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I watched the new version of the movie Dune a few weeks ago, and I loved it. One of the things I loved the most about it was that it has a bunch of cool technology in it.
My favorite futuristic item was a force field that is generated by a wrist watch. You hit the force field button, and it surrounds you like a bubble. Except it’s not a completely impenetrable force field. It endures most of the damage of somebody shooting at you or swinging a sword at you, but it’s a little like a bullet proof vest in that it isn’t perfect protection. It can eventually be broken through.
The reason I love that vulnerable force field is that it reminds me of me. At one of my first meetings, I heard somebody say they had a big ego and low esteem, and I was like, “Whoa, it’s like they are talking directly to me.”
That’s the truth: I have thin skin and think very highly of myself, which is a toxic mix. And because of that mixture, I also often think very low of myself, too. Up and down, up and down.
When I was in active addiction, that meant the slightest turbulence pushed me to numb out and get blasted. I’d drink at the problem, and it would wipe out most of the pain or fear. Not all of it—I still felt it. I remember getting into a disagreement with a work colleague one day and just sitting there at my desk, stewing, looking over the cubicles at the top of his head 20 feet away, downing pills and chewing Skoal. “Take that, a*****e!” I thought. Like drugging at it would take care of the problem.
But that never quite worked. The problem didn’t go away. The can just got kicked down the road. And by the end of my drinking and drugging days, I was plastered all the time, on good days or bad, it didn’t matter. I was still trying to use it as my force field, though.
Now fast forward into recovery. I was terrified of living without drugs and alcohol because life without my armor was terrifying! What would I do during a disagreement? Maybe just start running away? Fighting with the person? Screaming at them? Crying… just sobbing and collapsing to the ground?
Well, I found a new force field in sobriety. Recovery has helped me get to the middle place emotionally, where I have ambition and high standards but don’t think I am the best in the world. I think my skin is a little thicker—I said, a “little” thicker—and I haven’t dropped to the ground in tears recently. The force field is still a lot like the one in Dune—it exists, it blocks most things, but it can be penetrated, that’s for sure.
To get more specific about what my recovery force field is, I have found that I need a steady dose of sobriety. I’ve tried the thing where I go to meetings on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and load up all in a row, but it doesn’t work for me. By Wednesday at lunch time, recovery is far enough in the rearview mirror that I start getting a little jumpy.
I need some spiritual stuff every day to build up the force field. I meditate for 20 minutes each day, and I usually talk to one other recovery person every single day. Right now, I am hitting in-person meetings on Sunday and Monday, then Zoom meetings on Wednesday and Thursday. That spreads it out nicely. But even then, on Saturday evenings sometimes, I can be a little squirrelly.
All that said, the force field goes down sometimes, and it sucks. But it’s also part of sober life. I can’t numb out to bumpy moments any more, I have to try to walk through them. I went to an incredible Sunday meeting a few weeks ago and felt wonderful that night. On Monday morning… train wreck. I had a rocky interaction with my family, then a tough phone call, then a not-so-spiritually-fit Zoom meeting and I felt like a mess inside.
I also started working out a lot about a year and a half ago, so I went for a run and thought back to that Sunday meeting. It had been a fantastic blend of people with lots of time, and newcomers, and people in pain, and people who had felt similar pain but battled through it sober. It was everything recovery is all about—living life on life’s terms, even when life’s terms suck.
By the time I got back from the run, I felt much better and I felt like I was heading into the final part of the day with the force field back up. It was a very sweaty force field, but it was up.
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:
Two men attended a funeral and were talking.
“What killed him?” one man asked.
“Booze,” the second man said.
“Did he ever try AA?” the first man asked.
“Oh no, he wasn’t really all THAT bad.”
(Credit: AA Grapevine, March 2005, by Anonymous)
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