Wisdom Of The Rooms - 2025

[bluidkiti]

April 21

Quote of the Week

"No one owes you anything."

I can remember sitting at bars stirring my drink while I stirred my resentments. I resented my boss who promoted someone else over me when I deserved it more. After how hard I worked, he owed it to me, I thought. As I kept drinking, I looked at all the couples in the restaurant and thought about how lonely I was. Surely, I deserved to be in a relationship, too. As I ordered another drink, I started counting the resentments I had over past affairs that never worked out. The more I drank, the more the world owed me, and soon I was consumed with self-pity.

When I got sober, I simmered and seethed with these resentments. As I worked the Steps with my sponsor, I began to share my belief with him that the world owed me a lot and that one of the reasons I drank so much was because I had so little. He quickly told me that the reason I drank so much was because I was an alcoholic, and the reason I had so little was because I rarely worked hard enough or long enough for it. He told me no one owed me anything.

This was hard to hear at first. But after working Steps Four and Five, I discovered that my part was the most important part in the equation of what I had and didn’t have in my life. I found that others who had the things I thought I deserved did indeed do the things I didn’t: they worked and sacrificed for them. When I finally accepted that I was responsible for my life, I gave up the fantasy that the world owed me anything. And once I did that, I was free to begin working for and achieving the things that were truly meaningful to me.