Post by Dana on Aug 30, 2015 11:24:12 GMT -5
A thread started by Ron on the old forum:
In Search of (the authentic) Self
Categories: 12 Step Recovery
rjim
# 18685.1(1 of 5)
Jul-5 8:49 AM
rjim
Posts:7459
Dot said (in reply to my post #18211.630 over in the Day 0 thread):
>>>Hi there
Well don't know whether or not this post applies to blue, but it's spot on for me:). I wear so many masks, invisibility cloaks, body armor I have no idea what's underneath. Remove one, is this me? Nope. Another? Nope. And so on. I'm pretty sure there's an exoskeleton of some kind of unknown material as well
. It is exhausting pretending through life. I'm not trying to do this exactly, I just don't know how NOT to do it. It's all I understand. I know the genuine me is somewhere in this mess, and I get glimpses, but she's an elusive creature. And very, very frightened.<<<
Dot, I'm replying here because I think the topic deserves its own thread.
I agree. Finding our true, or authentic, self is a lot like peeling back the layers of an onion. Remove one layer, there's another underneath. At times it even involves the tears to complete the comparison.
I started with the 12 Steps, which are an elegant, simple formula for discovering and discarding the baggage of the past. That's necessary because all that baggage obscures our view of our true selves. In a very real way, Steps 4-9 let us sort through all the stuff we've been led to believe is our self, identify the stuff that's no longer useful to us (such as defense mechanisms that were once useful, even necessary, but are now holding us back, e.g., the masks, cloaks, armor, lies, etc.) and get rid of it.
What's left is the good stuff, like the honesty that we knew was good, but never seemed like a good idea at the time, or maybe just didn't get us what we wanted when we wanted it. The rest of the good stuff is all the other virtues and principles that we believe in, the ideals we would aspire to if all the crap we've been hanging onto wasn't holding us back. A lot of these you'll discover only after you've gotten rid of enough of the crap to expose them.
While I was sorting through my baggage, I took a look at my faith, what did I really have faith in, where did I put my trust. Was any of that faith or trust unjustified? What things did I believe just because I was told they were true, or just because most people I knew seemed to believe them. Examples: I had faith in the program of AA (the Steps). That was justified. For years, I had faith in science. That was unjustified. For quite a few years I believed that the best I could hope for was living continuously recovering, never recovered. I believed that because just about everyone I had contact with and just about everything I read told me this is the way it is. Turns out not to be true at all. I did recover, partly because I finally chose to believe what Bill W. had written in that book with the subtitle, "The Story of How Many Thousands of Men and Women Have Recovered from Alcoholism".
This is all work. Mental work, but still grueling as working on a chain gang. But it's all manageable by taking baby steps. Discard the obvious and the easiest baggage first, then keep digging and tossing. Your authentic self will be found once enough light can reach it. She's there. You're not reinventing yourself, you've always been in there. Just hidden behind the piles.
I hope this helps a little, Dot. You deserve to shine in your own special light.
ron
---------------------------------------------------
doodoodotdot1
# 18685.2(2 of 5)
Replied to: rjim
Jul-9 8:36 PM
doodoodotdot1
Posts:3279
Thanks for this amazing post Ron. You've sent some other good ones to our newer folks. Who've been posting some crazy good stuff. Or at least stuff I can relate too.
I am traveling right now. Visiting my poor ole parents. God it's awful. So sad. But I'm weathering it. They are shinning examples of the destruction of alcohol on the human mind. I wish a newcomer could witness them....it's a serious deterant. For so many years I really only considered my body...as in below the neck, and the damage done to internal organs. But that didn't include my brain. Scares the heck outta me now.
I will give this post proper consideration when I get home on Monday. I also book marked your blog. Thank you Ron.
---------------------------------------------------
Igotaclue
# 18685.3(3 of 5)
Replied to: doodoodotdot1
Jul-13 10:18 PM
Igotaclue
Posts:2841
Hi there Miss Dot. I have known you for a long time now. I do believe you are real. You love, laugh, cry like all of us do living life. You may think your searching for you but I believe you have known her all along. Facing the kind of pain you have gone though and not giving up makes you amazing to me. We fall and get up many times but you learn from your falls. Life is a journey and it changes us all the time. Who are we, we are strong, we grieve, we love, we fail and we learn each and every day. You are beautiful inside and out and maybe your the only one that doesn't know it. I do! For me the lighter my load became the happier I became and started to like myself just the way I am.
Love you Clue
If life knocks you down you get back up and say, is that all you have Bitch!
----------------------------------------------------
doodoodotdot1
# 18685.4(4 of 5)
Replied to: Igotaclue
Jul-14 10:11 PM
doodoodotdot1
Posts:3279
Thanks clue. You're right....about me not knowing that I am good. I'm getting back to that person and it feels good. I have such strong codependent issues that I slip away without realizing it. And then I'm left standing there dumbfounded.
-----------------------------------------------------
rjim
# 18685.5(5 of 5)
Replied to: doodoodotdot1
Jul-16 7:25 AM
rjim
Posts:7459
You're welcome.
I was just thinking a few nights ago that pretty much everyone here has been posting 'crazy good stuff' for some time now. This stuff is hard to do, harder to talk about, and yet harder to try to write about. But believe it when I say that I'm learning from each person here, and lovin' it. Thank you, and the whole forumily too.
