Some time

It’s not lost on me how therapeutic it was to write about my sobriety when I was just deciding if I could commit to one more day of it. It was essential. I felt that, even if no one was reading it, that there was an accountability in releasing the words and thoughts into the world. I couldn’t deny them – I mean, I could delete them, I suppose – but I was also trying to do this new ‘honesty’ thing. So, I’ve never deleted one – I’ve never gone back and read them all, so far either. I sometimes click on a random entry and read it. I feel it all, but I also have some distance.

Some time. And some distance. Those two concepts brought up immediate anxiety and fear and WANTING in me, before. I couldn’t be patient enough to imagine, really, either of those things being beneficial. As I come to terms with my self and the way (and speed) at which I move through the world, I’m realizing that time and distance are my allies, not my enemies. I suppose it’s got to do with the release, or at least recognizing, of a boat load of fear that kept me submerged in addiction for a very long time. Once recognized and somewhat dealt with, those fears have dissipated. Not entirely, not always – but I don’t hold space in this world in a crouched position, anymore, waiting for the next shoe to drop. I don’t apologize for who I am or how I feel. Sobriety has allowed me to reconnect with people, the world around me, the things I love – my self. I am able to make decisions, stand more firm in what I believe and want, because I am sober – I am sure.

It wasn’t too long ago that I lived in that position. I operated from that viewpoint, of fear. And I remember it, physically in my body, whenever fear or self-doubt comes to the surface for me – which it certainly does, on a regular basis. I’ve learned this with patience, too – that my humanity is what I was looking for, at the bottom of copious cheap wine bottles. I was trying to connect with the part of me that REALLY felt fear and self-doubt. I mean, mostly I was trying to connect and find the piece of myself that felt joy, creativity, love, excitement and all the other things on that end of the spectrum. But, early on in sobriety, after the cloud of rose evaporated and things got .. uncomfortable, I recognized that this too was what I was missing – the fear and the pain of life, that no one is immune to. I sought indifference ans escape for my entire drinking, adult life.  I think I was truly terrified that I couldn’t survive it; that some part, if not all, of me would be absolutely destroyed by witnessing life as it was given to me. It was too hard. The sad part is the true extent of that delusion – I believed it, as I poured shitty California reds on top of every feeling I had and numbed myself to every aspect of reality. I was misguided, as I think most alcoholics are. I don’t fault myself for that, in a deep way though – I don’t find it a moral failure on my part. A misguided compass? For sure. Caused by what? Life? My genetics? My experience? My personality? Who knows. Doesn’t matter to me, now.

The point of my compass today leans to true north. And it’s only because I’ve cleared my brain and my soul of all of the things that caused me to move further away from the person I truly am. Being sober, being intensely and purposefully present in my daily life, I have been able to re-frame my understanding of who I want to be – I’ve found this rocky, uncertain path for myself that feels unlike any choice or life I ever thought was on the table, for me. It’s tethered to my soul – I’m connected.