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I went to my local airport the other day, and, as usual, all the signs outside the parking garage said it was full. But there’s always at least a few open spots on the top level, so I ignored the signs.
Then I got to the front of the actual entrance, and there were four cones spread out. It was clear at that point that the airport meant it this time, that the garage was off limits. But then I noticed one of the cones was knocked over a bit, and there was a car up ahead that had squeezed through.
I paused for a moment because it was quite obvious that the airport did not want people driving into that parking garage. In the distance, I saw the guy ahead of me pull up, get his ticket and drive into the parking deck. Clearly he wasn’t supposed to be doing that, so the right thing to do was to follow directions to the nearest lot.
And I… well, I followed the guy into the garage. I found about 25 open spots as I drove around, so I used that to justify that the garage should have been open. I pulled into a spot and went into the airport. No harm, no foul, right?
Except, I have to be verrrrryyyy careful in situations like this. I know it sounds small, but every bad thing I’ve ever done in life started small, with me saying, “Well, I am justified because of x, y and z.” And I always found reasons why my behavior was okay. Always. That’s dangerous, and it is an infectious disease. Once I am breaking a rule, why not bend that other rule, too? Pretty soon, I have rationalized a bunch of bad behaviors.
In that airport situation, I couldn’t help but laugh and shake my head about the role of the other guy. I’ve had sooooo many times in my life where I’ve kind of wanted to do something I shouldn’t, but once I saw somebody else do it, well, hey, everybody’s doing it, so I can too!
In my addiction days, that meant I always just found somebody else who was slightly more out of control with drugs and alcohol and used that person to help normalize my behavior. As long as I had at least one constituent, I was in the clear.
In sobriety, it’s less terrible behaviors, but it’s still the same justification. The worst day-to-day example is gossiping and s**t-talking. If you start railing on Biff from accounting, I will think in my head, “Don’t get sucked into this, it’s not good for your spiritual condition and it’s not nice. You don’t want to be that version of your self.”
And then I immediately join in dumping on Biff. “What. An. A*****E. And the other day, his fly was down and his shirt had a grease stain on it. What is he doing, smashing Taco Bell on the way to work?”
Listen, I understand that nobody ever had to go to rehab for goofing on their neighbor. But I also think a lot of people at rehab started out with some minor spiritual transgressions and progressed to medium-sized bad behaviors and then large bad behaviors, and lots of those people found examples of other people doing worse as a justification. I know I did. I started abusing painkillers right at the beginning of the opioid crisis and kept seeing headlines and thinking, “See, this is totally normal. Everybody changes dates on prescriptions and steals painkillers from their wife after she gave birth. I’m fine.”
I was going to end this by saying that I need to be careful about caving to peer pressure. But that’s the wrong way for me to look at it. That guy in front of me at the airport parking garage didn’t tell me to follow him. I told myself that, so that’s not really peer pressure, is it? That’s me finding an a*****e that will help me be an a*****e, too. I should probably not be doing that!
In case you missed it, I put together a fun mini comedy special about my 10 favorite addiction/sobriety jokes. Check it out HERE! (It’s behind a paywall)
This newsletter is a place of joy and laughter about the deadly serious business of sobriety. So, as I will often do, let me close with a joke:
"When I was 16, I was trying to act 44, and when I was 44, I was trying to act 16. I am not sure how, but alcohol made both possible."
(Credit: AA Grapevine, from January 2006, by David B. of Peoria, Arizona)
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