Monthly Archives: November 2015

Some Patterns Cause Us to Stumble, Others Help Us Build

Some patterns cause us to stumble while others help us to build.I have been working the 12 Steps since 1999. I actually started going to meetings in 1991, but didn’t get a sponsor and start working the program for eight years. Even in those early years, as I went to meetings week after week, I heard people talk about what helped them find sobriety and serenity, and what caused them to stumble. As I have listened to others, and as I have worked the Steps myself, I have gained an understanding of the importance of looking for patterns – patterns that help me grow as well as patterns that undermine my recovery. I have learned to look for them, analyze them, and use them to my advantage.

Patterns in Practice

The first time I became aware of the importance of a pattern was when I finally became willing to start recording the food I ate. It was the first change I became willing to make in my life as a result of my participation in the 12 Step program. I wasn’t willing to change how I ate at that point or tell anyone else what I was eating, and I certainly wasn’t willing to plan my food, but I decided that I was willing to record what I was eating.

Two things began to happen when I started to collect data on what I was eating. First of all, I started to lose weight. Why? Because I found that I had been eating mindlessly – picking up a handful of something every time I passed through the kitchen. When I committed to writing down every bite that went into my mouth, I discovered that some of the food I had been eating just wasn’t worth the effort it took to write it down! So the mindless snacking was cut way back.

The second thing was that I started to notice patterns. I could eat lunch on one day, and eat a different lunch the next day, both of which contained approximately the same number of servings from the same food groups, and find that I was satisfied when I finished one lunch but still wanted to eat more after I finished the other. As I continued to record what I ate, a pattern emerged. My satisfaction level was controlled not simply by how much I ate, or what kinds of foods I ate. The most important factor in determining whether I would be satisfied was texture – specifically crunch! If I didn’t get enough crunch in a meal, I wanted to continue eating. As soon as I came to that realization, I started keeping crunchy foods in the house and I found that I could eat less, be satisfied, and lose more weight!

Looking for patterns in an inventory

One of the objectives I have when receiving someone’s 5th step inventory, is to help them identify a list of shortcomings and character defects they can use as input to Step 6. As I listen to the person share their inventory, I make note of patterns I hear. Are they using certain words repeatedly? Does the same kind of thing keep happening to them? These patterns usually point to a shortcoming or character defect that I jot down. When they are done sharing their inventory I ask them to look back over it and identify any patterns they can find, and come up with their own list of shortcomings. Then we compare lists and talk about what they think they need to become willing to turn over to God as they embark on Step 6.

Dailies

The use of patterns I mentioned so far is for taking a look at past behavior and understanding it better. Patterns can also help us create healthier and more effective ways of living. In the program I often hear people talk about “the dailies.” This is a set of activities they do every day to help them maintain sobriety and happiness. Here are some of the dailies that help me live a life of recovery:

Scripture Study

At one time in my life I heard people talk about the importance of daily scripture study. I just couldn’t seem to find time to do it. Finally, I made a decision to get up before my children, very early in the morning, and try to establish a pattern of daily scripture study and prayer. I was successful and it made a big difference in my life.

Prayer

I try to write my morning prayer every day. That is a part of my “dailies.” Written prayer helps me “tune in” to the right frequency to connect with the Lord all day long.

Exercise

My husband and I walk each morning. It is good for our health and good for our relationship. It also gets our day off to a good start. This is a pattern that helps me in my life.

Long-time readers will know that I believe structure is a very important aspect of living a sober and successful life. Collecting data to analyze and looking for self-limiting patterns helps me to identify things I need to change. Establishing recovery-promoting patterns helps me put a framework in place to allow the Lord to change me from within so that I can live my best life.

Please share your thoughts about this post by commenting below.

Related Posts:

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Acceptance: Reflections on the Death of My Mother

Mira's Mom and DadLosing a loved one is always hard. Even when they have lived a good life and are just “done”, it is hard to let go; to accept that there will now be a time of separation. For those who have a testimony of life after death, it can be a little easier, because we have hope of being together again. But the pain of missing them is still a reality of life.

Acceptance

The key to peace for me, as I lost first my father and then my mother within ten months, is acceptance. In On Grief and Grieving Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and David Kessler identified 5 stages in the grieving process: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. I know that many people do experience these five stages, and it is good for them to understand the process so that they don’t think something is wrong with them as they pass through these emotions.

My Experience

Thirty years ago I lost my three year-old son Mikey in a drowning accident. It was certainly unexpected and played out quickly over just a few days. Now I have lost my Dad and my Mom who both declined slowly over years and months. In all three cases, regardless of whether death came suddenly and unexpectedly, as a welcome relief, or was a quiet, peaceful passing, my experience with grief and loss seems to be colored by my testimony of an afterlife and the 12-Step work I have done on acceptance.  I have learned to trust the Lord in all things, everyday. I have learned that with His help I can overcome anything; he will give me the strength and power to do all things that are expedient unto him (see Moroni 7:33.)

