September 9, 2024 • 40 mins
Recovery can challenge us to transform our spiritual and religious understandings and underpinnings. For many, especially those emerging from rigid religious backgrounds, rediscovering or reimagining one's higher power becomes a transformative step. In this episode, Sara delves into her personal journey of redefining her higher power, lending an inspiring narrative to those struggling with similar...
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Sara S (00:01):
we are told we can create our own God of our understanding.
So I decided I was going to do it.
I was going to just accept it's ablank canvas and there's no rules.
Spencer (00:12):
Welcome to episode 417 of The Recovery Show.
This episode is brought to you by Julie,Rebecca, Ams, Sue, Tori, and Kimberly.
They use the donation button on our website.
Thank you, Julie, Rebecca, Ams, Sue, Tori,and Kimberly for your generous contributions.
This episode is for you.
(00:34):
We are friends and family members of alcoholics andaddicts who have found a path to serenity and happiness.
We who live or have lived with the seemingly hopelessproblem of addiction understand as perhaps few others can.
So much depends on our own attitudes, and webelieve that changed attitudes can aid recovery.
Before we begin, we would like to state that, in this show,we represent ourselves, rather than any 12 step program.
(01:00):
During this show, we will share our own experiences.
The opinions expressed here are strictlythose of the person who gave them.
Take what you like and leave the rest.
We hope you will find something inour sharing that speaks to your life.
My name is Spencer.
I am your host today, and joining me today is Sarah.
Welcome to The Recovery Show, Sarah.
Sara S (01:21):
Thank you.
Spencer (01:22):
You wrote to me and said you wanted to talk about, As you put it in your words, overcoming the God that was given to you from organized religion and finding the freedom to create a God of your own understanding, so that you are able to fully turn your will over to a higher power that you love and trust.
And this is in relation to Al Anon Step 3, wherewe made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
(01:50):
Is that a fair summary?
Sara S (01:52):
Yes, that's exactly how my newly created higher power has helped me more fully put Step 3 into my life.
Spencer (02:02):
what is the God that organized religion gave to you?
What are the characteristics thatyou had or you understood for God?
Sara S (02:10):
For me, that God was angry, a scorekeeper, waiting for me to mess up, standing there with a scoreboard or a clipboard type of situation.
I felt I had to be perfect.
And this was a male God that was given to me.
And if he wasn't helping me, or if my life was a mess,it was because of some quote unquote sin I had committed.
(02:36):
I was afraid of that God, and I only prayedbecause I was supposed to, and I'm a rule follower, so for me there really was no choice.
I was in that organized religion at a very young age.
And so my relationship with this God was mostly out of fear.
My communication was fear driven, because whatwould happen if I didn't, that'd be breaking one of the rules and I guess I would be sent to hell.
(03:02):
That's what my thinking was.
Spencer (03:04):
When you look at step two, which talks about a God that can help return us to sanity, you're probably not willing to turn to that God that you were given for any kind of support or help.
You can't trust that God to help return you to sanity.
Right.
Sara S (03:24):
Exactly.
This was my God of my understanding forthe first, probably 10 years of recovery.
And so I just kind of white knuckled itand this is, better than what I was used to without the 12 steps, but definitely steps two and three gave me a little bit of angst.
Spencer (03:42):
Yeah.
if you're afraid of God, why would youturn to that God for any kind of help?
Sara S (03:48):
exactly.
Spencer (03:49):
it.
So then what?
Sara S (03:51):
I left that organized religion and I just avoided prayer.
I avoided higher power topics when theycame up in meetings, I just listened.
And felt guilty that I had left the God that I was raisedwith, but I also really didn't think I could create my own.
(04:11):
And I just white knuckled it for about three years.
Spencer (04:14):
So what happened?
Sara S (04:16):
I listened and I heard a lot of things in meetings about people having a female God or nature or the meetings or people, animals.
You know, we are told we can createour own God of our understanding.
So I decided I was going to do it.
I was going to just accept it's ablank canvas and there's no rules.
(04:37):
Initially I, came up with one that I named Blake.
I don't know why I just did.
I just didn't want to call.
I didn't like the capital G God, so mine had to have a name.
And at the time it was a male and, he soundedlike Matthew McConaughey just because he was going to tell me it's going to be all right.
(04:58):
All right.
All right.
that was the God of my understandingfor about, probably two years.
but I really didn't still fully trustit and I didn't really believe in it.
But then over the course of the last year, Istarted to think of people who had been in my life.
who always made me feel adored or welcomedor celebrated just for showing up, for being myself, nothing else that I did.
(05:22):
And there were about four people inmy life that came in various places.
One was a law professor.
One was actually a judge that I worked with.
One was a coworker and one was a friendactually from the organized religion.
These were both male and female.
So I just started when I would meditate and pray.
(05:42):
I would think, what would I feel likeif I was around those four people?
I would feel celebrated, adored.
I could trust them.
And so that kind of is now my, higher power.
It's a, they, them type of higher power.
It can be male or female.
It's like a panel, if you will, of higher powers.
(06:03):
And I still call them, they Blake.
Which is nice because it's a gender neutral name.
but yeah, it's made all the difference.
I am fully, willing to turn over the careof my life to this group of higher powers.
I don't ever feel afraid.
I talk to them when I wake up all day long.
If I need to give something up, it's very easy now.
(06:26):
It's easy to put things in my God box as well.
I don't, wonder if it's going to work or not.
Spencer (06:31):
that's quite a journey there.
and I have not heard from anybody else this idea of God asa panel, and that is one of the, I think, beauties of the way that step three is expressed in our literature, that we find our own understanding of a higher power that will work for us, that will work with us, that we can feel confident in turning our will and our life over to the care of.
(07:03):
I was just rereading the step threereading from How Al Anon Works.
It says, we respect that each of us has a right to chooseany higher power that seems best suited to us, one to whom we will be willing to turn over our will and our lives.
and We are careful to avoid imposingour personal beliefs on one another.
(07:25):
That's right in the literature.
I consider this book, How Al Anon Works,to be core literature for the program.
Sara S (07:33):
I've been to a lot of meetings and so that was basically the core of what I started to grasp onto is, okay, this is what Al Anon's telling me.
I can create anything from my higherpower and there are no parameters here.
And that's what I did.
And, it works so well.
(07:54):
I used to when I would pray or meditate, even afterI left organized religion, I still felt like uneasy, Not like this was a welcoming situation, but now that I have this panel I think of these people, and I think we all have those kinds of people in our life.
If you will review your life, maybe a teacher, justsomeone who they just like you just for being you.
(08:21):
And there's probably people in your life who you just like.
They just feel good.
The energy is good.
Now that I think of those four persons When I'mmeditating or talking or asking for help or giving something up, it's a whole different experience.
I can't describe it more than I just feel thesame way I felt when I was around them in person.
(08:43):
And for me, that's really powerful because I don't feel sosmall or minuscule when I'm asking my higher power for help.
I can picture those people and Iknow how they would receive me.
So that gives me faith that there's a higherpower that's even bigger than they are.
who feels the same way towards me.
Spencer (09:04):
I'm curious now when you are having a conversation with them, do you hear from.
individual voices in that panel?
Is it more likely that one or the other of them is gonnaspeak up about a particular thing that's on your mind?
I don't really know how to ask that question.
Does that make sense?
Sara S (09:24):
It does.
I know what you're asking.
I don't hear any of those person's actual voices.
Spencer (09:30):
Maybe that's the question.
It's this composite being that, that bringstogether aspects of all of them into one?
Sara S (09:38):
yes.
So I would say, It still does have MatthewMcConaughey's voice because I just like that voice.
but it's like their persona.
When I am mostly meditating like if I'm anxious ornot serene, I just visualize in my head, like walking into being around those people, I get that feeling of love, adoration, support, And then I can relax more and hear what my higher power as a composite would say.
