Religion, Religion, Religion

     Religion is zerious stuff.  People blow things up in the name of their religions.  People kill each other with the blessing of their favored god.  People get bent over cartoons depicting their religious icons.  Even Bill W. gets in the act by accusing people who question the evil done in the name of a religion as not concentrating on the right things.

     Enter humor.  Humor can be a way of saying "Enough." 

     True humor is not designed to be politically correct.  I never cared for P.C. [political correctness, not personal computer] even when it was in its heyday of popularity.  P.C. turned out to be just another justification for censoring ourselves and each other.  P.C. has been replaced by "positive people, positive thinking, positivity" in some percentage of recovery circles.  Because we must be the best recovering people we can be.  We must join the sheeples and the masses in order to gain some of that social and societal acceptability.

     But life and living has got to be about more than assimilation into the masses.  And acceptability does not equal recovery.   

sapphoq needing a coffee very badly says:  Below are some comics about religion for your viewing pleasure or displeasure.

[Codes disintegrate and links break over time.  The links worked as of today and there are no guarantees that they will work tomorrow].


http://theoatmeal.com/comics/religion
@Oatmeal on twitter (r)
@TheOatmealRss on twitter

http://ohmygods.co.uk/
This site ran seven years of the omgz comic strips and is now dedicated to Shivian's two books featuring all of the strips for seven years. 

http://shivian.com/
@ohmygodscomic on twitter (not updated at the moment)
@OhMyGodsRss on twitter
@shivian on twitter

http://www.sidewalkbubblegum.com/category/comics-about-faith-religion-spirtuality/

http://www.webcomicsnation.com/spiritpainter/sacred_cows/series.php


Collections:
http://www.gocomics.com/collection/1440782#.UpNxm6-A2Uk

http://www.comicbookbin.com/religioncomics.html

Egofags in Recovery

One of the platitudes that I've heard "in the rooms" to the point of wanting to puke goes like this:  EGO means Easing God Out.  Frequently coupled with that is the notion that we must strive to become "selfless."  I call bullshit.

Recovery is not about becoming selfless.  We have to think about our selves.  The ego is not something to be avoided or killed off.  Merging into anyone or anything to the point where there is no longer a separate identity is not an admirable goal.  [Possible exceptions might be sexual union between adults and the feeling of inter-connectiveness in a crowd].  The ego-- or "the self"-- is the framework from which we experience others.  Our self-esteem is based on what we think about our own selves.  [Esteem based on a deity might better be labeled as "god-esteem."  Esteem based on others might be an expression of true co-dependency].  When I experience my self as enough, adequate to meet the challenges inherent in everyday living and strong enough to meet some extraordinary challenges, and as a unified or at least a semi-organized front, I [think that I probably] have a better crack at discovering true inter-dependency.  Just as the map for human relations ought to include inter-dependency rather than total independence or total dependence, the map for recovery has room for the self.  I am not interested in becoming selfish nor selfless.  I am interested in the evolution of my own true self.  The expression of my own true self is a catalyst for action. 

Those who claim to be working toward "selflessness" are [in my anecdotal estimation only] egofags underneath their glitzy exteriors.  Who else but an egofag would have the audacity to claim that their god has eased or is easing their egos out?  An egofag secretly may strive for the attention garnered by seeming to possess special little snowflake status.  The egofag, like the failed psychic or false prophet [N.B.: which is "all of 'em," folks], is not satisfied with being an ordinary human being just like everybody else.  In that respect, the egofag is a close relative of the famefag and the leaderfag.

Egofags, famefags, and leaderfags all serve a necessary function.  But then they refuse to get off of the stage after the curtain closes.  They are addicted to other peoples' attention.  They must be recognized for the good work that they do-- and some of them achieve the extraordinary-- and written up in the anals [misspelling intentional] of history.  They are legends in their own minds and they don't allow you to forget it for one instant. 

