‎…and the atoms in your right hand are from different stars than the atoms in your left hand, different galaxies throughout your entire body even. Einstein said “Time only exists so everything doesn’t happen all at once.” Haha…awesome.
There is quite obviously to me, an underlying force in the universe today, and always, bigger than I could have ever imagined. So get busy living or get busy dying. The magical mysteries of this world are fucking amazing. Coincidence upon coincidence, fate bumps into serendipity and my life, in sobriety, just gets better and better every fucking day.
A couple of weekends ago I took my son up to Chattanooga to go fishing with my brother, his uncle. My brother and I got to talking about women, and he’s dating a 21 year old blond dutch women whose smoking hot, and he says to me, “And Bryan, guess what it is we have in common.” I look at him and without flinching and say “Both your fathers killed themselves.” He said, “How the hell did you know that?” I have no fucking idea. From our Big Book, … “for nature and God alike abhor suicide.” Drinking and drugging it slowly to death or the one drastic action all at once, nature and God alike abhor it. Maybe my spirit just knew it was that terrible of an act from the tone of voice he used, maybe God gave me the forewarning thought. Perhaps, string theory really exists and our thoughts are all connected on strands of physical wavelengths we just haven’t proven yet and as someone near me has a thought we all share it. Maybe therein lies the strength of the program, that my thoughts of not drinking plus your thoughts of not drinking, plus the string attaching us, or the bond connecting us make us stronger, hell maybe the bond, is all the REAL strength their really is. And so 1 + 1 = 3 . God knows I couldn’t quit on my own, and God knows it was a breeze once I finally surrendered and did what I was told, made 90 in 90, got a sponsor and did the work. I don’t know what makes that telepathic magic. What makes ESP happen from time to time, or hell even what makes me yawn after someone near me does, even if I don’t see them do it. But it happens and because it happens, even now in my sober life, at 4.4 years sober I’m just as big a faithful believer in magic as I was when I came in. Later that day, a few weeks back, it was the biggest full moon in something like 18 years. I was cooking steaks for my brother and son who were inside my brothers house watching television and I remembered about the moon. Instinctively I knew I wanted to look up and see the moon, but it was too early for it to come up, but still I found myself staring at exactly the spot on the horizon in which the moon would rise in just an hour or so, despite ever having seen a moonrise or a sunrise from Chattanooga, and most especially from his property. How could I have known where the moon was going to rise? I don’t know but I did. This is a world of magic, God’s wonders aren’t a tenth explained, and I’m so grateful to be a part of it all. God is good, and I’m alive to enjoy all this magic, simple as it may seem, that gratitude has kept me on a high for weeks, and it ain’t no pink cloud, it’s just the realization that the same amazing miraculous God who removed the urge to drink and drug from me, and then cured me of Hepatitis C, and then just as easily removed the urge to smoke cigarettes, polluting the most come involuntary human reflex we have, that of breathing, that same God, is in me, and I’m a part of, and he loves me, and through him ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE. I mean, this may sound over the top, but this realization as of late, having had the latest obsession, the latest lust cloud my mind for so long, and finally exhaled out, has been huge. This world, indeed this universe, and everything in it, including myself is nothing short of a miracle, and God’s will is good, and I’m so thankful that I continue to grow.
