I can see why some of the items are on the list. I have had three rice cookers, all three given to me by my dad, and I have rarely used them. I have a bread machine that I use constantly for pizza dough. I’ve only made bread in it a few times and one time I made a huge batch of dough for cinnamon rolls (I was a hit with the neighborhood kids), but for pizza dough, it’s a real time saver.

Also on that list – books. Books?  I love books. I have a large collection of cookbooks and while I do look things up on the internet, I love to sit down with my cookbooks and find new dishes. I’m never going to be a kindle person, because I love holding the book in my hands, looking at the glossy photos, making notes on the pages, looking at the books lined up neatly on the shelf. The idea that books might grow obsolete just does not make sense to me. It’s heresy. Honestly, it makes my stomach hurt a little.

Ice cream makers are lumped with bread machines, they don’t even get their own place on the list, the author finds them that worthless. I don’t have an ice cream maker now, but I did at one time and we would use it a couple of times a month. It wasn’t the most cost effective appliance, but the kids loved it and some things you do just because they are fun. The same goes for the Polaroid camera. Some things in life are not about ease, they are about the process.

When I was a kid, my grandma had an old school ice cream maker that required rock salt and an incredible amount of noise. I can remember the machine going at family reunions and the ice cream took forever in coming, but the taste of that fresh vanilla or strawberry desert was better than anything else I had ever tasted.

When I think about Grandma’s machine, the whole family reunion experience is there – in and out the back door with the cousins, the warm sun, smelling something on Grandpa’s barbeque, swimming in the pool, lots of hugs and kisses. Not everything is about fast, easy, and convenient. Slow down. Pull that useless ice cream maker off the shelf and make something cold and yummy with the kids.

Image credit: Directron.com

Post from: Blisstree

Don’t Throw Out the Ice Cream Maker

From the current online Grapevine issue – “A Child of Woodstock”, additional validation of many years of my adult life. Similar thoughts had been expressed to me well after the divorce when I had seen my ex for the first time in many months. She didn’t appear to be the person I had known and I brought it to my sponsor. His explanation was quite close;

“What is relevant here, as I began to realize slowly in AA, is that it was alcohol that made our marriage possible for all the years we stayed together. We drank as our parents did, and liquor flowed into the fissures between us. It erased our reality. It cloaked our deep estrangement from each other and ourselves. It made deception and inauthenticity livable.”

My wife rarely drank and didn’t drink alcoholically (then). Alcohol had a profound and direct influence on her humanity through her family before me. I added new chapters.

The words that ring true for me in this lady’s sharing are the erasure of reality, deception and inauthenticity. Alcohol definitely does that, from my personal experience. The paths were not identical yet our reality wasn’t real, we deceived each other and we weren’t able to be authentic with each other. She might not see it the same way. The point is the level of damage alcohol brings to a relationship that had hope and wonder. Alcohol created hopelessness and bewilderment. Which, despite the amends, will always be part of that first “life.”

I must continue to remember that my God has graced me with a gift beyond my wildest imagination. He transcends all the earthly troubles. I am grateful.

Post from: Blisstree

Alcohol Erased Their Reality

I know we’ll continue to hear this in meetings – ““I was a functioning alcoholic – I had a job, went to work, made money,” etc. etc. And I know those folks will hold fast to that belief. So be it.

Dr. Bob knew…

Pages 175-176;

“I developed two distinct phobias. One was the fear of not sleeping, and the other was the fear of running out of liquor. Not being a man of means, I knew that if I did not stay sober enough to earn money, I would run out of liquor.”

What Bob did was exactly what I did – substituted.

“Most of the time, therefore, I did not take the morning drink which I craved so badly, but instead would fill up on large doses of sedatives to quiet the jitters, which distressed me terribly.”

I had found a different “sedative” but it worked the same.

Then;

“This routine went on with few interruptions for seventeen years. It was really a horrible nightmare, this earning money, getting liquor, smuggling it home, getting drunk, morning jitters, taking large doses of sedatives to make it possible for me to earn more money, and so on ad nauseam.”

Yeah, functional.

Post from: Blisstree

Dr. Bob, Phobias and Functionality

From the foreword to the Second Edition of the Big Book Alcoholics Anonymous;

“So far, upon the total problem of several million actual and potential alcoholics in the world, we have made only a scratch. In all probability, we shall never be able to touch more than a fair fraction of the alcohol problem in all its ramifications. Upon therapy for the alcoholic himself, we surely have no monopoly. Yet it is out great hope that all those who have as yet found no answer may begin to find one in the pages of this book and will presently join us on the high road to a new freedom.”