In Search of (the authentic) Self
Categories: 12 Step Recovery
rjim
# 18685.1(1 of 5)
Jul-5 8:49 AM
rjim
Posts:7459
Dot said (in reply to my post #18211.630 over in the Day 0 thread):
>>>Hi there
Well don't know whether or not this post applies to blue, but it's spot on for me:). I wear so many masks, invisibility cloaks, body armor I have no idea what's underneath. Remove one, is this me? Nope. Another? Nope. And so on. I'm pretty sure there's an exoskeleton of some kind of unknown material as well
. It is exhausting pretending through life. I'm not trying to do this exactly, I just don't know how NOT to do it. It's all I understand. I know the genuine me is somewhere in this mess, and I get glimpses, but she's an elusive creature. And very, very frightened.<<<Dot, I'm replying here because I think the topic deserves its own thread.
I agree. Finding our true, or authentic, self is a lot like peeling back the layers of an onion. Remove one layer, there's another underneath. At times it even involves the tears to complete the comparison.
I started with the 12 Steps, which are an elegant, simple formula for discovering and discarding the baggage of the past. That's necessary because all that baggage obscures our view of our true selves. In a very real way, Steps 4-9 let us sort through all the stuff we've been led to believe is our self, identify the stuff that's no longer useful to us (such as defense mechanisms that were once useful, even necessary, but are now holding us back, e.g., the masks, cloaks, armor, lies, etc.) and get rid of it.
What's left is the good stuff, like the honesty that we knew was good, but never seemed like a good idea at the time, or maybe just didn't get us what we wanted when we wanted it. The rest of the good stuff is all the other virtues and principles that we believe in, the ideals we would aspire to if all the crap we've been hanging onto wasn't holding us back. A lot of these you'll discover only after you've gotten rid of enough of the crap to expose them.
While I was sorting through my baggage, I took a look at my faith, what did I really have faith in, where did I put my trust. Was any of that faith or trust unjustified? What things did I believe just because I was told they were true, or just because most people I knew seemed to believe them. Examples: I had faith in the program of AA (the Steps). That was justified. For years, I had faith in science. That was unjustified. For quite a few years I believed that the best I could hope for was living continuously recovering, never recovered. I believed that because just about everyone I had contact with and just about everything I read told me this is the way it is. Turns out not to be true at all. I did recover, partly because I finally chose to believe what Bill W. had written in that book with the subtitle, "The Story of How Many Thousands of Men and Women Have Recovered from Alcoholism".
This is all work. Mental work, but still grueling as working on a chain gang. But it's all manageable by taking baby steps. Discard the obvious and the easiest baggage first, then keep digging and tossing. Your authentic self will be found once enough light can reach it. She's there. You're not reinventing yourself, you've always been in there. Just hidden behind the piles.
I hope this helps a little, Dot. You deserve to shine in your own special light.
ron
---------------------------------------------------
doodoodotdot1
# 18685.2(2 of 5)
Replied to: rjim
Jul-9 8:36 PM
doodoodotdot1
Posts:3279
Thanks for this amazing post Ron. You've sent some other good ones to our newer folks. Who've been posting some crazy good stuff. Or at least stuff I can relate too.
I am traveling right now. Visiting my poor ole parents. God it's awful. So sad. But I'm weathering it. They are shinning examples of the destruction of alcohol on the human mind. I wish a newcomer could witness them....it's a serious deterant. For so many years I really only considered my body...as in below the neck, and the damage done to internal organs. But that didn't include my brain. Scares the heck outta me now.
I will give this post proper consideration when I get home on Monday. I also book marked your blog. Thank you Ron.
---------------------------------------------------
Igotaclue
# 18685.3(3 of 5)
Replied to: doodoodotdot1
Jul-13 10:18 PM
Igotaclue
Posts:2841
Hi there Miss Dot. I have known you for a long time now. I do believe you are real. You love, laugh, cry like all of us do living life. You may think your searching for you but I believe you have known her all along. Facing the kind of pain you have gone though and not giving up makes you amazing to me. We fall and get up many times but you learn from your falls. Life is a journey and it changes us all the time. Who are we, we are strong, we grieve, we love, we fail and we learn each and every day. You are beautiful inside and out and maybe your the only one that doesn't know it. I do! For me the lighter my load became the happier I became and started to like myself just the way I am.
Love you Clue
If life knocks you down you get back up and say, is that all you have Bitch!
----------------------------------------------------
doodoodotdot1
# 18685.4(4 of 5)
Replied to: Igotaclue
Jul-14 10:11 PM
doodoodotdot1
Posts:3279
Thanks clue. You're right....about me not knowing that I am good. I'm getting back to that person and it feels good. I have such strong codependent issues that I slip away without realizing it. And then I'm left standing there dumbfounded.
-----------------------------------------------------
rjim
# 18685.5(5 of 5)
Replied to: doodoodotdot1
Jul-16 7:25 AM
rjim
Posts:7459
You're welcome.
I was just thinking a few nights ago that pretty much everyone here has been posting 'crazy good stuff' for some time now. This stuff is hard to do, harder to talk about, and yet harder to try to write about. But believe it when I say that I'm learning from each person here, and lovin' it. Thank you, and the whole forumily too.