In the rooms of AA we hear people whine about complacency, about the “pink cloud” or how hard it is at 9 months I remember being the first major roadblock people groaned of. Then two years, then 4, then 5 and 6, and you hear people bitch about the difficulties of reaching 10 years, and man, the more I’m in the rooms the more I realize, MOST OF THESE PEOPLE ARE NEGATIVE THINKING NUTCASES. For me, and not just me, but for a select few people I know, the program gets EASIER AND EASIER. My life continues to get better and better. Sure there are speed bumps and challenges, getting over this last woman and dealing with letting go is a perfect example, but once again, inevitably, pain is the touchstone to growth, and I feel better, more complete, more free than I did before I went through the entire process with her or the last one. I just keep learning, and I just keep becoming more and more complete, more and more confident in God’s will for me, less and less concerned with my little plans and designs, and just overwhelmingly trusting in the process, and the fact that God’s ultimate will has my best interests at heart. That he could very well end me up on a beach surfing somewhere, occasionally teaching the word of God, or leading meetings or something just amazing, and better than I could ever have planned, and maybe that doesn’t even involve a woman, and if not, so be it. In the course of my history women haven’t brought me a whole lot of serenity, and it’s kind of nice and freeing to not have and more importantly, finally, not need one around. It’s almost like quitting smoking or drinking, lol. And maybe one day the right one will come along, and I’m open to that, but in the meantime, the fact that my life in Alcoholics Anonymous continues to get better and better, reminds me that all the nay sayers and whiney bitches in AA that barely ever make meetings then come in and dump their shit on everyone that it’s sooooo hard now the pink cloud is gone, just aren’t growing spiritually. They probably never got off their fucking meds. They probably never worked any steps, they have probably never made an amends, never grown, never done a consistent 10 step every night for years on end. This program of AA is a fucking non stop miracle, and my life continues to get better and better. There is one guy who taught me that the “Pink Cloud” doesn’t have to end, a Christian man and I still look up to him and am grateful that for all the average spirituality going around in the rooms, there are still men who almost tear up in joy every time they share, grateful as I am to be alive, to not be craving a drink or a drug anymore, and to know that God is incredible, awesome, and now, fully, on our side, and entirely capable of miracles.
I believe this is probably the case of the modern marriage as well. That the Pink Cloud never has to end. Neither does the honeymoon. I don’t know this, I drove my marriage into the ground and I haven’t had a real relationship last longer than a month in sobriety, so admittedly it’s sheer speculation, but just as the whiney negative bitches in AA override the majority and put the fear that the latter years in recovery are a struggle, so too I bet are the voices of married couples, focused on the negative, grass is always greener in someone else’s yard defeatist majority out there. Who can blame them, with the Judeo Christian ideals of marriage, God and commitment constantly mocked, with lust used to sell everything from Swiffer picker uppers to deodorant none of us really need, there is enough temptation and media to make the most beautiful couples feel complacent and ordinary. I’d bet though, just like with the program of AA, that I have to work every day to stay in the middle of the bed with, but when I do pays off with results and dividends like I’ve never experienced before in my entire life, a constant endorphin buzz, I bet a real relationship, a real marriage and honeymoon can be the same. With a little work, gratitude, and appreciation can be the essence of magic, can be the elixer of heaven, that a real Godly relationship can be the most awesome expression of God and of love here on Earth that you have ever experienced and that it can stay fresh, and new and grateful, and that with that kind of Godly love, that kind of appreciation of each other and of your creator, you can accomplish any of the tasks or goals God puts before you. I was never so motivated in my life as when I was 18, married, with a new son and a goal to buy us a house and by God, I became the number one salesman of a billion dollar corporation so I know what power God can give you through the magic of love, through the motivation of his gifts, but I simply didn’t have a clue as to the source or the magnitude of that power early on in my life. I bet now, sober, ten plus years later I would grasp it, hold on to it, and never let go. And I bet, just like the pink cloud, the honeymoon would never end, and I would love my wife, and serve God until my dying day, and despite whatever speed bumps we might come across I would know to be grateful, and that like everything else, they were just a part of the journey, and that God never put anything before me he didn’t also match in strength for me to overcome. God is good, and I’m simply grateful to be exactly where I’m at, more appreciative that I’ve ever been and ready for the next leg of the journey. As an addict I was always sinking, but sober, complete and whole, every experience teaches me something, and I grow more and more complete with each challenge. So then, even the most arduous bullshit, is a blessing in the long run, which actually makes all of life exciting, even the shitty parts!
Thanks for reading this blog post, and for more on my life, my journey through recovery, alcoholism, cocaine, opiate and pharmaceutical addictions as well as my overcoming Hepatitis C, Interferon and sheer madness and insanity here in sprawling suburbs of Atlanta, please read my book 100% free at http://www.books4free.com, on smashwords, or of course on Amazon! Please also leave a review and thanks again for your support!
-Jared Bryan Smith
JB Smiths Blog - Author @ books4free.com 