Let’s see – you’ve been dying horribly for a long time, you’ve chased away all those who love you, no one has, up until now, told you there is a way to change, someone says “I have a way out,” and you tell them they’re lying to you. Or – you tell them no thanks. Better yet, you blast it across the globe by way of the Internet that the solution is a lie. People continue to die. You continue to fight the solution.

How does that make sense? Please, someone clue me in?

Oh yes, one more thing, did I mention you can have it – for free???

Post from: Blisstree

No Monopoly Great Hope New Freedom

Thankfully, our founders foresaw these people and wrote;

“Do not be discouraged if your prospect does not respond at once. Search out another alcoholic and try again. You are sure to find someone desperate enough to accept with eagerness what you offer. We find it a waste of time to keep chasing a man who cannot or will not work with you. If you leave such a person alone, he may soon become convinced that he cannot recover by himself. To spend too much time on any one situation is to deny some other alcoholic an opportunity to live and be happy.”

I didn’t cause it, I can’t control it and I can’t cure it. I can try because I am uniquely qualified but I can’t sell someone short who really wants it while wasting my breath on someone who doesn’t. God obviously has other plans for them or different timing than I perceive.

Their anger, when misdirected at me or you, when we caused that person no harm at all, is unwarranted and ought carry no emotional weight at all. Besides, God will sort it all out…

Next?

Post from: Blisstree

Move Along – Who’s Next?

Referencing comments from the crosstalk topic and conference approved literature, there is a quote from one of my older posts that Glenn C. put together at Hindsfoot;

“I am trying to avoid sounding overdramatic about this issue, but an A.A. which no longer follows the traditional A.A. program laid down by the good old-timers, will lose its heart and spirit, and its power to transform human lives and lift lost souls out of the miry pit where they had lain them down to die. The good old-timers took what they received from God and passed it on to us. We in turn must take their message and pass it on to the next generation of newcomers, or we will have failed to carry out the task which God assigned us.

How could it conceivably be “against the rules” in A.A. to read what these good old-timers wrote, and the books that they advised newcomers to read? Let’s start using some simple common sense. The authentic tradition of the good old-timers — the ones who were proved to be channels of grace by the hundreds of lives they saved — is the most accurate touchstone we possess for judging the worth of our message and our practices today.”

I trust what those old bast**ds gave me because it has worked for almost 19 years. Someone with 25 years may see it differently and that might be okay except that their concerns seemed to have been based in unfounded fears (my perception of someone else’s perception).

I can’t apologize for what I believe in and has saved my life and probably my soul, so I won’t. I will not allow myself to be a part of the removal of AA’s heart and soul because I refused to use simple common sense. And I will continue to champion what I was taught, what was unconditionally passed on to me.

Post from: Blisstree

Heart and Spirit

Obviously there are those who are so incredibly wrapped up in themselves that they believe it is correct and proper to speak down about a new beginner’s meeting simply because it was announced that the format would follow some level of “crosstalk.”

“Oh, I would recommend to my people they not go there – crosstalk is such a no-no.” (Paraphrased)

Yeah, I know I ought not take it personally. I was told by someone I respect to alter the announcement. I will – for the sake of the newcomer. But for those of you who feel the necessity to character assassinate one of the most important tools I was presented with in my recovery – it isn’t happening! Got it?

I can deal with it. There are thousands upon thousands of folks who are yet to come to A.A. in the hope that a better life can be had by them. I know for certain that God will level the playing field if He deems it necessary. So, if you idiots get too far out of control, God will provide whatever reality check He thinks will wake you up.

But, right now and in the hereafter, you will not be allowed to crap on my recovery. Crosstalk helped save my life and the lives of many of my friends. Therefore, you’ll know who you are, if you were character assassinating our new meeting behind our backs you might have cost a newcomer their opportunity. I pray you can live with that. I couldn’t. Idiot.

Read the balance of this post which contained this quote from a G.S.O. staff member;

Looking at the subject from an AA’s point of view, a G.S.O. staff member says, “Comparing notes, many of us realized that nonjudgmental suggestions we had received in meetings in response to something we had shared, was very beneficial to our recovery. It is how we learn, and that’s what ’sharing experience, strength and hope’ is all about. Also, there is a thin line between guidelines and rules; and experience suggests that in A.A.’s ‘benign anarchy,’ rules, rigidity and attempts to control don’t work very well.” Whether an individual A.A. group chooses to include the crosstalk ‘guidelines’ in its meeting format is entirely up to its group conscience to determine, of course. But please do not say that such guidelines came from the General Service Office.“

Or came out of your sick and diseased mind regardless how many years appear after your name.

Post from: Blisstree

You’re Not Allowed To Crap On My Recovery!

