PATIENCE MONTH: DAY 24: “It is very strange that the years teach us patience – that the shorter our time, the greater our capacity for waiting.” ― Elizabeth Taylor
Time is a man-made construct. None of us has more or less of it than anyone else. We all get 24 hours to spend as we see fit. There is a tendency, in our culture, to be victimized by time; believing ourselves to be at its mercy, but that is just an illusion.
We envy those who seem to have more or less time than we do and feel that we are not in control of our time and how it is spent. At any moment, we all have the ability to shape-shift time and make new or different choices with how we view and spend it.
I remember being new here and learning to wrap my head around the concept of going to a meeting every day and calling a sponsor every day and writing in a journal every day and so on. I thought my head would explode with all these demands. Ha!
What I did not look at was that I spent countless numbers of hours each day in the use of drugs and alcohol. Oh! And running around, trying to get them both. Now, being efficient, I had begun to work in bars, since I wanted to be there anyway. But I was not functional much of the time at either the job or the drinking. I could not do either well at the same time. Oh!
And then there were the long days and nights spent sitting in custody or behind bars. Oh yeah! And I did little or nothing during that time! Ugh! Talk about impatient…nothing worse than waiting for bail to post or days to go by with nothing to do but sit in there!
I am sure that, in the early days, I went to too many meetings. I am sure, also, that I have spent too much time on working with those who did not stay on the recovery path (also remember the work I do!)
So, I may have “wasted” a lot more of my time than I should have.
BUT, I do not know which meetings I can consider ancillary or “extra;” just like I cannot pick out those steps I could have left out; or which newcomers or sponsees or clients I may have “wasted” my time on. So, I guess I just have to do what is in front of me and do what feels right and expect that my life, when I am at the end, will have been spent well.
Time is more precious than anything else we are given. It is what we are spending in each moment, with every breath. I want to be wise with how it is spent. We may all have done things that were frivolous with our time, but I believe it is ALL unfolding just as it should.
I do not know how I could ever have embraced this thing so well, had I not “wasted” a great deal of time in jail or custody or in any of the other asshole things I did when drinking and using. They are the greatest investment I made into getting to a spectacular bottom. Oh!
And I am sure I have never wasted a moment or a breath on anything I did to get there or since. Every time I think I get to judge that, I am proved wrong. And guess what, I am! OH!
So, the lessons of patience are great ones. While I think I am waiting for one thing, I am given an entirely new thing to see the beauty of. Isn’t that wonderful? I think so…but who am I to judge?
Dolphin Hug 