My sponsor asked me “Who is the man you want to be?”
I have no idea. I have no idea who I am now! I have no idea what is available to me. I can’t tell you what the possibilities are. Please give me a menu. Could you give me a list of choices? What are my options? But, you know what? I can be anyone I want to be. The world’s mine oyster. Which may be true. In Shakespeare’s comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Pistol said he would open it with sword. Sure, it’s mine, but until I open it, I don’t know what’s in it. It’s going to be hard to open, but I’m sure, well worth it.
Emotional Maturity
I don’t know what I’m capable of. Going through life drunk or stoned, never really looking at myself to consider my potential. I’ve never grown up. I’ve never matured. I never really thought about others and considered their lives. I just stumbled along on my merry way.
They say that you are the emotional age that you were when you started drinking. That’s probably why I’ve been accused of acting like a teenager so often. But when you start drinking, you stop maturing. You stop learning. It’s been found that alcohol has a strong effect on the ability of the brain to store things in short-term memory. There’s no path to long-term memory without going through short-term memory. Maybe that is why drunks don’t learn from their mistakes–half the time, they don’t remember what they did wrong.
Without remembering what you did wrong and spending the time to figure out better methods for future actions, then, no, there will be no emotional growth. So I need to keep my eyes open and my head clear, so I can see what’s happening around me, what results I am responsible for and what is a better course of action.
Doing 12th Step Work
In AA’s responsibility statement, we are reminded that we should be available to those seeking help. This is true 12th step work. But we are also reminded, in that same step, to “practice these principles in all our affairs” which emphasizes carrying 12-step work into everyday life.
And that is the man I want to become. I want to be available. 100% available to anyone who needs me. When someone needs me, they need ME, not someone else. There was a reason they sought ME. I have unique talents, knowledge, and experience that they may be lacking. I need to share those characteristics of ME with whoever has chosen me. I need to make sure that I am physically, emotionally, and spiritually ready to give myself to them. God created me this way to do His work. I need to be available when I am called. If I am drinking or drugging, I am not “on call”. He put me here to carry out his will. He put me here to be of service to my family and friends and perhaps, someday, a complete stranger.
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This is quite a post asking “Who is the man you want to be?”
Please allow a bit of a share…
In my service work at the County Jail I am in the habit of writing the following on the white board:
BEING > doing
Lemme explain – Who I am informs what I do, what I think and what I say. BEING is greater than doing.
If I am a jerk I’ll act like one and it’ll be evident to all. If however, I surrender to being transformed (made new) it will be on display in everything I do, everywhere I go and everything I say.
I attended a weekend AA conference about a year ago. One of the featured speakers spoke of the oft repeated refrain “If you want what we have then you’ll do what we do.” What I experienced in coming into the rooms was attractive to me, so I went back again and again.
The speaker continued, “At first, I really did want what I saw you had!” The longer I have been sober the more I realized I no longer wanted what you had. The relationships in AA that I had grew.
I woke up one day and decided that there were some folks I knew very closely that I wanted what they WANTED.”
SUMMUM BONUM
😎Thank me for sharing😎