Tag: personal-growth

Still Finding Layers

Free From Old Beliefs

Sometimes the hardest beliefs to uncover are the ones I have already worked on before.

And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. John 8:32

I was listening to a recovery speaker recently when she mentioned that her first sponsor had agreed to be her “temporary sponsor.” That caught my attention immediately. I stopped. Temporary sponsor? My first sponsor had used those exact words with me almost twenty years ago. For all these years, I had thought that was something specific to me. Then she said her “temporary sponsor” ended up sponsoring her for years. That caught me even more. I started wondering if “temporary sponsor” was actually a term. Was this really a thing? I discovered that it was. And I was not so unique and special as I had assumed. Suddenly I realized I had misunderstood this from the very beginning and had carried that misunderstanding with me all this time.

When I was brand new to recovery, I had no idea that offering to be someone’s temporary sponsor was a common way to help newcomers get started and begin working the steps. All I heard was the word temporary. With my best thinking at the time, I translated that into, I am not good enough for a real sponsor. I have to settle for a temporary one. This is not going to last. I secretly carried that inside. So even though my sponsor never treated me like I was temporary or less than, I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. I wondered when he would finally tell me our time was up. I never asked what he meant by temporary because I was afraid of what the answer might be. Instead, I filled in the blanks myself. He sponsored me for two years, and even after I moved away, he continued sponsoring me long distance for months. He never ended the relationship. I did.

Looking back, I can see how an old corrupt core belief was still operating underneath everything. I had already done a lot of work in recovery around the faulty thinking that I am not good enough. My sponsor calls the deeper belief underneath that the corrupt core belief of “I am bad.” Yet I was discovering that another layer of it was still there. His actions never supported the story I had created in my head. He showed up. He invested in me. He stayed connected. Yet I continued interpreting the relationship through an old belief I had never challenged because I was afraid to ask.

Finding out after all these years that temporary sponsor was actually a common recovery term did something in me that I still cannot fully explain. It was like another layer of the onion had been peeled back. Nothing dramatic happened. I just noticed a little more rest inside me. A little more confidence. A little less suspicion that something was wrong with me. I am learning that even after years of recovery, there can still be old beliefs quietly influencing how I see myself and the world around me. Recovery has helped me challenge that corrupt core belief many times, but apparently there was still more underneath it. There may still be more. Today I am simply grateful that truth reached another place in me where an old lie had been quietly living for years. And that is the gift of recovery for me.

Reflection

What old belief may still be shaping the way I see myself today?

Perfect Conditions

No Longer Putting It Off

I don’t always want to face what is in front of me, but I usually feel better after I do.

If you wait for perfect conditions, you will never get anything done. Ecclesiastes 11:4

This past weekend I finally tackled a project I have been putting off for a very long time. Over the past twenty years, I have changed computers several times, and with each backup I accumulated multiple versions of my writings: sermons, teachings, studies, articles, and book projects. I would work on something, save it under a new name, come back later, add more content, and save it again. Eventually, I ended up with multiple versions of the same material scattered across different folders and drives. Some had material the others did not. Some were duplicates or partial versions. I kept saving everything, telling myself that one day I would go through it all, consolidate it, organize it, and clean it up. This weekend was finally that day.

It was laborious and tedious. I spent the whole day opening files, comparing them, checking word counts and page counts, combining material, deleting duplicates, and trying to figure out what belonged where. Some of my book projects had several different versions, each containing something a little different. As I was finishing the project, I was mentally tapped, but I was also relieved. It felt good to have finally completed this project, something I had avoided for so long. What had seemed overwhelming and impossible before I started was now finished. The mess was organized. Things I no longer needed were gone. Things that belonged together were together. And I had freed up almost 500 gigabytes of space on my hard drive.

As I thought about it, I realized how much doing that reminded me of my recovery. The things I do not want to deal with, I tend to avoid. Maybe something seems too difficult. Maybe I do not understand how to deal with it. Maybe I am afraid of the consequences or an outcome that I cannot control. What I am finding is that when I have the courage to face things, I am ultimately glad that I did. I feel better about who I am, and many times the outcomes or consequences I feared never materialize the way I imagined they would. Sometimes just facing something begins to take care of the problem itself. Sometimes there are unpleasant consequences, but eventually those pass too. And when it is over, I still feel better about who I am. Most of the time, like this past weekend, I reap a real benefit from confronting and dealing with things instead of avoiding them. Avoidance was old behavior.

Working the Steps of recovery has helped me learn that I do not have to want to do something before I do it. I do not have to like it, understand all of it, or know exactly how it is going to turn out. I can simply do the next right thing and deal with what is in front of me. There is something freeing about that. I am no longer carrying the weight of everything I am putting off or trying not to think about. This weekend, I finally brought order and structure to the chaos of all my writings on my computer. I also freed up a lot of space on my hard drive. In recovery, by facing things instead of avoiding them, I have brought order and structure into areas of my life and relationships that used to be chaotic too. I have also gained a lot more space in my life for new things. I may not always like what I have to face or want to deal with it, but I like who I am when I do. And that is the gift of recovery for me.

Reflection: What am I putting off because I am waiting for better conditions?