(10:10):
But I don't ever hear their actualvoices of each of the individuals.
And interestingly, it's two men and two women.
I didn't plan that.
I just thought of people who mademe feel that way in my lifetime.
And those are the ones that I thinktheir combined personalities would be what I want my high power to be towards me.
Spencer (10:30):
That is so cool.
You're still hearing the, guidance from yourhigher power with that voice, which, you know, my higher power is not that embodied.
My higher power doesn't have a voiceother than my internal voice, I guess.
You know, the, the more I talk to people about this step,about finding their own higher power, the more diversity I encounter, and the more fascinating it is, what do each of us want and need, from or of a higher power?
(11:08):
so I don't know.
But it's cool.
let's go back a little bit here.
when you first came into program I think you said youlived with the given God, if I can call it that for three years, your first three years in recovery, more or less.
Sara S (11:26):
No, like the first 10 years.
Spencer (11:27):
First 10 years.
Wow.
What were you feeling?
what was coming up for you when thetopic in a meeting was around God?
Sara S (11:38):
So it was interesting.
Because of the religion that I was raisedin, I did not have an open mind and I did not allow other people to have their higher powers.
So when someone would say I havea goddess, I was judgmental.
I was like,
that's blasphemy, because that's what wasput into my brain since I was a little girl.
so I guess I would just check out.
(12:00):
Now that I look back, I think it was definitely anattitude of superiority because I feel like that's what I was taught is that, Everyone else is wrong.
And this is the right God.
And if you believe anything else, then you're not correct.
It was a struggle.
It really was.
I remember one time, the first time I heard, someonein a meeting say they were talking to God and they told them to F off and I was like, Oh my, Oh, what, that
Spencer (12:25):
right?
Yeah.
Sara S (12:29):
like you are, that is bad.
just, really a lot of mindsets that, governedmy thinking that I really wasn't aware of.
so
that's how the 10 years went.
Spencer (12:40):
I assume that at some point you have worked the steps.
Sara S (12:43):
Yes.
A couple times.
Spencer (12:46):
Did you do that during those first ten years, or did you get blocked at like step two or three?
Sara S (12:52):
I didn't really get blocked.
Looking back on it, I was doing it moreout of this is what you have to do.
It's a rule.
Spencer (12:59):
You said you're a rule follower, right?
Sara S (13:02):
I knew the 12 steps would work because I'd been to a lot of meetings and watched a lot of people transform.
So I wanted that.
And I worked with sponsors, but it did takeme about three or four sponsors, because I just would always get hung up on three.
I don't know if I had even the wordsto communicate what was going on.
(13:22):
Like, I didn't Know that I felt that way about thatorganized given God, you called it the given God.
I like that.
So I guess I would just say, we just went throughit and you know as we do There's no perfection.
You just do the best you could.
This year I'm doing the traditions one a month And I thinknext year I will switch again and do the steps because I think it'll be a lot more, eye opening and give me a lot more recovery doing it with the God that I love and trust.
Spencer (13:54):
I'm going to jump ahead a little bit in the steps here, because I remembered this reading, in this book, Paths to Recovery, for step six, at the beginning of the first paragraph, it says, Spiritual growth in Al Anon includes gaining an understanding of our relationship and trust with the God of our understanding.
And then at the end of that first paragraph, itsays, without true unconditional acceptance of step three, the action of step six is impossible.
(14:21):
And step six is, were entirely ready to haveGod remove all these defects of character.
I completely see where that's true for me.
If I haven't turned my will over to the care of myhigher power, my life over to the care of my higher power, how can I expect my higher power to remove my shortcomings, my defects, whatever we want to call them.
(14:43):
I really have to have some trust there tohave that readiness, not even to ask for them to be removed, just to be ready to ask.
so that feels like that could have beenanother place where you might've got stuck.
Sara S (14:57):
it's so interesting.
You'd bring that up because.
Within the last four weeks, thishas been a huge eye opener to me.
I think we hear what we'resupposed to hear when we're ready.
I was in a meeting, and I don't remember if it was adaily reader or if someone was reading from the forum, but it was a story about a woman who was on the beach, and she wrote down all of her defects in the sand.
(15:23):
And then as she got up to walk away, she looked back andsaw that the tide had come in and taken some of those away.
And that really struck me like, Oh, it's notmy job and I can give these to my higher power.
And so what I did was I wrote down a list of allmy character defects that I was willing to give up.
And I wrote them on stickies and put them in my God box.
(15:44):
And just recently I had a really goodexperience with my partner where I.
I get really mad when people are late and it's like a shortcircuit, it's a character defect that I am powerless over.
Spencer (15:57):
Yeah.
Sara S (15:58):
And something happened.
Like my brain, I could recognize I had achoice and before I've never felt that choice.
I just go right to anger.
And so I do feel like,, I'm letting myhigher power in and that, that defect.
Is being removed by not me.
I don't know how you can't do it.
(16:19):
so it was really powerful, but yeah,I think you made a good point.
I'm sure I was reluctant to really believe that andactually even do it because I didn't ever trust my God.
Spencer (16:31):
And then during this three year where you just didn't have a God.
Sara S (16:35):
Right.
Spencer (16:36):
I would guess that you also were not actively working the steps during that period, or were you, and how did that work?
Uh,
Sara S (16:47):
kind of in COVID times.
And I had moved from a location that had a lot of meetingsto a very rural setting, which is where I live now.
And there aren't a lot of meetingsand I couldn't find one locally.
So I just worked with my sponsor.
I've had the same sponsor throughabout the last seven years.
(17:09):
So I would just talk with her, I wouldn'tsay I was actually working the steps.
I would say I was white knuckling it,as I said before, just hanging on.
But I definitely didn't have a lotof serenity, during those times.
Spencer (17:20):
What was the experience of working the steps with Blake?
How did that feel different?
Sara S (17:26):
Haven't really done, I mean, other than just going to meetings and whatever, but actually working the steps, I've been doing the traditions this year,
and it has been.
amazing Like a whole new experience.
every day is a whole new experience now,that I really trust my higher power and am willing to give him, them, my problems.
Spencer (17:49):
I'm interested in how you're working the traditions.
I have gone through the traditions in several differentways in the years I've been in the Al-Anon program.
I don't think I would ever have characterized it as working,so I'm interested to hear what your experience is there.
Sara S (18:09):
It's been literally life changing, really.
it has completely altered my relationshipswith my partner, with my family, I've largely struggled with, My nuclear family in many ways.
now we're on tradition eight and wework it through the, that workbook.
Reaching for personal freedom.
Spencer (18:30):
Right.
Sara S (18:31):
It goes through the steps, then it goes through the traditions, and then it goes through the concepts.
So the way I work them is, I read these things,we write about them, and then we meet weekly and discuss what we got from them, what our takeaway was.
That's how we've been working.
And I talk with my sponsor about what welearned in the book study and how it's applying to my life and what takeaways I'm gleaning.
Spencer (18:57):
That particular book really focuses on how the steps, the traditions, and the concepts of service can apply in our own lives.
The traditions technically areabout how Al Anon groups work.
But we can take a tradition like tradition one about unityof purpose, and apply that to a family, apply that to a work situation, and come at the way in which we relate to other people in a new way, in an Al Anon way, if you will.
(19:39):
It sounds like.
You're doing that.
Like you're actually taking, as you're studyingthese, you're finding ways that you change the way in which you relate to the other people around you.
Is that true?
Sara S (19:52):
That's true.
And that's exactly what my sponsor told me.
She said, the steps in her opinion areabout getting right with ourselves and the traditions are about getting right with others.
And so while it is largely written for Al Anongroups, this book that I'm taking it through applies it to the relationships in your life.
And so it, it's really eyeopening.
(20:16):
One of my favorites so far wasthe self supporting tradition.
That's the seventh tradition.