It is our own FALSE EGOS that we must strive to save our selves from.  A healthy ego is an asset to recovery.  I would no sooner strive to obliterate my ego that I would strive to use the word "we" all the time in all sentences in place of the word "I."  When I got up this morning, I brushed my teeth.  "We" did not brush "our" teeth.  The wait staff in the restaurant who says, "How are WE doing today?" is annoying.  The ego is the psychological center from which I move in the dance of relations.  Why would I want to obliterate that?   

sapphoq itching for a coffee says:  Perform in the play, but then G.T.F.O.  Stay for the curtain call, go to the party, collect the flowers but then go on home.  I am not here to cater to your grossly-inflated FALSE ego. 

How Not to Get People Motivated for Recovery from Addictions

Here is a somewhat incomplete list of what to do if you do not want someone to stop some sort of addictive behavior and get healthy.  Or if you want them to flee from your version of recovery back into the streets and possibly to die.

If you don't want them to get into recovery or remain in recovery, then you will:

 1.  Dictate who they can talk to on the telephone or write letters to or hang out with.

 2.  Tell them exactly what they "need to" do in order to get as "healthy" as you are.

 3.  Pull rank.  Remind them that they are problem people and that you have the answers.

 4.  Quote from recovery literature extensively, force them to read it, and teach them how to talk in clichés and platitudes.

 5.  Insist that you know what they need better than they do and insist that you know them better than they do.

 6.  Force them to find a male god similar to or the same as your god whether they are non-theists, polytheists, or other.

 7.  Demand that they "forgive" everyone who abused them in any way and demand that they talk about "their part" in the abuse.

 8.  Show them what "Tough Love" is-- even though you yourself know nothing about the history of the "Tough Love" movement or what an abomination it is-- and show them how to apply "Tough Love" to everyone else around them.

 9.  Take away their privacy.  Living in a fishbowl is oh so healthy.

10.  Give them a damning psychiatric diagnosis that will follow them for the rest of their lives, preferably one that ends with the phrase "personality disorder."


sapphoq itching for a coffee   

 

When a friend heads back into addiction

Art is still drinking and still claiming that his drinking is not a problem.  Art has not drank in front of me.  And there are no bottles at his home.  Perhaps he is only drinking at camp.  I don't really know.

Art's personality is not being improved by his intake of the drug alcohol.  That is for sure.  I've noted a ruder and cruder Art emerging over coffee in the last week.  Consequently, I've had to make a tough decision.

Art has to go.  Or, to put it another way, I have to make myself scarce as far as Art is concerned.  I have found myself mourning the friendship that we have shared over the past decade or more.  We've had lots of good times, he and I.  We've done quite a bit of traveling and drank quite a bit of coffee together.  But that is done for now.

I cannot jeopardize my own well-being for the sake of another.  Art is not an evil human being.  At this time, I cannot afford to hang with him.  Art has returned to a past lifestyle.  I cannot do that.  I don't want to be around the drama that is Art when he uses.  When and if Art is ready to quit using again, someone else will have to help him.  We've been too close.  I can't do it.  There are other people that I can have coffee with and travel with and have good times with.

We become what we do.  And we become again what we do again.  I wish to journey forward as a human being, not backwards into the bondage that is true addiction.

          Where's the coffee?

Thinking of alcohol as different...

Thinking of alcohol as different from other drugs has caused a great many addicts to relapse. Before we came to N.A. many of us viewed alcohol separately, but we cannot afford to be confused about this. Alcohol is a drug. We are people with the disease of addiction who must abstain from all drugs in order to recover.

~ from the N.A. Recovery Text reproduced on-line at  home.mchsi.com/~ciana/NA_Basic_Text_Fifth_Edition.doc

A close friend of mine recently decided to drink again after more than a decade of being abstinent from all drugs.  Art's justifications [not his real first name] for drinking were many and varied.  At the top of the list was the disclaimer, "I never really had a problem with alcohol.  I could take it or leave it."  But marijuana, he told me, was an entirely different story.  He had been unable to moderate his use of pot back in the days of active addiction.  He decided three weeks ago to take up drinking again.

