Rest on our laurels

p.85 - It is easy to let up on the spiritual program of action and rest on our laurels. We are headed for trouble if we do, for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God's will into all of our activities. "How can I best serve Thee - Thy will (not mine) be done." These are thoughts which must go with us constantly.

So the phrase "rest on our laurels" comes from the original Olympic games where the winners of an event were honored by being crowned with a wreath of laurels (bay leaves) that they wore on their heads (picture those iconic images of Caesar and you'll get the idea). Of course the implication for AA members is that once we have acheived our goal (a spiritual experience sufficient to bring about recovery from alcoholism), that we should not rest and assume that this experience is everlasting.

Detachment

I recently ran across this comment by Thomas Merton:

Detachment from things does not mean setting up a contradiction between "things" and "God" as if God were another "thing" and as if His creatures were His rivals. We do not detach ourselves from things in order to attach ourselves to God, but rather we become detached from ourselves in order to see and use all things in and for God. This is an entirely new perspective which many sincerely moral and ascetic minds fail utterly to see.
-New Seeds of Contemplation. (New York: New Directions Books), p 21

Detachment does not mean abandonment of the world in search of a spirituality that is separate from the world.  It means perspective, and with perspective, humility.  As one of my favorite AA slogans says, if it's not practical, it's not spiritual.

I have spoken in this blog about the 'get sane quick schemes' I engaged in when I was drinking.  The various things I tried, such as  meditation and yoga, were good in themselves but they became 'get sane quick schemes' for me because I was using them in pursuit of a disembodied spirituality.  I thought there was some healthy pink cloud I could enter that would make me feel good about the world and (especially) myself without changing anything in the world or in myself.  I was seeing 'spiritual' detachment precisely as a separation from reality, rather than a principled, spiritual engagement with it, contributing to changing it and myself.  Unless I'm seriously misreading Merton, that is what he means when he talks about seeing and using things in and for God.

The Third Tradition - WE THINK NOT!

Among my friends I have been known as the guy who can't stand hearing The Promises read at meetings, which anyone who has read my previous post Those Pesky Promises can plainly see. But hopefully what is also apparent is that it's not that I don't like, or disagree with The Promises, in fact just the opposite... I love them. What I don't like is some of the rituals and pomp that surrounds them.

Some perspective

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore, we must be saved by hope. ... Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore, we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness 

- Reinhold Neibuhr

Those pesky Promises

Anybody who knows me in AA knows how I feel about what has become known in AA circles as "The Promises". Those often quoted lines on pages 83 and 84 that are such a staple and a favorite of so many people in the fellowship. They know... I hate 'em.

Okay, maybe I don't hate them. As a matter of fact, I love many thing about them. What I hate is what they have come to represent and how they are misunderstood.

Spiritual Materialism

In my last post I called using the AA program as a way to feel good a form of 'spiritual materialism' (also known as 'spiritual narcissim').  As I understand it, spiritual materialism (a term coined by the Buddhist teacher Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche) involves ego inflation rather than the AA goal of 'ego deflation in depth'.  We inflate our egos when we use our program as a source of temporary pleasure, as a tool for feeling good, rather than as a tool for changing ourselves in a fundamental way, surrendering to our higher power and facing reality.

Are these extravagant promises? (part of a series)

The following is part of a series Dave and I are doing on the Promises. (See Contingent Promises, Learning to Play, and Love for an earlier post.)

If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through. We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and selfpity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.  
Are these extravagant promises?

Well, as I often hear them interpreted in meetings, yeah, they are extravagant.

God's joy, music, and foreclosures

I am a string in the concert of God's joy.
- Jacob Boehme
I love this quote.  I cannot define what I am refering to when I use the term "God".  For me it is shorthand for the ultimate flowing core energy of being, something that contains all of reality including me, but that's a pretty vague statement.  Whatever it is, I think its defining characteristics are love and joy, and both of those characteristics involve relationship, interaction between all the elements of reality.

Another side of One Day at a Time

How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. ~ Annie Dillard

Your mind tricks you into believing tomorrow is a reality, thereby giving you permission to waste today.

I spent yesterday reading a light novel -- nothing great, just an enjoyable read.  Now, there was nothing wrong with that.  In fact, I was more comfortably 'in the moment' than I had been for several days.  Relaxation is good, but, being an alcoholic, I nonetheless felt a bit guilty.  That got me thinking about relaxation vs. wasting time (aka sloth).  I don't really know any rules for telling the difference, but like the classic rule on pornography, I know it when I see it.  The fact is that, while yesterday was a very good day, I do waste - kill - too much time and that is something I have to pay attention to.

This is a side of living 'one day at a time' that I too often forget.  I am responsible for how I live every day and killing time is a felony.

Don't Keep Score

What I am saying is this: the score is not what matters. Life does not have to be regarded as a game in which scores are kept and somebody wins. If you are too intent on winning, you will never enjoy playing. If you are too obsessed with success, you will forget to live. If you have learned only how to be a success, your life has probably been wasted.

Thomas Merton. Love and Living. (New York: Harcourt) p. 12