And, I have always considered myself fullyself supporting because I financially am, but to me, it's like, it's four tires, right?
There's financial, Emotional, spiritual, and physical.
And I found out when I worked at Seventh Tradition,I wasn't, emotionally self supporting at all.
(20:40):
I very heavily relied on mypartner and that's a heavy burden.
Spencer (20:43):
it is.
Sara S (20:44):
And it's heavy on a relationship, but to me, it's like when you go shopping, I don't know if you like to shop, I do.
And, if I go shopping with someone andthey just follow me around the store.
I'm like, go shop, quit following me around.
And I feel like that's how I was You know,emotionally, I was just very needy, very like right on the heels of a shopper.
(21:05):
Like, I don't know what to do.
I'm just going to follow you around.
so it's really, it's been phenomenal.
Spencer (21:13):
that is cool.
I might want to get you back and just talk in moredetail about your experience with the traditions, because that is something that, in my experience, is not emphasized or sometimes even really discussed in meetings, in many of the meetings that I've been to.
The meeting that I started out in, which turned out tobe a meeting with really deep recovery in the meeting.
(21:40):
They would read the tradition of themonth at the beginning of the meeting.
it was almost never a topic of discussion, youdon't get any depth of understanding that way.
You hear these words, you're like, okay, whatever,that's what we do at the beginning of the meeting.
Now let's get into the real meat of thestuff here, which is how do I deal with this person in my life who is drinking too much.
Sara S (22:04):
I would love to, I really would because the, group that we started is just whoever wants to come on this day of the week, we're always on the tradition of the month.
So it makes it easy for people to drop in.
And one of the.
people, participants who come is a long time Al Anoner, and they had never done the traditions either.
(22:25):
When I was telling my sponsor this, she said,yeah, a lot of people look over the traditions and she's like, wait till you get to the concepts.
Spencer (22:32):
Yeah.
Sara S (22:33):
I'm pretty excited, but I feel the same way.
I feel like before I just would like glossover the traditions, okay, whatever, that doesn't have any meaning for me really.
Spencer (22:42):
Yeah.
I got to put a couple of bucks in the basket.
Okay.
Okay.
I can't talk about.
Other programs when I'm in my Al Anon meeting.
Okay.
Whatever.
So I like this, the steps arehow you get right with yourself.
The traditions are how you get right with other people.
The concepts of service is how you getright with groups that you're a member of.
(23:06):
It's one way of looking at it.
they are more technical some of them, youreally have to kind of stretch your imagination.
but I think again, the Reaching for PersonalFreedom book does a nice job of trying to relate that to my personal experience.
I'm interested to see how that goes actually,because one of the meetings that I attend regularly.
(23:29):
It's a hybrid meeting and the group that's on Zoom has beenworking through that, reaching for personal freedom book.
It's going to be real soon that westart getting into those concepts.
and so I'm really looking forward to Where thoseconversations go, I've been through them a couple of times and some of them are like beautiful.
(23:50):
Like participation is the key to harmonyis the fourth concept of service.
yes, I can take that in and I canunderstand what it means for me.
in whatever context, whether it's a work contextor an Al Anon meeting context or whatever.
but some of the others are like, what?
Sara S (24:10):
Yeah, and
I find that's a little bit true of the traditions.
We've been on eight and, this is thethird week that we'll be doing it
and we're both like, how manyways can you ask this question?
we know we have our own talents andwe can ask for people to help us if we
need help.
we're asking this, we're just beating itover and over, but it's still very useful.
(24:31):
Right.
Spencer (24:32):
yeah, we've been in, in our progress in that book, we've just gone, however many questions we get through, each meeting, we're not trying to lock it into the month or anything.
and so if you get one of those, like that onewhere, yeah, okay, like we've talked about it, we're done with that, but we still have one more week.
What are we going to do?
(24:52):
we just move on.
Having a cadence helps because as you say, whensomebody drops in and they haven't been there for a couple of weeks, they know where you are.
Sara S (25:01):
And then the supplement that we've been using is the book that you already referenced, Paths to Recovery, because they have, quite a good selection of questions on the back of each step and tradition and concept.
We'll go into there if we run out of stuffwith the reaching for personal freedom.
Or we'll go to the daily readers andread what the answers are on those.
Spencer (25:23):
Actually I'm looking at the questions for tradition eight in the Paths to Recovery book.
Some of these are they're focused on Al Anon, butdo I ever have a tendency to be a know it all?
that's about me and my life, right?
Sara S (25:35):
Yeah.
Spencer (25:36):
They're both good resources if you want to get deeper into the steps and the traditions and the concepts, both paths to recovery and reaching for personal freedom are great resources.
They come at them from slightly differentdirections and they compliment each other, I'd say.
Sara S (25:52):
I would agree.
Spencer (25:54):
I'm going to phrase this question the way I usually do.
And you can take it wherever you want.
What would you now say to you then, thatmight have helped you to shorten your journey.
Sara S (26:08):
I think I would say something I've heard before take the cotton out of your ears and put it in your mouth so you listen more than you talk, I think I would tell myself that, listen and have more faith and trust in, in these people.
You know, it was just so foreign to me.
I don't know if other people have had that experiencewhen they're coming from a very organized religion that kind of dictates what you should and shouldn't think.
(26:35):
I was in my early thirties and I think I was justafraid to trust myself or listen to anybody else outside of that circle of influence of religion.
So I think to shorten my journey, I wouldtell myself, take them up on their word.
It says you can create your own higher power.
So do it.
and don't feel guilty.
(26:55):
You don't need permission.
Go do
it.
Spencer (26:58):
Thank you so much.
We'll take a break by talking about a song that you chose.
What is your first song?
Sara S (27:06):
My first song is by the spinners, Working My Way Back to You.
I just heard this recently and I thoughtthat is so appropriate for my higher power.
He's been there all along.
He, they, them, she, whoever, waiting for me to come back.
And I guess it would be working my way back becauseI'm sure when I was a small child, I had a different relationship, but then in the middle of being raised and be a young adult, I left I just liked that song.
(27:38):
It says, I'll keep working my way backto you, babe, with a burning love inside.
Yeah, I'm working my way back to you, babe.
And the happiness had died.
And I love that my happiness had died.
The God that I was given didn't work for me.
And this God does work for me.
And I feel like when I hear that song, it's applicable.
I'm just working my way back.
Spencer (28:08):
In this section of the podcast, we talk about our lives in recovery.
How have we experienced recovery recently?
You want to go first?
Sara S (28:16):
Sure.
So I have been attending a lot of online meetings lately.
As I mentioned earlier, I live in a rural setting and,it's just really refreshing to see and experience.
Different recovery with new faces.
sometimes I slip into the belief that Ihave enough Al Anon, I can skip meetings.
I can just rely on the readers, my sponsor, workingthe steps, our traditions as it may be right now, but there's just something I get from a meeting that I can't get anywhere else because I hear my stories.
(28:48):
in their shares.
Recently I went to one that was based out of England.
and it was I just love the English accent.
And it was lovely to hear all of it,the whole opening read like that.
And, just their vernacular is fabulous to me.
I love the way they phrase things.
And, then what you figure out is we're all the same.
(29:11):
I'm not unique.
I have the same problems as everybody else, evenpeople on the other side of the world . So it just reminds me that's where my solution is.
Spencer (29:20):
Thank you.
I've been listening to a number of speaker tapes,open talks, whatever you want to call them, where, an Al Anon member shares their experience, strength, and hope, usually in the format of what it was like, what happened, what it's like now, where what happened is, how did I get into recovery?
(29:40):
How did I get into Al Anon?
what brought me here?
and I also have been reflecting about how,the way that I have expressed that story of my own has changed over the years.
I know that when I was early in the program and I was askedto share my story, there was a lot of my loved one, who was the alcoholic, whose behavior brought me to Al Anon.
