worn trail part two

     This is not something that happened overnight. It is with time and experience that I can see the spiderweb like connections to all these people, family, friends, colleagues and experts in their field. When I got sober, I was taught and so I learned, that I was never alone. I was taught that I would always have the fellowship in sobriety, of those like me, trying to get through the day, and I always have the God of my understanding. As I have grown in sobriety and have gotten older I have been able to expand that circle to include family, friends, and professional people inc doctors, lawyers and such.

      This is one of those... gee I wish I had known this then deals. When I drank, the combination of false pride, ego, false self-esteem and fear of rejection, would not let me ask for help or assistance. It was not in my vocabulary nor in my make up of a person. I could not say “I don't know” or “Could you help me?”.I would either bumble around blindly or eavesdrop on someone who knew the subject at hand, then try and bullshit my way through the problem at hand. An alcoholic is the only person I know that can go into a courtroom for a DUI and leave thinking he is now a lawyer if not a judge. There is an old line “I am not a doctor, but I play one on TV”, that fits me to a “T”. That all encompassing feeling that I knew. What I knew, I could not tell you, but oh... I knew all right. Mentally twisted I admit, but that was me when I drank. The elevator did not stop at all the floors, seemed to skip one or two. Seems I was born under the stupidity curse of “I don't need your help. I can do it myself, and probably better than you anyway”. You can guess the kind of trouble and the type of friends that attitude brought.

     After I had been sober awhile, a friend passed a some valuable lesson to me. He said, “If something is broke , you might as well try to fix it, it won't get any more broke than broke”. His point of reference was to my car. I seemed to always be working on keeping that thing running. But I have used that lesson on all sorts of things since. Computers, cars, equipment to friendships and relationships, it seems to work rather nicely. I have even used it on myself. If I am having trouble: i.e. something is broke, no one is going to be able to fix it but me, so I might as well try and fix it. As with my car when it wasn't running, and since I know I am not a ACE mechanic, I had to ask for help. I found out lot of folks like to help if your willing to do the work with them, not so much if I just sit back and watch them work. So to was it with my Life. I had to become willing to ask for help in the different areas that were broke as I saw them. In finances, in relationships, with family matters, on dating, and sex, I became kind of an open book, for people to write on my pages. Discovering that I could not do Life on my own, I invited everyone to join me . Yes it kind of let folks see I was a messed up goof, but it also gave them the chance to be helpful and of use. It relieved me of the stress of having to know everything and allowed me to become a “work in progress” as apposed to a finished product.