Page 113;

“We temporarily cease to grow because we feel satisfied that there is no need for all of A.A.’s Twelve Steps for us. We are doing fine on a few of them, the First Step and that part of the Twelfth where we “carry the message.” In A.A. slang, that blissful state is known as ‘two-stepping.’ And it can go on for years.

The best intentioned of us can fall for the ‘two-step’ illusion. Sooner or later the pink cloud stage will wear off and things go disappointingly dull. We begin to think that A.A. doesn’t pay off after all. We become puzzled and discouraged.

Then perhaps life, as it has a way of doing, suddenly hands us a great big lump that we can’t begin to swallow, let alone digest. We fail to get a worked-for promotion. We lose that good job. Maybe there are serious domestic or romantic difficulties, or perhaps that boy we thought God was looking after becomes a military casualty.”

I.E. the realities of life jump up and bite us in the a**! And if we’re not fully centered, or grounded, in the Twelve Steps, chances are we’ll drink again.

If you’re part of the “gang” who’s out there trying to convince newcomers that they can stay sober based on service work before they’re versed in the Twelve Steps, stop it, then go back and fix what you’ve done.

“But obviously you cannot transmit something you haven’t got.”

Post from: Blisstree

Two-Stepping

September is National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month. B5 media’s Health and Wellness Channel (check out B5’s new design btw) is taking the moment to present our collective individual experiences with the Twelve Steps. Or, we’re going to do the research needed to offer our readers valuable information on the Twelve Steps relating to a number of areas in the human nature.

If you are a new reader here are the Twelve Steps according to Alcoholics Anonymous. There are over 2000 other variations relating to groups and gatherings and fellowships other than AA who have their own versions;

• Step 1 – We admitted we were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable
• Step 2 – Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity
• Step 3 – Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him
• Step 4 – Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
• Step 5 – Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs
• Step 6 – Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character
• Step 7 – Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings
• Step 8 – Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all
• Step 9 – Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others
• Step 10 – Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it
• Step 11 – Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out
• Step 12 – Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs

If you’re not familiar with National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month, here are the basics from Recoverymonth.org;

Every year, towns, counties, and states around the country observe National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month (Recovery Month) in September. This year, the 19th annual Recovery Month recognizes the impact that real people and real stories have on recovery, and celebrates those who have worked to advance the treatment and recovery landscape.

In 2008, we are highlighting the people for whom treatment and long-term recovery have given a renewed outlook on life. We invite you to take part in our theme, “Join the Voices for Recovery: Real People, Real Recovery,” and spread the word that addiction is a medical illness and that treatment is effective and recovery is possible. By getting involved, you can help more people on a path of recovery to lead more fulfilling lives.

Our other Health and Wellness bloggers thought I could offer you all some background on the Twelve Steps. Strangely, that feels like a difficult prospect due to the fact that most folks aren’t familiar with them. I believe the best information I might give you is that the Twelve Steps, regardless of which fellowship they are associated with, are designed to do the same thing – bring the person who practices them to a spiritual awakening and a psychic change sufficient enough to bring about a radical change in thinking. The change in thinking defines a blueprint for living making clear the realities of life allowing us to live free from our addictions and to find happiness in life that we hadn’t known before.

Post from: Blisstree

September – National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month

For me, the most important thing I want to remember is that when I do hear someone say this, currently, my belly barometer goes off. I.E. I get this instant feeling in the pit of my stomach that telling someone they are in the right place sounds so much like judgment unwarranted.

What others have mentioned about our courts is also our experience in this area. The courts are simply dumping folks by the dozens into AA meetings because they’ve had some level of a problem with the law regarding alcohol. It has become convenient, imho, for the courts to do this. The problem with this is they are also dumping drug addicts into AA. Of course that is their prerogative. It’s too bad they seem to know nothing of Narcotics Anonymous.

God continues to work His miracles anyway! I just wrote about seeing some friends who found their way to NA. I am grateful God is still in charge.

Anyhow… sooo what we do is offer new folks the opportunity to speak to us, right? We welcome any and all without prejudice. Perhaps some are not real alcoholics. More than likely many aren’t real alcoholics, right? But what does that mean to us? Do we change the message that we carry because we “think” they might not belong?

I don’t think so. We continue to pass this on the way it was given to us. If it doesn’t fit or is not wanted, we let that go. Then, the folks that don’t belong eventually filter out. Some will return later, having become real alcoholics. God will find the right place for them.

Having listened to many along the way, when I hear someone who has a story that sounds quite familiar I have no problem trying to speak with them and elicit answers to some pertinent questions – those I was asked.

“What happens when you pick up the first drink?”

If I receive a very similar answer to my own I can tell the person that it sounds like you’re in the right place but I remind them that is not my call to make – it’s theirs.

Post from: Blisstree

Are You In The Right Place?