(30:04):
It was a lot of her in my story.
She did this.
This happened.
This other thing happened becauseshe was drinking or whatever.
Okay.
I remember hearing a friend of mine sharinghis story and it was almost entirely about him.
It was about how he felt and how he acted or reactedand, the effects that he had on the people around him and how his life changed when he came into recovery.
(30:36):
The, what we sometimes say in program qualifierperson was almost not in his story at all.
And I thought, Oh, How can I do that?
can I do that?
Can I divorce my story from the, the story of the rehabs andthe outpatients and the events and, you know, so I started, working to sort of restructure my story in that way.
(31:04):
There are places in the literature where it says, wedon't talk about the alcoholic, we talk about ourselves.
And, and I'm like, how can I tell my story withoutbringing her into it, at least on the outskirts.
And I still think that is a little bit true.
but at the same time, when I listened to other people'sstory as they tell it, mostly the ones that really grab me and keep me interested and lots of places to, to laugh and cry are the ones that focus on, as we would call it in an AA talk, the drunkologue.
(31:42):
The before story.
There is a series of Open Talks everySaturday night in the town that I live in.
AA Talks.
\ It's from 8.
30 to 9.
30.
And many times I've heard the person at the podiumsay, and my sponsor told me if I'm not sober by nine o'clock, I'm talking too much about the before times.
(32:06):
It's fun to listen to those stories.
You get some, what do you call it?
Schadenfreude, of, Joy in other people's pain or whatever.
you get a lot of things to laugh about.
But if we want to carry the message of hope, if we wantto carry the message of recovery, which is at least one of the reasons for giving these talks, we have to talk about what recovery has done for us and maybe how we got there.
(32:28):
So I've tried to
move the focus of what I say.
And I can only prescribe this for myself.
I can't tell anybody else how to tell theirstory because their story is their story.
and I do enjoy listening to the drunkologs, I got to admit.
Oh my God, yeah, that happened to me too, orwow, I'm so glad that never happened to me.
(32:53):
Both of those can happen in the same story.
This is just something that's been on mymind recently, probably because I'm giving a talk at a conference next month, and so I'm thinking about what I'm going to say this time.
the motto of the conference is something about action,and I'm like, okay, I think what I want to try to focus on is the actions that I took in recovery and the effects that those actions had for me.
(33:18):
so I'm still thinking about that.
And what I usually do when I give a talk is Ilet it over to my higher power and whatever comes out of my mouth is what comes out of my mouth.
But I like to have a little bit ofstructure ahead of time, at least.
Anyway, so that's what's going on in my life here.
Looking forward in the podcast,we're still working on the steps.
You're actually the second personI'm talking to about step three.
(33:40):
And I've got a person coming up who.
is going to talk about working the stepsas an atheist, if I remember it correctly.
So let's get a lot of voices, a lot of differentperspectives, a lot of different experiences, because this step can go many different ways for different people.
we welcome your thoughts.
You can join our conversation.
please leave us a voicemail, send us anemail with your feedback or questions.
(34:04):
And I want to thank you, Sarah,because you put some questions in here.
These are awesome.
Do you feel like you have the freedomto create a God of your understanding?
How have you created a God of your understanding?
What is holding you back fromcreating a God of your understanding?
All excellent questions.
If you would let yourself create a God ofyour understanding, would it be easier to turn the care of your life over to that God?
(34:28):
And I.
completely see how these questionsrelate to what we've been talking about.
Thank you for those questions.
Sarah, how can people send us feedback?
How can they give us their responses to these questions?
Sara S (34:41):
you can send a voice memo or email to feedback at the recovery show, or if you prefer, you can call and leave us a voicemail at 7 3 4.
707 8795.
You can also use the voicemail button on thewebsite to join the conversation from your computer.
(35:03):
We'd love to hear from you.
Share your experience, strength, and hope, oryour questions about today's topic of Step 3.
or any of our upcoming topics, including the steps.
If you have a topic you'd likeus to talk about, let us know.
If you would like advanced notice for some ofour topics so that you can contribute to that topic, you can sign up for our mailing list by sending an email to feedbackattherecovery.
(35:29):
show.
Put email in the subject line to make it easier to spot.
Spencer, where can our listeners findout more about the recovery show?
Spencer (35:39):
that would be our website, which is for the, I don't know, nth time in this section, therecovery.
show, where we have all the information about the show,which is mostly these days, the, the notes for each episode.
Those include links to the books that we read from or talkedabout videos for the music that in this case, Sarah chose.
(36:00):
And there's also some links to other recoverypodcasts and websites that we'd like, and you can find the notes for this episode at therecovery.
show slash 417, or, any other episode, just stickthe number on the end and you'll get right there.
What is your second song?
Sara S (36:19):
My second song is Courage to Change by Sia, which is awesome because it's the name of one of our daily readers.
but I love it because the words or lyrics in there,number one, remind me it does take courage to change, but it also reminds me that I'm not alone.
(36:39):
There's lyrics in there that says,you're not alone in all of this.
You're not alone.
I promise.
Standing together, we can do anything.
That's a good reminder that I'm never alone.
And, that I, especially in my journey, it'srequired a lot of courage to trust a higher power.
And this song somehow reminds me that I'm not alone.
. Spencer (37:10):
We got a couple emails to share with you in this episode.
Mike writes, Hi Spencer, I just listenedto the Step 3 episode and love the format where you read a paragraph and speak on that.
I like the free flowing format too, but this onefelt like a meeting and I got a lot out of it.
I'm prone to worry, so I have to remind myselfthat I can't worry myself into serenity.
(37:33):
One thing that I heard in a face to facemeeting last weekend was that there are two things that Al Anon members hate.
The way things are, and change.
That changes over time as we work thesteps, but it still resonated with me.
Keep up the great work and enjoy retirement.
Take good care.
Mike.
Thanks, Mike, for writing.
Thanks for, the feedback on thisformat that I'm using for the 12 steps.
(37:56):
And maybe we'll take that forward into someother content, such as the traditions, maybe?
It's been a while since I've done Traditions.
Yeah.
Can't worry yourself into Serenity.
A learning from that last episode.
And yes, we often don't like the way thingsare, and we don't want them to change, which, you know, seems paradoxical, but People are paradoxical, inherently, I think.
(38:24):
I got an email from Andrew.
He had a suggestion about how I might be able to improve theaudio quality of voicemails that I get from Google Voice.
So I'll be trying out his suggestion onthe next few voicemails that come in.
Thanks for that, Andrew.
Thanks for that idea.
Sarah, I want to thank you so much for bringing yourperspective, your unique understanding of a higher power.
(38:50):
As far as I've heard, I'm sure that you're not the only onewith a panel or a committee or whatever as a higher power.
Thank you so much.
Sara S (38:59):
Yes, thank you for having me.
I've enjoyed this.
Spencer (39:03):
And what is the third song?
Sara S (39:06):
My last song is Living in the Moment by Jason Mraz.
This song has always been with me, evenfrom very early stages in recovery.
I remember hearing it and I reallywanted to believe it could apply to me.
But I didn't.
there's lyrics in there that talk about livingin the moment, not worrying about things.
But as I now know, my problem was I didn't have ahigher power I could turn it over to that I trusted.
(39:32):
So now when I listen to this song, I'm much morejubilant about it because it does apply and, the entire song, I encourage everyone to listen to it.
It's just such a happy song if they haven't listened to it.
But the ones I really love is, I will notwaste my days making up all kinds of ways to worry about things that will not happen to me.
(39:55):
So I just let go of what I know I don't know.
And I know I only do this by living in the moment.
Living our life easy and breezy with peace in my mind,with peace in my heart., It's one of those songs that all of the phrases are applicable to me and my journey
of recovery.
Spencer (40:21):
Thank you for listening, and please keep coming back.
