January 16 2008 DonInLondon - ‘Day In the Life’ Reality A Daily Gift

How often do we realise the gifts we have around us. As life is always on the move, we are on the move, making and doing something for ourselves and people we know.

Driven Human Beings

We all driven to need and wants. The difference between the two is what may stress us enough to achieve more, the distress is wanting more and more and not knowing the difference between our needs and wants.

We need enough, emotional and physical elements to keep us happy in our daily patterns. We also have a need to be connected to the day, the people and the community we live in. Some may call this just another need, some call it spiritual and the spiritual is what defines us as humans.

Needs Spiritual

Our spiritual outlook is driven by nature and our nurture, often we know what we need to make life worth living, family and partners, being at one with ourselves inside and out. And being part of something we might consider society. Some of us need less of some things and more of others. Some maybe need to leave their stamp on history. Most do this by being in families and being parents when the time comes. Some like me have probably gone past their expiration date when making more humans and at the same time we are part of the bigger society and we help out as we may.

As time passes for me, the gift of today is in many categories, from surprise when I wake to still be alive after decades of torture and misgivings and never quite sure I had any role at all in this world. I forget I would argue the case for any human to be kept alive if they wish it so, and sometimes keep them safe till that wish to live comes back. I spent years feeling I had no value, these days I have the same value to this world as anyone else and I do my bit one way or another to be a part of something called living.

Today

I work hard to keep sober, to exercise better choices and know its ok to say yes to some things and no to others. We need humour, we need serious, we need food, we need joy as life offers and we also need sadness or we would not know the difference.

All day, the elements outside, the weather has been blustery and yet I chose to weather the weather! I went out into the centre of town. Usual haunts to take photo’s, and with the dark and gloomy conditions, not much success just for today. No matter I bumped into a fellow here and there I know from the fellowship of AA, Alcoholics Anonymous.

Last night it was the same after the meeting, seeing people I know out and about who are a part of the fellowship. Seems to me the longer I am in AA, a society of people just making each day work, the outcome is I just see people here there and everywhere.

One has just had triple bypass heart surgery, and they are doing well. Better than me in walking which these last few days has been hard. No so easy as we all get older and find different things happen, that is life happens and we do as we may.

Keeping Positive

If we look for the bad in a day, if we compare and judge, if we consider others by what we see, there is always a problem as we make assumptions over and over without proper regard for those we encounter.

Judgments And Book Covers [ Always Already Listening]

If we always judge people by the way they look, their race their colour, their expression, their language, their height their weight, we still go around judging the world and wondering where we are in the pecking order today. Best to stop judging, stop comparing and just get on with life and be part of it as a human sized person and not the judge of anything.

What is always already listening? Its that set of assumptions in your head, how you determine and I determine what next and what we encounter. Our always already listening is looking for the place we fit, they fit, that they are this, and I am that. The always already listening tape when running still casts judgements deep and so hinders our connection to this day today.

Likes and Dislikes

We all have them and often what we do as a short hand is use judgment, and worse still use judgment when we know we are wrong and still deny the truth.

As long as there is always someone worse off, some people feel they are ok and that the world is not so bad. Now how dumb is that? The awful truth is that those who judge us and we know it, well its sad really we end up doing the same back, as long as they see us in some way worse off than themselves they feel ok, and I for one loath this behaviour. I have done it myself, I feel the glass house I lived in has less glass these days as stones thrown back have served me well and I have learned lessons a plenty.

Denials and Attitudes and Judging

Less helpful to the journeyman, less helpful as learning is marred and made so much harder as old attitudes wash over truth and leave it stained with lies and discontent.

Try judge less and feel happier on your own path. Be helpful where you can, let go old judgments from family, from where you once were king or Queen in your own mind. And realise the path to happiness is in a useful life made good in useful endeavour and not in idling and forgetting what life is all about.

Simply living as the day offers, knowing what we can do, can’t do and learning the wisdom to see the difference. I am learning so merely one day at a time. Not easy or smooth, as hard as any learning from the school of hard knocks.

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January 16th 2007

Manic Mondays - Just Another Day (written for Tuesday)

Seems it was a long day! Yes it has been a long day, all days in recovery seem to get longer and longer as I try squeeze in everything. Not easy to get all my tests done, eat properly, do some coding for websites and make things up to date. Where is my serenity? Well I do have some

Tonight

A good meeting at my local AA meeting in the Bolton’s. We are a good group and we do make an effort to understand the nuts and bolts of the AA fellowship steps of action.

As I am probably going to keep on mentioning this week, the 12 steps of AA are all about action. Changing the one element we can, ourselves. The more I understand the powerlessness over people, places and things, the more life works. Its about realising the power and choices of those people around us and taking account of our own choices and what this means in the big picture of our living. Purely on a day by day basis.

So it was about Step 5, "Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs."

