April 5

HONESTY MONTH: DAY 5: “It was a huge comfort to have a person who’d keep you honest with yourself and who also gave you safe harbour.”― Lauren Dane

This is what I believe we do as sponsors. I know this is what I get from my sponsor. I want someone who is not afraid to tell me the truths and observations I need to hear. She is my lodestar. I feel that she is there to guide me to stay on track.

I don’t need someone who just talks about theory or with whom I discuss what I am up to unless they are willing to let me know when I am full of shit or going off-track. That is invaluable to me. I need course correction quite often because I can run full-steam ahead (or in circles!) at top speed all day, every day.

And to do this without judgment or hooks is the key to the safety piece here. I need the safety of knowing there is no attachment to anything we are working through. I have gone through a great deal of life in these 34 years, and I have trusted two of the sponsors I have had out of all of them with the really deep stuff. Others have been there to put me back into the steps, but we did not go so deep. I am blessed to have the sponsors I have had.

Each has had a purpose unique to the time when we have worked together. They did not always have an answer for me, but they were doing the work and could find out when they didn’t. That is always welcomed by me.

I work to be this kind of sponsor to my people as well. They know I am going to give them an honest answer and hold them in my heart as well. No bullshit, that kills addicts like me. And some of them do not respond well to the naked truth. Others are not willing to do the work or want to believe in their own BS. That ends things with me. But we are here to give what we have, not what everyone may want or is looking for. I am grateful for the people who are strong enough to give me what I need, not what I want. It has been a lifeline in my life that I always want to hang onto.