Whatever your problems, there arethose among us who have had them too.
If we did not talk about a problem you arefacing today, feel free to contact us so we can talk about it in a future episode.
May understanding, love, and peacegrow in you, one day at a time.
we are told we can create our own God of our understanding.
So I decided I was going to do it.
I was going to just accept it's ablank canvas and there's no rules.
Spencer (00:12):
Welcome to episode 417 of The Recovery Show.
This episode is brought to you by Julie,Rebecca, Ams, Sue, Tori, and Kimberly.
They use the donation button on our website.
Thank you, Julie, Rebecca, Ams, Sue, Tori,and Kimberly for your generous contributions.
This episode is for you.
(00:34):
We are friends and family members of alcoholics andaddicts who have found a path to serenity and happiness.
We who live or have lived with the seemingly hopelessproblem of addiction understand as perhaps few others can.
So much depends on our own attitudes, and webelieve that changed attitudes can aid recovery.
Before we begin, we would like to state that, in this show,we represent ourselves, rather than any 12 step program.
(01:00):
During this show, we will share our own experiences.
The opinions expressed here are strictlythose of the person who gave them.
Take what you like and leave the rest.
We hope you will find something inour sharing that speaks to your life.
My name is Spencer.
I am your host today, and joining me today is Sarah.
Welcome to The Recovery Show, Sarah.
Sara S (01:21):
Thank you.
Spencer (01:22):
You wrote to me and said you wanted to talk about, As you put it in your words, overcoming the God that was given to you from organized religion and finding the freedom to create a God of your own understanding, so that you are able to fully turn your will over to a higher power that you love and trust.
And this is in relation to Al Anon Step 3, wherewe made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
(01:50):
Is that a fair summary?
Sara S (01:52):
Yes, that's exactly how my newly created higher power has helped me more fully put Step 3 into my life.
Spencer (02:02):
what is the God that organized religion gave to you?
What are the characteristics thatyou had or you understood for God?
Sara S (02:10):
For me, that God was angry, a scorekeeper, waiting for me to mess up, standing there with a scoreboard or a clipboard type of situation.
I felt I had to be perfect.
And this was a male God that was given to me.
And if he wasn't helping me, or if my life was a mess,it was because of some quote unquote sin I had committed.
(02:36):
I was afraid of that God, and I only prayedbecause I was supposed to, and I'm a rule follower, so for me there really was no choice.
I was in that organized religion at a very young age.
And so my relationship with this God was mostly out of fear.
My communication was fear driven, because whatwould happen if I didn't, that'd be breaking one of the rules and I guess I would be sent to hell.
(03:02):
That's what my thinking was.
Spencer (03:04):
When you look at step two, which talks about a God that can help return us to sanity, you're probably not willing to turn to that God that you were given for any kind of support or help.
You can't trust that God to help return you to sanity.
Right.
Sara S (03:24):
Exactly.
This was my God of my understanding forthe first, probably 10 years of recovery.
And so I just kind of white knuckled itand this is, better than what I was used to without the 12 steps, but definitely steps two and three gave me a little bit of angst.
Spencer (03:42):
Yeah.
if you're afraid of God, why would youturn to that God for any kind of help?
Sara S (03:48):
exactly.
Spencer (03:49):
it.
So then what?
Sara S (03:51):
I left that organized religion and I just avoided prayer.
I avoided higher power topics when theycame up in meetings, I just listened.
And felt guilty that I had left the God that I was raisedwith, but I also really didn't think I could create my own.
(04:11):
And I just white knuckled it for about three years.
Spencer (04:14):
So what happened?
Sara S (04:16):
I listened and I heard a lot of things in meetings about people having a female God or nature or the meetings or people, animals.
You know, we are told we can createour own God of our understanding.
So I decided I was going to do it.
I was going to just accept it's ablank canvas and there's no rules.
(04:37):
Initially I, came up with one that I named Blake.
I don't know why I just did.
I just didn't want to call.
I didn't like the capital G God, so mine had to have a name.
And at the time it was a male and, he soundedlike Matthew McConaughey just because he was going to tell me it's going to be all right.
(04:58):
All right.
All right.
that was the God of my understandingfor about, probably two years.
but I really didn't still fully trustit and I didn't really believe in it.
But then over the course of the last year, Istarted to think of people who had been in my life.
who always made me feel adored or welcomedor celebrated just for showing up, for being myself, nothing else that I did.
(05:22):
And there were about four people inmy life that came in various places.
One was a law professor.
One was actually a judge that I worked with.
One was a coworker and one was a friendactually from the organized religion.
These were both male and female.
So I just started when I would meditate and pray.
(05:42):
I would think, what would I feel likeif I was around those four people?
I would feel celebrated, adored.
I could trust them.
And so that kind of is now my, higher power.
It's a, they, them type of higher power.
It can be male or female.
It's like a panel, if you will, of higher powers.
(06:03):
And I still call them, they Blake.
Which is nice because it's a gender neutral name.
but yeah, it's made all the difference.
I am fully, willing to turn over the careof my life to this group of higher powers.
I don't ever feel afraid.
I talk to them when I wake up all day long.
If I need to give something up, it's very easy now.
(06:26):
It's easy to put things in my God box as well.
I don't, wonder if it's going to work or not.
Spencer (06:31):
that's quite a journey there.
and I have not heard from anybody else this idea of God asa panel, and that is one of the, I think, beauties of the way that step three is expressed in our literature, that we find our own understanding of a higher power that will work for us, that will work with us, that we can feel confident in turning our will and our life over to the care of.
(07:03):
I was just rereading the step threereading from How Al Anon Works.
It says, we respect that each of us has a right to chooseany higher power that seems best suited to us, one to whom we will be willing to turn over our will and our lives.
and We are careful to avoid imposingour personal beliefs on one another.
(07:25):
That's right in the literature.
I consider this book, How Al Anon Works,to be core literature for the program.
Sara S (07:33):
I've been to a lot of meetings and so that was basically the core of what I started to grasp onto is, okay, this is what Al Anon's telling me.
I can create anything from my higherpower and there are no parameters here.
And that's what I did.
And, it works so well.
(07:54):
I used to when I would pray or meditate, even afterI left organized religion, I still felt like uneasy, Not like this was a welcoming situation, but now that I have this panel I think of these people, and I think we all have those kinds of people in our life.
If you will review your life, maybe a teacher, justsomeone who they just like you just for being you.
(08:21):
And there's probably people in your life who you just like.
They just feel good.
The energy is good.
Now that I think of those four persons When I'mmeditating or talking or asking for help or giving something up, it's a whole different experience.
I can't describe it more than I just feel thesame way I felt when I was around them in person.
(08:43):
And for me, that's really powerful because I don't feel sosmall or minuscule when I'm asking my higher power for help.
I can picture those people and Iknow how they would receive me.
So that gives me faith that there's a higherpower that's even bigger than they are.
who feels the same way towards me.
Spencer (09:04):
I'm curious now when you are having a conversation with them, do you hear from.
individual voices in that panel?
Is it more likely that one or the other of them is gonnaspeak up about a particular thing that's on your mind?
I don't really know how to ask that question.
Does that make sense?
Sara S (09:24):
It does.
I know what you're asking.
I don't hear any of those person's actual voices.
Spencer (09:30):
Maybe that's the question.
It's this composite being that, that bringstogether aspects of all of them into one?
Sara S (09:38):
yes.
So I would say, It still does have MatthewMcConaughey's voice because I just like that voice.
but it's like their persona.
When I am mostly meditating like if I'm anxious ornot serene, I just visualize in my head, like walking into being around those people, I get that feeling of love, adoration, support, And then I can relax more and hear what my higher power as a composite would say.
(10:10):
But I don't ever hear their actualvoices of each of the individuals.
And interestingly, it's two men and two women.
I didn't plan that.
I just thought of people who mademe feel that way in my lifetime.