In my case it was always an ongoing activity, but I never knew how much I had suppressed a lot of events over the years and how angry I was inside till I started working on the steps. Its like an explosion which manifests in many ways depending on our life experience. Most likely in the process we feel very angry and sometimes rage comes out. And we need to be careful we have enough restraint to know our reactions to times past and then respond as we share our story.

As is often said, confession is good for us as we see our place and size in the world. And for many people in the fellowship this is a blinding revelation to untold hurts. As bad as it can be for any human who has experienced dreadful times, so alcoholics get real with their issues in the steps.

Really good sharing and excellent insights to us humans living in the day. As we find we can sometimes be exploding at situations, we need remind ourselves where these unbalanced moments are triggered. And the change in us as we recognise what we can do, and what we are powerless over too. So its all to the good.

We stayed later, to discuss matters of administration and other bits too. A group conscience its called. Not everyone stays, more likely those who wish to understand the group and how it keeps going on next to nothing in our case, just about keeping a balance in the books. After all, we just try to make a meeting with people and we don’t have any funding other than ours. No affiliations or connections.

So as an autonomous group we got somewhere tonight. It’s a strange thing. Trying to get equal sized opinions from everyone. But we sort of got there in the end. We are human after all, and we know what is going on most of the time. Just seems to me, some feel more equal than others.

Attitudes

We all have them, and we all want to do the right thing. And we do need group conscience to ensure safe and good practices in all our dealings, or we would fall down in anarchy. So easy and so its not surprising that people do share their deep feelings. And of course we all get trampled sometimes in life. So in the end maybe we got somewhere sensible, at the same time, we may not always get our way. And that these days is really ok. Smiles here if it were up to me, the whole thing would have been my way, and then there would be a meeting of just me! Or as life shows me, no meeting and no one to talk to…

So overall between doing a lot of coding work for websites and then meeting and tea making and group consciences, its been a pretty full day.

Overall

I need pay attention to my sugar levels and diabetic control, some concerns for me presently as my body is not happy with what I am doing. So a very important step is to get this back on track now. Diabetes is also called the silent killer. I guess it is, it can snuff a person out very ably in quick time.

So I have resolve and will make some new data sheets to keep my records up to date. Indeed with all the other stuff I have been doing its even more important I keep a check and do it thoroughly. As often said by those who designed the medical regime, it’s a self managed condition, and so easy to get it out of balance. Like now. And now is the time to act.

Odd too the painful neuropathy is just so, painful. So maybe time to check on what help I need.

Other matters

Have helped I hope a couple of friends with some basic and also very complex situations, not easy and not really where I consider it wise to go, at this represents some past where I have expert power, and no desire to practice, being worn thin that way again is a danger too.

Overall

Just for today, I may hit the pillow and be quiet in my mind, as long as the support I have given does not start going round and round. Progress not perfection, some elements of life are dangerous paths to tread, and experience teaches me great care. I will be careful.

January 16th 2006

Love and Obligation

Two words and two concepts and realities. The reality of love and how it manifests is what we believe it to be in our own minds. Our view and understanding, our experience of love is what it is. It is as good as we can make it, for love truly will make our world go round. And stop it as abruptly when we find love is missing, lost, withdrawn or generally lacking in our world.

Obligation is a hard word, full of hard feelings and realities. Our obligation to life is simply to live. No more or less, yet this obligation notion is something underpinning most our lives and activities.

Love and obligation makes our world confusing. Those we love we may hold to no obligation when our love is unconditional. And some argue that loves unconditional, so there is never an obligation. Yet we all know love and obligation has some connection, especially where love is given with some form of condition. Yes there are terms to our endearments until we realise the terms are always unacceptable!

Our learning and realities experiencing love, our need of it, our expression of it make us feel either right sized, downsized or oversized. And we have this want for love back and forth with our near and dear, our less close and our general love requirements from acquaintance and foe like.

We get very confused, we love and don't get some back, we get some, we don't want that much, we give it to those who don't want it and get none from those we do. Obligations, we may do well to dismiss.

Our contracts and assumptions to love and get loved are near always assumed and accepted. Its no wonder most divorce rates and rules about our love partners are so often ill formed and useless to both parties.

We need find love, not be scared of it or its lack, we are forever assuming we need be one way or another. And many subscribe to love being the key.

Acceptance is our real key, knowing where and how we are loved. And our real key to acceptance is through contact, discussion, sharing and grounding ourselves in our love education. The education of life, experiencing truth and love without obligation, even sized to our agreements forever negotiated by our behaviour and demeanour.

We owe nothing to our loved ones, we give everything to our loved ones without prejudice or obligation. And if we change in our love and we have made good our living contracts with our beloved, we make good our understandings and acceptance. Our key in this day.

January 16th 2005

Seeing Things Truly

We tend to see things not as they are, but as we are. Becoming quiet and simple inside is the first step towards seeing things truly.

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