is it a trait I would be better off without? If it is something I don’t want to continue to be, think or project, I leave it behind. If I’m inspired or uplifted, I decide what I like about the occurrence and look for ways to apply it to myself.
My newest theory on becoming a more rounded individual and taking life on life’s terms is to be change rather than wait for it or fear suffering from it. Every single person, place or thing that grabs my attention is going to help me maintain this constant cycle of change. By shedding the bad, retaining the wonderful and constantly examining if it is myself or my disease that responds to new-found changes, I am sure to maintain the path of progress. Becoming a spirit that constantly changes will keep life interesting and much less frightening. I’ve embodied my biggest fear.
If someone had handed me this essay at any other time in my life, I’d have laughed at it if I’d even bothered to read it. Even when I first entered a facility and thought I was ready to change, this essay would have seemed a little far fetched. At that point I figured quitting drugs was the only thing I needed to worry about. While that was my main goal, real recovery isn’t just about substances. It’s about putting a stop to every evil I was involved in at that point in my life and healing the scars from the events that I had no control over.
In rehab I learned about coping skills. This was obviously helpful, as change may spark a trigger that can lead to relapse if a coping skill is not applied. However for me it is much less of a headache to embrace change and become ever-changing rather than wait for a change and hope I apply a coping skill to it. I feel that this method of madness gives me a more wholesome approach to life on life’s terms. I take life in stride, and I take it with me or leave it behind and move past it. I am always learning and becoming something better than what I was, one day at a time, one layer at a time and one inspiration at a time.