When is enough, enough?

March 21

When is enough, enough?

“What is the difference between full and all?  Don’t know?  Well, let me tell you,” said my sponsor with a wink.  “Full is when the broccoli that went perfectly with the entrée leaves a pleasant smile on your face, full is when the arrow on the gas gauge points to F, these are little indicators of full.  Indications that you have reached all: the wet scary feeling in your mouth after your second piece of pie, all is the gas pouring down the side of your car because you have to try to squeeze more in.”

“Yes, yes,” I reply, “I know when I’ve overdone it; I resent everyone or at least I am cranky about everything.  I know when I’m under doing it, too; I get either a lost feeling or the sense that I should be in charge, but how do I really know that I am doing enough?”

“If your sponsor has a good idea of where you are mentally, physically and spiritually; if the people in your home group can count on you to contribute service regularly.  If most people in most meetings know not just your face, but also your name.  If your sponsees freely admit that you are their sponsor, those are sure signs.  Though the biggest signal for me is how constant my contact is.  If I’m reluctant to pray I’m usually not doing enough of something.”

Learn from pain

*

MATH

If this is the solution why aren't I happy?
I ask my sponsor in a piteous whine.
You've run the equation and the solution equals happiness?
She queries, that's the whole and total answer?
How many times did you go through the computations?

What's your point?
Are you saying happiness isn't the answer?
What about joy and freedom?
I heard someone say that was the goal
I know that's what I heard.

Let's think about it for a hot second
What would you think
If I worked the steps as hard as I do
And as a result walked around in a perpetual grin?
I'd think you had lost your mind.

So you're telling me you believe
The product of recovery is idiocy?
The thing we all are aspiring to is bliss and nothing but?
No, I guess not.
Then what is the solution for you? I ask.

A tally which fits the day I'm having
Joy sometimes fits that bill
But other days it's sadness or concern
There have been days when disbelief
And dismay were part of the appropriate response.

For me, the solution is having an equation
That helps me respond to life
Instead of reacting to it.
That's better than unending happiness
That's wholeness she said with a grin

You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/More-Sober-The-Way-Sane/dp/144141231X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1374072329&sr=8-3&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/Lines-My-Life-Sherrie-Theriault/dp/1448652820/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374072576&sr=1-1&keywords=Lines+from+my+life%2C+Sherrie+theriault

Resistance

March 8

Résistance

Resisting tough love is approaching long run action with short run thinking.  I hate to set the toddling babe down lest he fall, but in the end if I do not put him down he and I will both be the worse for it.  Whether I see a forest or I see trees depends so very much on my perspective, also on my willingness to delay the prevention of minor scrapes to eliminate the need for permanent scaring.    The theme is greater personal responsibility and less irrational fear. Guarding tomorrow’s possibilities by not hamstringing them today through the resistance of tough love saves lives, it saves mine.

Raise the roof on your thinking

*

PICTURES & FRAMES

I paint my way into the corners of the frames.
Each picture I fill diligently,
Color, texture, all the tricks I use.
I work hard to get the desired effect.
I hold nothing back, I put heart and hopes forward.
I load my brush with pigment,
I propel my tongue out of my mouth,
I use it for balance like a kangaroo uses it's tail.
Stroke after stroke I layer the image
My depiction is fresh to me,
I bring the green, the red, the blue,
All of them flow from me.
The canvas fills, my soul soars through the tinctures
Then the disappointment begins,
The complaints, the lamentations,
The perspective is off.
I can't seem to contain this scene
Within the confines of this gilded prison.
I readjust, I tilt my head
I paint from the bottom up, then the top town, No---No.
I must pick up a new canvas and frame.
The oak, burnished and honeyed brown.
I cast to the side the gilt and sculptured casing.
I lay it along the wall with the others.
The many discards of my life
As yet the obvious has escaped me.
The tint, the hue, the angle
Size may diverge but that is all.
I have recreated the same scene
In all the frames,
In all my attempts,
I have painted only one picture.

You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/More-Sober-The-Way-Sane/dp/144141231X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1374072329&sr=8-3&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/Lines-My-Life-Sherrie-Theriault/dp/1448652820/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374072576&sr=1-1&keywords=Lines+from+my+life%2C+Sherrie+theriault

Recognition

February 10

Recognition

All I have are these two hands; I can not lift the world

All I have are these two legs; I can not flee the hoards

All I have is this one heart though need and want prevail

All that’s left is this one mind to try to tell this tale.