As far as I can tell, I have not experienced denial, anger, bargaining or depression in the face of death; some sadness – yes, but sadness is not depression. I have been blessed to go immediately to a place of acceptance. It is a comfortable place. I am grateful for this gift.

The morning I got word that my mother had slipped through the veil, I was standing in the bedroom and the following conversation took place in my head. I seemed to hear my mother speaking to me.

Mom: “You know what? There IS an afterlife! And Dad is here, too!!!”

Me: “I know, Mom. ?”

Then, a few minutes later, I was reflecting on the fact that I never “heard from” Dad after he died, and I thought, “He was too proud and stubborn to tell me I was right”. And then, in my head, I heard HIS voice: “Yeah, yeah.?”

As I wrote my prayers in the days following my mother’s death, this came to me in the Lord’s response to one prayer:

“Your Mom and Dad are adjusting to the new realities of their lives. Because your Mom is more open to learning new truth that is not consistent with the ‘traditions of their fathers,’ she and your Dad will be walking the same spiritual path at the same time, despite his earlier arrival. It helps that Mikey, and their parents, are able to visit with and teach them.  Oh, what interesting conversations are taking place up here. ?”

As I said at the end of my post about Dad’s death, it is what it is. I am at peace. And I am grateful.

Please share your thoughts about this post by commenting below.

Related Posts: Peace: It Is What It IsAcceptance: Identifying the Things I Cannot ChangeChange: The AADWAR Process

 

Structure Lost, Structure Found – Getting Back on Track

Structure: Train tracks keep the train headed in the right direction.
Copyright: duron0123 / 123RF Stock Photo

Dear Readers,

It has been a long time since I posted; a long time since I have written. I wish I could say that I was working diligently on my book manuscript. That would be an impressive excuse, right? The truth is, structure is what keeps me moving forward in life, like the tracks keep a train headed in the right direction. When events interfere with my normal, daily structure my productivity and the manageability of my life suffers.

My husband is a teacher and we have a high-schooler still at home. My last blog post was May 20th, the last week of the 2014/2015 school year. Don’t get me wrong, I love having my family around and spending time with them, but it is easy for me to get caught up in the things they are excited to do after they are FINALLY done with school, and to put my “own” life on hold. That would have been fine, for a couple of weeks. But a couple of weeks stretched into a month, and then I went to Boston to see my mother. And the stuff on my desk started piling up.

Mom was in a nursing home. I had planned to go see her in June. It turned out that my eight year-old granddaughter was going to summer camp for the first time and needed someone to pick her up from western Massachusetts in mid-July and get her home to Utah, so I arranged my trip so that I could do both. Then Mom got pneumonia the week before I was to go see her. We decided to give her antibiotics at the nursing home and prayed I would get there in time. I did. We had a peaceful and calming visit for five days as I mostly sat by her bedside while she slept. She died peacefully in her sleep a few days after I returned home. My desk was a mess.

I thought I might write about losing my mom at the time. I had written about my Dad’s death 10 months earlier. But it just didn’t come.

Then school started again, and I thought; “Now I will get back on the horse, back to writing regularly.” But I didn’t. I didn’t clean my desk, either. There was always something I needed to take care of – something urgent. Maybe not very important, but always urgent.

As the mess on my desk became deeper and deeper, it became more and more difficult to think about writing.

In late September, I went to Utah to help my daughter settle in after she and her husband bought a new home. Over Columbus Day weekend, my family and friends gathered for a memorial service in New York City, where my parents had lived until the last few years of their lives. It was lovely. I felt both uplifted and enlightened by the things people shared about my mom and even received insight into several of my own character traits that I had not previously thought of as being like hers.

When I got back the desk was not visible under the paper. I felt overwhelmed. Then someone, a reader, finally noticed that I hadn’t written in awhile.

So I have had a season of not writing; and not keeping my desk clear. And now it is the season to start doing those things again. My good friend Joan came over and worked quietly on her own writing while I worked on my desk. She was like an anchor, keeping me from getting sidetracked and from meandering off into the woods of all the other things I would rather be doing. I even did a little more after she left. Now I can see the desk. There is still a lot of filing to do, but it feels more manageable now. I will continue to work on clearing the desk and filing the paper because I like it that way – not because it is anyone else’s expectation of me. And I will try once more to implement the structure that helps me keep it that way.

I have started writing again. It feels good. I hope it helps you. It makes me happy to help other people in their journey of recovery. I know it helps me.

Much love,

Mira

Please share your thoughts about this post by commenting below.

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