And those are the ones that I thinktheir combined personalities would be what I want my high power to be towards me.
Spencer (10:30):
That is so cool.
You're still hearing the, guidance from yourhigher power with that voice, which, you know, my higher power is not that embodied.
My higher power doesn't have a voiceother than my internal voice, I guess.
You know, the, the more I talk to people about this step,about finding their own higher power, the more diversity I encounter, and the more fascinating it is, what do each of us want and need, from or of a higher power?
(11:08):
so I don't know.
But it's cool.
let's go back a little bit here.
when you first came into program I think you said youlived with the given God, if I can call it that for three years, your first three years in recovery, more or less.
Sara S (11:26):
No, like the first 10 years.
Spencer (11:27):
First 10 years.
Wow.
What were you feeling?
what was coming up for you when thetopic in a meeting was around God?
Sara S (11:38):
So it was interesting.
Because of the religion that I was raisedin, I did not have an open mind and I did not allow other people to have their higher powers.
So when someone would say I havea goddess, I was judgmental.
I was like,
that's blasphemy, because that's what wasput into my brain since I was a little girl.
so I guess I would just check out.
(12:00):
Now that I look back, I think it was definitely anattitude of superiority because I feel like that's what I was taught is that, Everyone else is wrong.
And this is the right God.
And if you believe anything else, then you're not correct.
It was a struggle.
It really was.
I remember one time, the first time I heard, someonein a meeting say they were talking to God and they told them to F off and I was like, Oh my, Oh, what, that
Spencer (12:25):
right?
Yeah.
Sara S (12:29):
like you are, that is bad.
just, really a lot of mindsets that, governedmy thinking that I really wasn't aware of.
so
that's how the 10 years went.
Spencer (12:40):
I assume that at some point you have worked the steps.
Sara S (12:43):
Yes.
A couple times.
Spencer (12:46):
Did you do that during those first ten years, or did you get blocked at like step two or three?
Sara S (12:52):
I didn't really get blocked.
Looking back on it, I was doing it moreout of this is what you have to do.
It's a rule.
Spencer (12:59):
You said you're a rule follower, right?
Sara S (13:02):
I knew the 12 steps would work because I'd been to a lot of meetings and watched a lot of people transform.
So I wanted that.
And I worked with sponsors, but it did takeme about three or four sponsors, because I just would always get hung up on three.
I don't know if I had even the wordsto communicate what was going on.
(13:22):
Like, I didn't Know that I felt that way about thatorganized given God, you called it the given God.
I like that.
So I guess I would just say, we just went throughit and you know as we do There's no perfection.
You just do the best you could.
This year I'm doing the traditions one a month And I thinknext year I will switch again and do the steps because I think it'll be a lot more, eye opening and give me a lot more recovery doing it with the God that I love and trust.
Spencer (13:54):
I'm going to jump ahead a little bit in the steps here, because I remembered this reading, in this book, Paths to Recovery, for step six, at the beginning of the first paragraph, it says, Spiritual growth in Al Anon includes gaining an understanding of our relationship and trust with the God of our understanding.
And then at the end of that first paragraph, itsays, without true unconditional acceptance of step three, the action of step six is impossible.
(14:21):
And step six is, were entirely ready to haveGod remove all these defects of character.
I completely see where that's true for me.
If I haven't turned my will over to the care of myhigher power, my life over to the care of my higher power, how can I expect my higher power to remove my shortcomings, my defects, whatever we want to call them.
(14:43):
I really have to have some trust there tohave that readiness, not even to ask for them to be removed, just to be ready to ask.
so that feels like that could have beenanother place where you might've got stuck.
Sara S (14:57):
it's so interesting.
You'd bring that up because.
Within the last four weeks, thishas been a huge eye opener to me.
I think we hear what we'resupposed to hear when we're ready.
I was in a meeting, and I don't remember if it was adaily reader or if someone was reading from the forum, but it was a story about a woman who was on the beach, and she wrote down all of her defects in the sand.
(15:23):
And then as she got up to walk away, she looked back andsaw that the tide had come in and taken some of those away.
And that really struck me like, Oh, it's notmy job and I can give these to my higher power.
And so what I did was I wrote down a list of allmy character defects that I was willing to give up.
And I wrote them on stickies and put them in my God box.
(15:44):
And just recently I had a really goodexperience with my partner where I.
I get really mad when people are late and it's like a shortcircuit, it's a character defect that I am powerless over.
Spencer (15:57):
Yeah.
Sara S (15:58):
And something happened.
Like my brain, I could recognize I had achoice and before I've never felt that choice.
I just go right to anger.
And so I do feel like,, I'm letting myhigher power in and that, that defect.
Is being removed by not me.
I don't know how you can't do it.
(16:19):
so it was really powerful, but yeah,I think you made a good point.
I'm sure I was reluctant to really believe that andactually even do it because I didn't ever trust my God.
Spencer (16:31):
And then during this three year where you just didn't have a God.
Sara S (16:35):
Right.
Spencer (16:36):
I would guess that you also were not actively working the steps during that period, or were you, and how did that work?
Uh,
Sara S (16:47):
kind of in COVID times.
And I had moved from a location that had a lot of meetingsto a very rural setting, which is where I live now.
And there aren't a lot of meetingsand I couldn't find one locally.
So I just worked with my sponsor.
I've had the same sponsor throughabout the last seven years.
(17:09):
So I would just talk with her, I wouldn'tsay I was actually working the steps.
I would say I was white knuckling it,as I said before, just hanging on.
But I definitely didn't have a lotof serenity, during those times.
Spencer (17:20):
What was the experience of working the steps with Blake?
How did that feel different?
Sara S (17:26):
Haven't really done, I mean, other than just going to meetings and whatever, but actually working the steps, I've been doing the traditions this year,
and it has been.
amazing Like a whole new experience.
every day is a whole new experience now,that I really trust my higher power and am willing to give him, them, my problems.
Spencer (17:49):
I'm interested in how you're working the traditions.
I have gone through the traditions in several differentways in the years I've been in the Al-Anon program.
I don't think I would ever have characterized it as working,so I'm interested to hear what your experience is there.
Sara S (18:09):
It's been literally life changing, really.
it has completely altered my relationshipswith my partner, with my family, I've largely struggled with, My nuclear family in many ways.
now we're on tradition eight and wework it through the, that workbook.
Reaching for personal freedom.
Spencer (18:30):
Right.
Sara S (18:31):
It goes through the steps, then it goes through the traditions, and then it goes through the concepts.
So the way I work them is, I read these things,we write about them, and then we meet weekly and discuss what we got from them, what our takeaway was.
That's how we've been working.
And I talk with my sponsor about what welearned in the book study and how it's applying to my life and what takeaways I'm gleaning.
Spencer (18:57):
That particular book really focuses on how the steps, the traditions, and the concepts of service can apply in our own lives.
The traditions technically areabout how Al Anon groups work.
But we can take a tradition like tradition one about unityof purpose, and apply that to a family, apply that to a work situation, and come at the way in which we relate to other people in a new way, in an Al Anon way, if you will.
(19:39):
It sounds like.
You're doing that.
Like you're actually taking, as you're studyingthese, you're finding ways that you change the way in which you relate to the other people around you.
Is that true?
Sara S (19:52):
That's true.
And that's exactly what my sponsor told me.
She said, the steps in her opinion areabout getting right with ourselves and the traditions are about getting right with others.
And so while it is largely written for Al Anongroups, this book that I'm taking it through applies it to the relationships in your life.
And so it, it's really eyeopening.
(20:16):
One of my favorites so far wasthe self supporting tradition.
That's the seventh tradition.
And, I have always considered myself fullyself supporting because I financially am, but to me, it's like, it's four tires, right?
There's financial, Emotional, spiritual, and physical.
