Letting go of the negative

God, help me let go of my need to stay immersed in negativity. I can change the energy in my environment and myself from negative to positive. I will affirm the good until it sinks in and feels real. I will also strive to find one quality that I like about someone else who's important to me, and I will take the risk of telling him or her that.
From The Language of Letting Go by Melody Beattie ©1990, Hazelden Foundation.

Today's reading from The Language of Letting Go is pertinent in my life because as an addict I tend to focus on the negatives in my life. I tend to find everything I did wrong, then focus on it and shame myself over it, procrastinate and put off my life and my recovery longer.

I have to confess honestly that sometimes I feel my recovery is taking too long, even think sometimes of just giving up the process of recovery. Then I'll think it's my fault it's going so slow, I'm the one who is screwing everything up, who keeps hanging on to the lure of the addiction. Why can't I just step out of the way and let HP take over? It must surely be easier than I am making it. That is all negative thinking that my addictive self, my diseased self uses to keep me locked in my disease.

Whether it is the wrong way I am working my recovery or the wrong way I am living my life ... if I am using the word "wrong" then I am not accepting myself, and I am not accepting that my HP has a plan for me, whether I understand it or not.

As the AA Big Book says, "Acceptance is the answer to all my problems today." And what better way to accept life on life's terms, on my HP's terms, than to find the things in it for which I can be thankful and can admire. That simple shift in attitude can make all the difference.

That said, I'll transform a couple of negative into a few positives this morning:

Negative:

My addiction leaves me feeling trapped, locked in its clutches and I feel powerless to move ahead with anything else in my life. It is stifling, like being locked in a cellar.

Positives:

I am powerless which clears the way for a power far greater than I to have a role in my life and help me to experience life at a level which I could never have dreamed.

I have seen life at a depth that few people can comprehend; it gives me perspective that helps me to handle situations with a greater understanding. In other words, some things that cause others to freak out, don't even faze me. I can see them in perspective and realize they are passing issues.

My addiction is a manifestion of the pain I felt as a sexually abused child and recovering from this addiction is helping me to recover from the painful feelings I never allowed myself to feel.

Negative:

My recovery is taking too long. I feel sometimes as if I am never going to get it right, that I might as well just give up, that I am one of those "unfortunates" that they talk about who is constitutionally incapable of being honest with myself. Either that, or I'm just too lazy and self-centered to do the work it takes to achieve success in this program.

Postives:

I can share these feelings with others and know they have been there too and that they made it through and have seen the miracles of the program happen over and over again.

I can pray and feel that my HP is there if I just reach out and make "concious contact."

Nobody is asking for perfection but me, and I do achieve success in this program in little steps that I can be very grateful for one little day at at time. For example, already today, I made a list of things I am grateful for about my husband and our relationship and I took the risk of sharing it with him, then let go of the expectation. That is one little grain of success for today. If it's all I get, I still have done something positive, which is a step in the right direction.

One day at a time, one moment at a time, I recover. And I'm certainly grateful that something inside me drives me to keep coming back.