All those warnings that the newcomer gets as the old timers watch them inflate with gratitude in the early days only to settle into the humdrum of life and wondering if this is all there is to life clean. Sound familiar I have seen it for myself in others and my ability to see the larger picture and create solutions before the problem presents itself had me looking for ways around this before it got me. The part of the program that teaches us to learn from others took me a while too grasp, but now I watch like a hawk.
I have blogged about finding this solution a few posts back in the 'Rut' post. I will touch on it again in a little bit of a different light today. I believe that when we first come into the program everything is new, we are learning a whole new way to live. We have a whole schwack of new friends to build relationships with and we have new activities to try that are not using ones. Everything we do is new.
Its that newness that actually has us excited and feeling free. Its that newness that keeps our focus off using and how boring life truly can be. After a few months the newness wears off and melancholy sets back in. This is when the pink cloud fades and the work begins. Because lets get real life is not different between using and not using, removing the drugs does not make life easy. But does it really have to be work? If we recognize that its the newness factor that kept us in gratitude can we not keep that going? I am sure some of us used because we were bored with life.
For me, I want to keep thee excitement factor going well past the first year. Upon recognizing this, I waited to get involved with service until the newness factor began to wane slightly for me. Each time my life starts to lose a bit of its lustre of gratitude I add in a new hobby to learn or cultivate a new friendship. I strive to always keep the newness factor alive and well in my life, this keeps me on a pink bubble of life. I keep my enjoyment and amazement of being alive in active freedom by practising this in my life. I don't accept the concept that life has to get tough.
I have dealt with some pretty intense shitty things in my past two years, I am actually struggling to find a job today. Yet life on life's terms does not threaten me today. It did in the beginning and I am grateful to my group for holding my hand through it. Again something new for me. Now I look at the situation differently.... I have alot of free time with no eight hour shift in my day, so I am learning new hobbies while I wait for prospective employers to return my follow up calls. I am still riding a pink cloud through my trials. Two years from now I will be on to a whole new set of experiences that I am fairly certain will continue to have me loving life and living in the amazement gratitude gifts me. For me its learning to function in my Higher power and trust the direction that power is taking me. Even before coming into recovery I had experience with this and can see it working again in my life, where I didn't trust before I do now.
Life is meant to be lived and lived fully. There is so much out there to learn and experience Moving beyond the boarders of my safe little world is what excites me and gives me passion today. The program is what gives me the tools to stay safe while venturing out there. Live and let Live ... it's been my motto since I was a teenager. Again if your not moving forward you are sliding back. I want to keep moving forward today... I see the bright light ahead of me and I am good with following that. Care to join me?
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