And I found out when I worked at Seventh Tradition,I wasn't, emotionally self supporting at all.
(20:40):
I very heavily relied on mypartner and that's a heavy burden.
Spencer (20:43):
it is.
Sara S (20:44):
And it's heavy on a relationship, but to me, it's like when you go shopping, I don't know if you like to shop, I do.
And, if I go shopping with someone andthey just follow me around the store.
I'm like, go shop, quit following me around.
And I feel like that's how I was You know,emotionally, I was just very needy, very like right on the heels of a shopper.
(21:05):
Like, I don't know what to do.
I'm just going to follow you around.
so it's really, it's been phenomenal.
Spencer (21:13):
that is cool.
I might want to get you back and just talk in moredetail about your experience with the traditions, because that is something that, in my experience, is not emphasized or sometimes even really discussed in meetings, in many of the meetings that I've been to.
The meeting that I started out in, which turned out tobe a meeting with really deep recovery in the meeting.
(21:40):
They would read the tradition of themonth at the beginning of the meeting.
it was almost never a topic of discussion, youdon't get any depth of understanding that way.
You hear these words, you're like, okay, whatever,that's what we do at the beginning of the meeting.
Now let's get into the real meat of thestuff here, which is how do I deal with this person in my life who is drinking too much.
Sara S (22:04):
I would love to, I really would because the, group that we started is just whoever wants to come on this day of the week, we're always on the tradition of the month.
So it makes it easy for people to drop in.
And one of the.
people, participants who come is a long time Al Anoner, and they had never done the traditions either.
(22:25):
When I was telling my sponsor this, she said,yeah, a lot of people look over the traditions and she's like, wait till you get to the concepts.
Spencer (22:32):
Yeah.
Sara S (22:33):
I'm pretty excited, but I feel the same way.
I feel like before I just would like glossover the traditions, okay, whatever, that doesn't have any meaning for me really.
Spencer (22:42):
Yeah.
I got to put a couple of bucks in the basket.
Okay.
Okay.
I can't talk about.
Other programs when I'm in my Al Anon meeting.
Okay.
Whatever.
So I like this, the steps arehow you get right with yourself.
The traditions are how you get right with other people.
The concepts of service is how you getright with groups that you're a member of.
(23:06):
It's one way of looking at it.
they are more technical some of them, youreally have to kind of stretch your imagination.
but I think again, the Reaching for PersonalFreedom book does a nice job of trying to relate that to my personal experience.
I'm interested to see how that goes actually,because one of the meetings that I attend regularly.
(23:29):
It's a hybrid meeting and the group that's on Zoom has beenworking through that, reaching for personal freedom book.
It's going to be real soon that westart getting into those concepts.
and so I'm really looking forward to Where thoseconversations go, I've been through them a couple of times and some of them are like beautiful.
(23:50):
Like participation is the key to harmonyis the fourth concept of service.
yes, I can take that in and I canunderstand what it means for me.
in whatever context, whether it's a work contextor an Al Anon meeting context or whatever.
but some of the others are like, what?
Sara S (24:10):
Yeah, and
I find that's a little bit true of the traditions.
We've been on eight and, this is thethird week that we'll be doing it
and we're both like, how manyways can you ask this question?
we know we have our own talents andwe can ask for people to help us if we
need help.
we're asking this, we're just beating itover and over, but it's still very useful.
(24:31):
Right.
Spencer (24:32):
yeah, we've been in, in our progress in that book, we've just gone, however many questions we get through, each meeting, we're not trying to lock it into the month or anything.
and so if you get one of those, like that onewhere, yeah, okay, like we've talked about it, we're done with that, but we still have one more week.
What are we going to do?
(24:52):
we just move on.
Having a cadence helps because as you say, whensomebody drops in and they haven't been there for a couple of weeks, they know where you are.
Sara S (25:01):
And then the supplement that we've been using is the book that you already referenced, Paths to Recovery, because they have, quite a good selection of questions on the back of each step and tradition and concept.
We'll go into there if we run out of stuffwith the reaching for personal freedom.
Or we'll go to the daily readers andread what the answers are on those.
Spencer (25:23):
Actually I'm looking at the questions for tradition eight in the Paths to Recovery book.
Some of these are they're focused on Al Anon, butdo I ever have a tendency to be a know it all?
that's about me and my life, right?
Sara S (25:35):
Yeah.
Spencer (25:36):
They're both good resources if you want to get deeper into the steps and the traditions and the concepts, both paths to recovery and reaching for personal freedom are great resources.
They come at them from slightly differentdirections and they compliment each other, I'd say.
Sara S (25:52):
I would agree.
Spencer (25:54):
I'm going to phrase this question the way I usually do.
And you can take it wherever you want.
What would you now say to you then, thatmight have helped you to shorten your journey.
Sara S (26:08):
I think I would say something I've heard before take the cotton out of your ears and put it in your mouth so you listen more than you talk, I think I would tell myself that, listen and have more faith and trust in, in these people.
You know, it was just so foreign to me.
I don't know if other people have had that experiencewhen they're coming from a very organized religion that kind of dictates what you should and shouldn't think.
(26:35):
I was in my early thirties and I think I was justafraid to trust myself or listen to anybody else outside of that circle of influence of religion.
So I think to shorten my journey, I wouldtell myself, take them up on their word.
It says you can create your own higher power.
So do it.
and don't feel guilty.
(26:55):
You don't need permission.
Go do
it.
Spencer (26:58):
Thank you so much.
We'll take a break by talking about a song that you chose.
What is your first song?
Sara S (27:06):
My first song is by the spinners, Working My Way Back to You.
I just heard this recently and I thoughtthat is so appropriate for my higher power.
He's been there all along.
He, they, them, she, whoever, waiting for me to come back.
And I guess it would be working my way back becauseI'm sure when I was a small child, I had a different relationship, but then in the middle of being raised and be a young adult, I left I just liked that song.
(27:38):
It says, I'll keep working my way backto you, babe, with a burning love inside.
Yeah, I'm working my way back to you, babe.
And the happiness had died.
And I love that my happiness had died.
The God that I was given didn't work for me.
And this God does work for me.
And I feel like when I hear that song, it's applicable.
I'm just working my way back.
Spencer (28:08):
In this section of the podcast, we talk about our lives in recovery.
How have we experienced recovery recently?
You want to go first?
Sara S (28:16):
Sure.
So I have been attending a lot of online meetings lately.
As I mentioned earlier, I live in a rural setting and,it's just really refreshing to see and experience.
Different recovery with new faces.
sometimes I slip into the belief that Ihave enough Al Anon, I can skip meetings.
I can just rely on the readers, my sponsor, workingthe steps, our traditions as it may be right now, but there's just something I get from a meeting that I can't get anywhere else because I hear my stories.
(28:48):
in their shares.
Recently I went to one that was based out of England.
and it was I just love the English accent.
And it was lovely to hear all of it,the whole opening read like that.
And, just their vernacular is fabulous to me.
I love the way they phrase things.
And, then what you figure out is we're all the same.
(29:11):
I'm not unique.
I have the same problems as everybody else, evenpeople on the other side of the world . So it just reminds me that's where my solution is.
Spencer (29:20):
Thank you.
I've been listening to a number of speaker tapes,open talks, whatever you want to call them, where, an Al Anon member shares their experience, strength, and hope, usually in the format of what it was like, what happened, what it's like now, where what happened is, how did I get into recovery?
(29:40):
How did I get into Al Anon?
what brought me here?
and I also have been reflecting about how,the way that I have expressed that story of my own has changed over the years.
I know that when I was early in the program and I was askedto share my story, there was a lot of my loved one, who was the alcoholic, whose behavior brought me to Al Anon.
(30:04):
It was a lot of her in my story.
She did this.
This happened.
This other thing happened becauseshe was drinking or whatever.
Okay.
