The Wisdom to Know the Difference

My hands are tucked under my thighs, my legs are swaying back and forth under my hard, red chair. I focus on the fibers in the carpet because I can’t seem to get a grip on this overwhelming anxiety. There are seven packets of tissues and six blue half sheets of paper in the middle of this imperfect circle. Some chairs are red, some are black, not all the same. There are men and women, mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, friends and siblings.

It’s intimidating to look up and see so many of you, but I can’t quite understand why. After all, we are here for the same reason.

This room is cold, it sends chills down my spine and raises the hair on my arms. This circle is warm. It is a safe place, a nice place. When the time feels right we stand together and crowd the seven packets of tissues and six blue sheets of paper. Our imperfect circle becomes one. The relation to the addict becomes inadmissible as we join hands. You can feel the damage, the torn hearts, the mending souls. You can hear the sadness. You can feel it through them because you’ve felt it from within.

We recite the serenity prayer, pray for peace and let go of our neighbor’s hand but this doesn’t break our circle. We sit back down and even though we have finished reciting the serenity prayer the words aren’t lost. Somehow the four beige walls around us keep sending them back.

These walls provide us with a sense of belonging. This circle allows our hearts to open, our minds to feel free, our voice, to be heard. We pass a blue, hard-stock sheet of paper around the circle. It passes through twelve different hands. A different hand, a different step. Each week we discuss a new step more in-depth. It may not be the one that you are focusing on this week but going through each step gives us wisdom, perhaps, a little more understanding.

We all have a chance to share who brought us to this circle, where they are in recovery, and where you are today. I think the anxiety lessens a little each week because I now have the courage to look up. I can see and hear that I am not the only one lost, and damaged, and searching for the right answers.

Now, after six weeks of sitting in this red chair, I can see there is no right answer. We are all in the same boat of allowing our thoughts to run around aimlessly in our minds, trying to fix our chaotic, unmanageable life. This is when our boat starts to sink; which sounds a little terrifying, doesn’t it?

My boat was submerged in water and I thought there was no hope. I forgot to bring a life jacket and as my boat started to sink, I went along with it. Six weeks and I am sitting here having an epiphany because this imperfect beautiful circle is my life jacket.

We come together and support one another because we get it. We’ve been through the unthinkable, the unforgettable and despite the pain we feel, we are all here with life jackets on. We too, are in recovery; taking it one day at a time.

We come here with a heavy heart. At times, depleted thoughts, we struggle to let go because we are afraid that if something goes wrong we won’t be able to say, “I did everything I could”. We are afraid it is our fault.

We are working our 12 steps and attempting to trust that our higher power can lead us to a more manageable lifestyle and even that can be a struggle because our higher power isn’t tangible. It’s not like the ocean where you can see the waves rolling in, you can touch the cool, salty water. We are in search of something physical, something solid because that gives us the notion that we can fix it. You can’t touch sobriety. You can’t see what you are trying to fix because it’s simply not there. It is difficult to trust something you can’t see, something you can’t touch. Unless it’s you.

I realize that now, that I never had control, not once in the last 12 years I’ve been trying. Looking back at all the times I thought I was saving him and fixing him- the only thing I was doing was draining myself. I never fixed a situation that I wasn’t a part of, and I never will because I don’t carry that power.

That’s the beauty of this village we have created. We share our painful stories but with pain, comes wisdom. The wisdom to know the difference.

As we come together again at the end of our meeting, we join hands but this time, a little differently. We recite the serenity prayer and add in “keep coming back- it works!” You can feel the strength; you feel the power and the courage. You can hear the hope. You can feel it through them, because you can feel it from within.