Everything in this bright orb is there for me to see

Everything laid out before me all that I can be

Everything that I perceive as wrong and know it in my heart

Everything I think to touch and change believing it’s my art

Once I take the giant reins acceptance escapes the scene

Once the fates are in my grasp chaos is the theme

Once the sight of my right place is lost from in my mind

Once I try to fill the great big shoes is the day that I go blind.

Prune expectation with open-mindedness

*

DON'T BE A FRAUD

Fake it till you make it is like saying,
Keep drinking till you get sober, complains my sponsor.
But what about the things I can't do yet?
You work on them, that's all, you work.

You adjust your attitude.
Practice the steps.
Carry your behind to meetings,
And talk to me and others in your network.

Yeah, that sounds like a breeze.
It's easier than staying sober while lying.
In this program we try to stay honest
And in the moment.

Pretending to feel differently than you do
Defeats your ability to be present
And makes it hard for people to trust you.
But it's so awkward, I grumble.

Which is why we of the alcoholic persuasion,
Try to find short cuts but don't get sucked into them.
Tell the truth and do the hard work of sobriety and
Stay away from people who try to sell you a Softer Way.

You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/More-Sober-The-Way-Sane/dp/144141231X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1374072329&sr=8-3&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/Lines-My-Life-Sherrie-Theriault/dp/1448652820/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374072576&sr=1-1&keywords=Lines+from+my+life%2C+Sherrie+theriault

Openhearted Grief

October 31

OPENHEARTED GRIEF

Tell a tale of openhearted grief and closed-minded terror.  Bend the limits of misery.  Pour over the damned feelings and tired excuses.  Level the cupful of measured tyranny and wipe the drooling face of denial.  The children will not dance tonight; the grass is wet with their tears.  The dogs circle the encampment of desire and come to sleep when we are settled.  Silly ruffled whimsy won’t carry the freight but the bus pulls into the drowsy station filled with tea-lites and pantomime.  This story will close with a hand on the doorknob of hope, an eye on the jelly sandwich of contentment.  Whisper the lullaby to the ones who stay to hear it.  Morning cracks the shell to daytime.  Shattered pieces litter the night; tremors shake my peace of mind.  Sum up the analogies of broken hearts and twisted minds.

Draw from your toes, fingers and memory.

*

Desert Island

When I am left to amuse myself,

more often than not I turn my wicked wit

to redress those whose neglect I sorely feel.

This is childish, this is pointless

and yet I do it and do it well.

I am, too good at being alone and I resent it

and resent every necessity for honing that skill set.

When in the past I have made my mind up

to accept seclusion each overture is a slashing intrusion.

I am not a happy medium,

though I do doubt if such a thing exists.

I am an attention seeker

and when I am not I am an isolation monger.

The wavering nature of human interaction

is an uncertain sea for me, alternating downing me

or leaving me washed- up on some remote shore.

Even amid those I love the most,

I am a skinless writhing neonate,

hyper-reactive and living on the edge.

I somehow know the answer is self-esteem

or spiritual development,

but when in the midst of this imprudent reaction

the paths to these are lost.

I try to hold my breath when underwater,

when on the beach I try not to breathe the sand.

If I survive today I may grow out of this tomorrow.

You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/Sober-On-The-Way-Sane/dp/1440417342/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576888&sr=8-1&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/More-Lines-From-My-Life/dp/1448677203/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576956&sr=8-1&keywords=More+Lines+From+My+Life

Abundance of Water

October 25

ABUNDANCE OF WATER

Waterfalls fail the catch basin and run off to make mud slide from the hills.  Power showers down, but the channels it uses are not always beneficial.  High tide with the push of tsunami wipes out the coast.  Water is the stuff of life, but God forbid it gets out of control, there is no living with it.  I cannot regulate the weather but today I have a plan.  I don’t have to stand out waiting to see how much will come down.  I may not have every contingency covered; I do have a backup for the worse than average season.  Yes, I did dig myself a French-drain, but I started by not living on the flood plain.

Travel in your own good company.

*

Basket Ball

Idiots out number poets, this is a fact,

though I do wonder why.

It cannot be an easy lot spending your days

in slow witted discharge;

I would think they might at least try putting pen to paper.

I think I would rather live in a world filled with bad poets

than drifting on this ship of fools,

The troubadours rise with imbeciles as their cover

and poems fall from favor.

I wonder how I could make verse a contagion,

how could I make it spread?

You may laugh at me, but think what some guy did

with a broken peach basket and a rubber ball.

You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

http://www.amazon.com/Sober-On-The-Way-Sane/dp/1440417342/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576888&sr=8-1&keywords=sober+on+the+way+to+sane

http://www.amazon.com/More-Lines-From-My-Life/dp/1448677203/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1388576956&sr=8-1&keywords=More+Lines+From+My+Life