"How's that working for you?" I asked.  [N.B.  I did not ask with a snarky tone of voice].  "Great!" he replied.  Art assured me that he was not overdoing the drinking, that so far he wasn't having a problem with it, that he was enjoying a social drink when out at the bar with a few buddies.  He told me that "no one wants to hang out with" someone who doesn't drink.  He said if he starts to develop a problem with alcohol, then he will "cut back."

Art was not asking for my help in this his latest endeavor.  I had to accept that.  In many ways, I would be the worst person for him to ask for assistance.  We've known each other since high school days, although we ran in different crowds and consequently never used together. 

There is a problem with thinking that an addict can return to using one drug safely, or can pick up a new drug and use that safely.  What we do is what we become.  If we've done it before, we will get in trouble with it again.  If we haven't done it before, we will get in trouble with it for the first time. 

"Trouble" does not necessarily indicate legal involvement or loss of income or relationships or stuff.  Trouble at the most basic level indicates being in trouble with oneself.  We can lie to others as much as we care to about anything.  [Most of] us do not get away with lying to ourselves.

Alcohol is a drug.  It is a chemical with a specific chemical formula.  It is physically addictive.  The addict who has never drank ought to endeavor to stay clear of alcohol.  Similarly, the alcoholic who has never used marijuana [or another street drug] ought to strive to not go out and experiment. 

A high percentage of people [90% is the commonly quoted number, but the number may actually be higher than that] are not addicts.  They don't experience any consequences from social drinking or social drug-taking.  That's great news!

A minority of people [10% is the commonly quoted number, but the number may actually be lower than that] cannot drink or use safely.  Bad things happen to them and around them when they do.  The addicts among us-- including those who are addicted to the drug alcohol-- may repeatedly endeavor to do it differently with or without excuses, justifications, or rationalization.  And just because addicts [including this one] cannot use safely, it does not follow that no one should.  I am not a prohibitionist.

To be honest, I also do not believe that addiction is a "disease."  I understand the sort of thinking behind this claim but I do not agree with it.  Labeling addiction, obesity, co-dependency, and other conditions as a "disease" is a legal and dimly medical argument to get insurance companies to pay for treatments.  I think that there are some numbers of etiologies underneath addiction.  I prefer to think of addictions as being conditions rather than disease entities. 

I am vaguely aware that some work has been done [in Canada, after being run out of the United States] by the Sobels in re-educating known alcoholics to healthy patterns of drinking.  I don't know enough about it to proffer an opinion about harm reduction in general.  I do know enough to know that I am myself beyond the point of being able to return to social usage.  My social use period was over with almost immediately after I first picked up.  I almost died and I am not willing to risk my life or my health on something that might kill me this time.

I am an addict.  I cannot control my usage once I've begun using.  There are drugs out there today that were not out there when I was using-- crack, beer with lime flavoring, hard lemonade, certain "designer" drugs-- but the bottom line for this addict is that what I do is what I become.  So I don't even flirt with the idea of trying them.  The powerlessness over my addiction for me specifies that now that I am an addict, I personally cannot go back to a state of being a non-addict.  I cannot use safely.

That is not to say that I am powerless over "everything."  I certainly am not.  I have a lot of personal power [N.B. power is not the same thing as control] and I intend to use it to my benefit and probably to the benefit of some other people around me.  Systems-change work involves the use of personal power of many members of a community of activists and stakeholders in order to challenge an archaic system.  I have hope today that justice can be had by people who have been and are being denied justice.  I have hope today that a closed system which demands compliance in order not to suffer set consequences can be mediated to include the freedom of individuality and self-expression.  I have hope today that we can create change.  I've considered the possibilities and I have picked my battles.  We need to change the systems that stifle us.

I wish the best for Art.  I really do.  I hope that his flirtation with drinking proves that he can drink safely or I hope that he is able to stop drinking [again] if he needs to.  And I hope he does not return to street drugs or to the abuse of legally prescribed drugs.  Meanwhile, I have some living to do.

                             Where's the coffee?