Written by, Paul D.
I was not always able to make choices.
It is said that no man can serve two masters. I had only one master and its name was addiction. This master forbids me to make decent friends because it wants me isolated and alone so it can kill me quietly in its own way. It forbids me to determine what is best for me and my loved ones. It took away my options. The only choices I was allowed to make were choices based on what served him, my addiction. Where can I get more …where is my next hit coming from …I need more …This master gave me habits, urges, and a troubled mind that all caused me to want to self-medicate. I used various substances to try to quiet my troubled mind. Tobacco, marijuana, alcohol, sex, food, sugars, name it, if a little is good for me, and a lot is bad for me …then I overdid the good, went for the bad and abused it.
Today, I choose. I have choices today. I can decide on what is best for me and my loved ones. Today, I know I am an addict. I know that I still like being numbed out to where I do not have to think. This is real… The struggle is real. I also know that if I am stopped, I am free from the chains that bound me to the addictions. With God’s help and the help of the programs I can make a choice. I am no longer powerless not to choose.
Today, I choose not to smoke cigarettes or tobacco of any kind. Although once they gave me comfort, I cannot imagine myself smoking again. I started smoking cigarettes in my early teens. I had a period when I was almost two decades tobacco free. One night I smoked one cigarette, brought a pack that night, and was two packs a day for the next ten years. Today, I have a choice, Today, I choose sobriety over tobacco.
Today, I choose not to smoke marijuana. Again, I am an addict. I had stayed away from pot for 17 years, then decided it would be a good idea to smoke some. I voted for it to be legal. It was something I deserved. Pot now is not like the pot I used to use back in the day. American agricultural ingenuity driven by market forces have helped to create strains of pot which are exponentially stronger than what I was accustomed to years ago. I like it but I know it is damaging for me in many ways. What started as just, a “hey let me see if it is true what they say about the new store bought pot,” went to, “damn it I need more and I need more.” I like to say that one is too many and a thousand is not enough. Today, I have a choice. Today, I choose sobriety over marijuana.
Today, I choose. I have always had a bottle I could turn to, as Merle would say. I used to drink heavily. The bottle of whisky with the built-in handle, 1.75 liters of alcohol, was mine to consume every two days. Sometimes that was not enough so I would then go out drinking. A body cannot take that kind of punishment day after day, week after week, year after year. Although I managed to drink like that for decades, it cost me two wives, two entire households, and estranged kids. I paid a grand price for alcohol. I could not stop… I did not have any choices. My girlfriend asked me once if I ever thought about stopping drinking. She did not drink and did not like it when I drank. I thought about it for a minute and told her, “No… I have never thought about not drinking and it is foreign to me to even imagine a life without alcohol.” That girlfriend is now my wife of twenty five years, and she was instrumental in my entering recovery and giving me the choices I have today. Today, because I can… I choose sobriety over alcohol.
I have heard it said that religion uses hell to scare normal people into acting right, to prevent them from going to hell. Addicts on the other hand, have been in their own personal hell and do not want to return. Addicts need their own kind of God. Not the punishing damning God of the Old Testament. Not a God that one needs somebody to interpret for them. Addicts need a loving, caring, and forgiving God that wants community with them and tries to bring out the very best in each one of them. In our program, we call this higher power. Not me, not my power. Bigger than I am. A Higher Power.
I look back on my life and realize that I have been lucky. Upon further investigation with higher power centered glasses on, I realize that God had spared me from the full consequences of my addictions. Why? Why would God save me from the punishment others have suffered for less infractions? Because He has work for me to do. I have been around and have seen many things. Sometimes, I am able to reach people that others can not. By coming to meetings, sponsoring and being of service, I set an example of what a 12-Step life can look like.
I did not always choose God. I turned my back on him years ago, but he never turned his back on me. He just waited patiently for me to ruin my life and when I did, he offered me hope and set a place for me at the table. Today, I have a choice…I choose my Higher Power. I choose God.
