August 27

COURAGE MONTH: DAY 27: “What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?” ― Vincent van Gogh

We are NOT courageous by nature. I use the prayer that others call “Serenity Prayer”; but not for serenity. I use that prayer for courage.

If I were naturally courageous, I would never have used drugs or needed to drink. That is the chicken’s way of life. We are all big chickens.

When you take drugs and alcohol away from people like me, I have to pray for the courage to do EVERYTHING. Ugh! I hate being such a chicken!

The good news is that we get courageous after some time. We become more adapted to life sober and that kind of adaptation can fool us into believing we are okay, after all. Perhaps this recovery thing is too much. Perhaps we are overstating the case for even needing recovery.

Oh, yeah! That works, doesn’t it? Not so much.

We are soon back at the place where we left off with addiction.

We have become more chronically anxious or angry and resentful of life. Many of us are such victims of our minds that we are locked in to that kind of belief structure and the cycle continues, with or without using and drinking.

This is the ugliness that makes a big surrender necessary. If we could produce that for ourselves, it would be great. But, the necessary surrender is something that will naturally occur when an abnormal and dysfunctional attitude and behaviors persist to the point of complete collapse for that person. We have all had these.

Most of us, many times over. We must let go of so many things, so many old ideas, so many beliefs in our ego-states, it is never fun or pretty.

This, for me, is the true test of our spiritual condition. I am nothing, without that Power that restores me to some form of sanity. I cannot do this alone. I am not made as a courageous spirit. I am a chicken. So, I must have the Power from another source. I can’t cut this thing alone.

Other people cannot provide this for me. It has to come from something greater, not only than myself, but you as well. My only source of faith sometimes is that I have seen it happen for others. Then, I can come to believe it is possible for me, too.

I have been watching this process for many years now. Others do not believe it when I tell them they are in the process of being surrendered. They truly believe they have surrendered it all. Oh yeah, denial is such a powerful foe…take that big ego! The Screaming Purple Monkeys are BACK!

The reason we MUST pray for courage is that it cannot be found IN US. It must come from the Power. This is the only source that works.

And I get surrendered by the circumstances of life and what I think about it, over and over again. I cannot let go…it must be smashed into oblivion…and the pain is always coming from my resistance to this…and I get angry and afraid and I lash out. And I blame you and you and you and life and God and whomever I can lay blame on.

In the end, I have nothing left except to lay down my battle weapons and cry in defeat…and then, thank God! I am free and I am courageous again. What an ordeal…and I do it (EVERY TIME!) to myself. This is an incredible disease we do battle with my friends.