We Interrupt this Awesome Life for A Lot More Awesome; A Recovery Tale for Everyone

The only sure constant besides death and taxes is, life with throw curveballs at you as long as you’re on the right side of the grass. Since I sobered up in ’92, I’ve dodged more proverbial landmines than I could possibly begin to list. The main difference between when I was a much younger lad pre-recovery and today is that I used to step on them back then.

Sad truth is, I simply made poor choices when I was drinking – and my bad choices on top of bad choices had a tendency to compound, as one would imagine they would. I’m here to tell you, I don’t think I could have amounted to as much as I did without the guidance of Alcoholics Anonymous. While it isn’t for everyone (well, technically it is for anyone, but I feel obligated to say it isn’t for those who choose a different path – and I have no opinion on the choice to go a different way – I wouldn’t, but what I would and wouldn’t do is about as consequential as bat shit), AA offered a path to correcting more than just the booze-related problems. It is often said, you can sober up a horse thief, but what’s left is still a horse thief.

In AA lies the ability to fix the “horse thief” stuff. In fact, we believe it’s the outlying issues that drove/drive us to drink in the first place. Another way to look at it is like this; take someone who used to be an angry drunk. If they’re not a drunk anymore, what’s left? Angry.

And so it was, I set about a path to fix me. Not the world around me, but me. And this has paid dividends upon compound interest. I’d never say I’m to a land of unicorns and rainbows, but freedom and happiness sure feel good after hell on earth.

While one could poke holes all day long into my theories on and understanding of happiness (and I have people who literally do poke at me for weaknesses, simply because they can’t stand seeing someone else being happy with acceptance of life on life’s terms) you’ll wear yourself out trying because my enjoyment of life and recovery doesn’t depend on the believing of others it’s worked.

And so it is with recovery. Have a little compound awesome for yourself. It’s there for anyone who wants to work for it. And it’s sweet.