I remember hearing a friend of mine sharinghis story and it was almost entirely about him.
It was about how he felt and how he acted or reactedand, the effects that he had on the people around him and how his life changed when he came into recovery.
(30:36):
The, what we sometimes say in program qualifierperson was almost not in his story at all.
And I thought, Oh, How can I do that?
can I do that?
Can I divorce my story from the, the story of the rehabs andthe outpatients and the events and, you know, so I started, working to sort of restructure my story in that way.
(31:04):
There are places in the literature where it says, wedon't talk about the alcoholic, we talk about ourselves.
And, and I'm like, how can I tell my story withoutbringing her into it, at least on the outskirts.
And I still think that is a little bit true.
but at the same time, when I listened to other people'sstory as they tell it, mostly the ones that really grab me and keep me interested and lots of places to, to laugh and cry are the ones that focus on, as we would call it in an AA talk, the drunkologue.
(31:42):
The before story.
There is a series of Open Talks everySaturday night in the town that I live in.
AA Talks.
\ It's from 8.
30 to 9.
30.
And many times I've heard the person at the podiumsay, and my sponsor told me if I'm not sober by nine o'clock, I'm talking too much about the before times.
(32:06):
It's fun to listen to those stories.
You get some, what do you call it?
Schadenfreude, of, Joy in other people's pain or whatever.
you get a lot of things to laugh about.
But if we want to carry the message of hope, if we wantto carry the message of recovery, which is at least one of the reasons for giving these talks, we have to talk about what recovery has done for us and maybe how we got there.
(32:28):
So I've tried to
move the focus of what I say.
And I can only prescribe this for myself.
I can't tell anybody else how to tell theirstory because their story is their story.
and I do enjoy listening to the drunkologs, I got to admit.
Oh my God, yeah, that happened to me too, orwow, I'm so glad that never happened to me.
(32:53):
Both of those can happen in the same story.
This is just something that's been on mymind recently, probably because I'm giving a talk at a conference next month, and so I'm thinking about what I'm going to say this time.
the motto of the conference is something about action,and I'm like, okay, I think what I want to try to focus on is the actions that I took in recovery and the effects that those actions had for me.
(33:18):
so I'm still thinking about that.
And what I usually do when I give a talk is Ilet it over to my higher power and whatever comes out of my mouth is what comes out of my mouth.
But I like to have a little bit ofstructure ahead of time, at least.
Anyway, so that's what's going on in my life here.
Looking forward in the podcast,we're still working on the steps.
You're actually the second personI'm talking to about step three.
(33:40):
And I've got a person coming up who.
is going to talk about working the stepsas an atheist, if I remember it correctly.
So let's get a lot of voices, a lot of differentperspectives, a lot of different experiences, because this step can go many different ways for different people.
we welcome your thoughts.
You can join our conversation.
please leave us a voicemail, send us anemail with your feedback or questions.
(34:04):
And I want to thank you, Sarah,because you put some questions in here.
These are awesome.
Do you feel like you have the freedomto create a God of your understanding?
How have you created a God of your understanding?
What is holding you back fromcreating a God of your understanding?
All excellent questions.
If you would let yourself create a God ofyour understanding, would it be easier to turn the care of your life over to that God?
(34:28):
And I.
completely see how these questionsrelate to what we've been talking about.
Thank you for those questions.
Sarah, how can people send us feedback?
How can they give us their responses to these questions?
Sara S (34:41):
you can send a voice memo or email to feedback at the recovery show, or if you prefer, you can call and leave us a voicemail at 7 3 4.
707 8795.
You can also use the voicemail button on thewebsite to join the conversation from your computer.
(35:03):
We'd love to hear from you.
Share your experience, strength, and hope, oryour questions about today's topic of Step 3.
or any of our upcoming topics, including the steps.
If you have a topic you'd likeus to talk about, let us know.
If you would like advanced notice for some ofour topics so that you can contribute to that topic, you can sign up for our mailing list by sending an email to feedbackattherecovery.
(35:29):
show.
Put email in the subject line to make it easier to spot.
Spencer, where can our listeners findout more about the recovery show?
Spencer (35:39):
that would be our website, which is for the, I don't know, nth time in this section, therecovery.
show, where we have all the information about the show,which is mostly these days, the, the notes for each episode.
Those include links to the books that we read from or talkedabout videos for the music that in this case, Sarah chose.
(36:00):
And there's also some links to other recoverypodcasts and websites that we'd like, and you can find the notes for this episode at therecovery.
show slash 417, or, any other episode, just stickthe number on the end and you'll get right there.
What is your second song?
Sara S (36:19):
My second song is Courage to Change by Sia, which is awesome because it's the name of one of our daily readers.
but I love it because the words or lyrics in there,number one, remind me it does take courage to change, but it also reminds me that I'm not alone.
(36:39):
There's lyrics in there that says,you're not alone in all of this.
You're not alone.
I promise.
Standing together, we can do anything.
That's a good reminder that I'm never alone.
And, that I, especially in my journey, it'srequired a lot of courage to trust a higher power.
And this song somehow reminds me that I'm not alone.
. Spencer (37:10):
We got a couple emails to share with you in this episode.
Mike writes, Hi Spencer, I just listenedto the Step 3 episode and love the format where you read a paragraph and speak on that.
I like the free flowing format too, but this onefelt like a meeting and I got a lot out of it.
I'm prone to worry, so I have to remind myselfthat I can't worry myself into serenity.
(37:33):
One thing that I heard in a face to facemeeting last weekend was that there are two things that Al Anon members hate.
The way things are, and change.
That changes over time as we work thesteps, but it still resonated with me.
Keep up the great work and enjoy retirement.
Take good care.
Mike.
Thanks, Mike, for writing.
Thanks for, the feedback on thisformat that I'm using for the 12 steps.
(37:56):
And maybe we'll take that forward into someother content, such as the traditions, maybe?
It's been a while since I've done Traditions.
Yeah.
Can't worry yourself into Serenity.
A learning from that last episode.
And yes, we often don't like the way thingsare, and we don't want them to change, which, you know, seems paradoxical, but People are paradoxical, inherently, I think.
(38:24):
I got an email from Andrew.
He had a suggestion about how I might be able to improve theaudio quality of voicemails that I get from Google Voice.
So I'll be trying out his suggestion onthe next few voicemails that come in.
Thanks for that, Andrew.
Thanks for that idea.
Sarah, I want to thank you so much for bringing yourperspective, your unique understanding of a higher power.
(38:50):
As far as I've heard, I'm sure that you're not the only onewith a panel or a committee or whatever as a higher power.
Thank you so much.
Sara S (38:59):
Yes, thank you for having me.
I've enjoyed this.
Spencer (39:03):
And what is the third song?
Sara S (39:06):
My last song is Living in the Moment by Jason Mraz.
This song has always been with me, evenfrom very early stages in recovery.
I remember hearing it and I reallywanted to believe it could apply to me.
But I didn't.
there's lyrics in there that talk about livingin the moment, not worrying about things.
But as I now know, my problem was I didn't have ahigher power I could turn it over to that I trusted.
(39:32):
So now when I listen to this song, I'm much morejubilant about it because it does apply and, the entire song, I encourage everyone to listen to it.
It's just such a happy song if they haven't listened to it.
But the ones I really love is, I will notwaste my days making up all kinds of ways to worry about things that will not happen to me.
(39:55):
So I just let go of what I know I don't know.
And I know I only do this by living in the moment.
Living our life easy and breezy with peace in my mind,with peace in my heart., It's one of those songs that all of the phrases are applicable to me and my journey
of recovery.
Spencer (40:21):
Thank you for listening, and please keep coming back.
Whatever your problems, there arethose among us who have had them too.
If we did not talk about a problem you arefacing today, feel free to contact us so we can talk about it in a future episode.
May understanding, love, and peacegrow in you, one day at a time.
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