[MajestyJo]

Growing up I had quantity for sure. I think when I was younger the quality was there but as I got out into the world and had to deal with life, I found it was diluted by resentment, disillusionment, fear, and lack of self-esteem and self-worth, mixed messages, guilt, and many other things that I let corrode my faith. I came to believe that God didn't believe in me.

So much of what I knew about God was done in rote and like I have shared before, so much of what I was taught was something I was told to believe and were old tapes like a lot of other things in my life, it was lived through other people. Whoever or whatever became my God, and I switched allegiance and God became distant and I lost contact. God became this distant being and no longer became an important force in my life. Someone who I called out to when I was in a corner and didn't know what to do. I would ask for help yet didn't have much faith that it would come. Soon I was looking for the quick fix, a short time solution to a long-time problem. Me!

It is hard to clean house when you think that your problems are all the fault of the people in your life. It is ironic that my second name means "God's gracious gift." I was always told to help others. I was a caretaker and caregiver all of my life. As a result, I lived through those people and found my value through them. Many times I was put on a pedestal, it is a long way down when you fall off. That generally happened when I became disillusioned by the 'god' in my life and what I didn't know was how to take care of myself. I allowed myself to be abused mentally, emotionally, and physically.

Through my addiction, I became selfish and self-centered and ended up becoming isolated and cut off from all spiritual things. My disease took over my life, and I became mental, emotionally, spiritually and physically bankrupt. When you shut down the negative, you also block the positive from coming in.

At first, I didn't think I was an alcoholic. A problem drinker seemed so much easier to accept. I just knew I didn't want to go back to where I came from. I knew I was an addict, and until I could accept that I used alcohol the same as I used everything else, the insanity still reigned in my life. I am powerless over people, places and things. When I surrender, I am empowered to do what I needed to do for myself. That empowerment had to come from a source outside of myself. As my sponsor said, "It doesn't matter what you believe in as long as your Higher Power isn't you. My concept of God and how He works in my life has taken many forms. I like the Higher Self, the Inner Self, which to me means that I learned to believe in me. I learned to quiet my mind and was able to listen to that still quiet voice within, I was able to take the journey from my head to my heart and find peace. Good orderly direction from a Group of drunks who filled me with Divine Orderly Good, and raised me to a level of being that is far above and beyond what I thought possible.

When I came in, I didn't think I was insane and I thought that I knew who God was. As I became clean and sober and my mind finally grew into a new state of awareness, I realized that I was totally insane and didn't have a clue as to who God was. I went on a Spiritual journey to find God and to make Him personal. The more I searched, the more I opened my mind, and was willing to learn, the chaos decreased and a new soundness of mind came into being. Learning to quiet my mind, to be open to all things, was a process in itself. That I didn't have to accept all things, and could take what I needed at the time, put the rest on the shelf, allowed me to find myself and believe that I could get better and I could heal. As I learned to believe more and more in this God of my understanding, my faith grew.

As someone once told me, God could, doesn't say He would, restore me to sanity. I found the assurance in meetings, I saw the program working in other people, and I came to believe it would work for me.

These words are my interruption of what I read and heard in meetings, have no association with AA or any other fellowship, although the basis of my recovery was AA, I went to NA, CoDA, ACoA, CA, GA, Al-Anon, and Nar-Anon.