Day 7: Journal Volume 1 -Wanting to Run & Hide

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Today's recovery journal meditation is about not having to fake that I have bad days and some days I don't want to deal with my life or anyone else's. I learned to let myself be where I am. Admitting this frees me and opens my ears to the old cliche, "this to shall pass" and so it does.

*This is the Excerpt from my book-series, “I didn’t ask to think this way, I just do...” that I am relating to. Book l Visuals, p.18, Recovery Journal Volume l, p.20

Day Seven: Wanting to Run & Hide I asked someone today, if they knew where any caves were. This person looked at me like, “what are you talking about?” I said, “caves, you know, someplace to hide out.” The person smiled as if I were joking. But I wasn’t. I am in such a knot inside. I’d like to curl up in a ball, and make the world go away. Life has to be like this right now. I have to face it, as it is. There is no way around what I am going through. I cannot turn back. It isn’t an option, and that makes this process awful, because I want turning back, to be an option.

That’s why I want a cave to avoid being in this miserable place inside myself. Though I suppose I would still be with me, even in a cave. The only good thing I can find about the days that feel awful for whatever reason, is that I can admit I want to run. I have found that by letting myself feel the feeling, it not only passes, but gives me the strength to face my life. Imagine that. Today I may want to take off and hide out, but instead I verbalize my dismay in an eccentric way and deal with it. This works for me. Welcome to the real world. Where we feel life, and have the capability to benefit from it. When we choose to stay and deal by letting ourselves have a bad day or two, life presents a natural opportunity to stand back up the next day, and each day after that. Having gone through & gotten through we are a bit stronger than before.

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I originally wrote this back in the 90’s in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. When a group of people in 12-step recovery, began showing me another way of coping without the use of chemicals or harmful behaviors. -Today I still need coping skills even though a lot of time has passed. Why? Because I still want what recovery has to offer! Freedom not only from addiction but freedom from unhealthy places my mind still can travel. As my sponsor reminds me, recovery is active change. I like living life outside of a cave. I like that I don’t have to run & hide today.

This meditation relates to several steps, but lets focus on Step 5 -We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

Step Five helps us to start to verbalize what's going on with us -to God, to our-self, and to others. We start to pinpoint that we are having issues and begin to cope with them. This action helps us to move forward on what we call bad days and leads to having a better day, in spite of our issues. It may sound crazy but we can have a peaceful bad day.

Homework: Google Step 5 to gain more insight on how it can broaden your horizons.

12-Steps for Recovery from Anything:

Adapted from Alcohol Anonymous

1. We admitted that we were powerless over having problems; that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. We came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

4. We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. We were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. We humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

8. We made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. We sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to any person who is struggling and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

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