Helpful

The other night, I chaired an Al-Anon meeting at a women's prison. It's nothing new for me to chair a meeting; I've chaired meetings before, and told my story of how it was, and what happened, and how it is now. But I've never told my story to a room full of prisoners who I'd never seen before and whose stories and backgrounds I really didn't know. Maybe the strangest part of it all was how natural it felt, and how comfortable I was, and how nervous I wasn't. Possibly what I didn't see coming was the outpouring of solidarity and the connection with every other woman in that room and the sobering conclusion that I'm really no different than they are and that maybe jumping on my yoga mat 5 years ago is the only reason I ended up on a somewhat sane path while they ended up in prison scrubs and mandatory 12-step groups. Let's face it, we all lacked the same skills and sense of normal; I just happened to stumble into a few sun salutations that made me question everything and that forced me to learn what love is. I didn't expect to feel so similar to these women; I didn't expect taht I wouldn't want to leave.

When I can talk about what I went through, and people listen and cry and tell me they needed to hear it, then I feel like the decades of pain and sadness do not equal a wasted life. When people care what I say becuase it helps them, I feel useful. I want to think that maybe sharing my experience for other people's benefit is my purpose. Talking at the prison was like a soft gentle nudge from something bigger than i am, whispering into my ear that my past is not the thing that blocks my path, but rather the path itself. When I consider that I can go into a prison and not feel afraid and do something as both simple and wrenching as tell my story annd have it help people, I am amazed at the meaning I feel in this life. I want more.

P.S. They asked me to come back every week, which I will.

Be disappointed

I love going to the therapist. Where else can you be completely, recklessly honest and not care about offending anyone? I also love trying out new therapists, so that I don't get into a rut of putting anybody's perspective on a pedastal. So thank you, employee assistance program, for providing me with 3 shiny free sessions with a new therapist, whose office is located conveniently right across the street from my apartment!

Growing up in an alcoholic home where the standard rules are to ignore the elephant in the living room and "don't talk, don't trust, don't feel," I learned how to pretend everything was okay when everything was really the farthest thing from okay. Keeping an ever-vigilent eye on the ticking, drunken time bomb and surviving the day was the main priority; I knew so little about myself that up until 2 years ago I couldn't even have told you my favorite color. I'd simply never even considered what I liked or what I wanted. The focus was always on keeping the alcoholic happy so that I could avoid the screaming; I was a stranger to myself. When I got to college and got some distance from the craziness and began to see how messed up it all was, pretending everything was okay became impossible. One Thanksgiving break I sat scowling on the couch and my mother snapped at me, perhaps intuiting that I was on the brink of throwing her precarious dance of denial off kilter.

"Slap a smile on your face and be nice to your family" she leered, and this threat became the mantra of my conditioned life.

When I spilled to the new therapist today about how my job is consuming my life and taking away from the time I need to spend on my own recovery, she asked me, "Why don't you just start asking for stuff? Ask for less work. Ask to move deadlines out. Ask to move your desk. And if they don't give it to you? Be disappointed. Look cranky and upset. Stop acting like it's your job to make them happy. Look disappointed the way they'd be disappointed if they didn't get what they want from you" In essence, stop slapping a smile on my face and be as irritated as I feel. What a freeing thought. One that I've been told to do dozens of times already, but was never ready to hear. As always, lessons are repeated until learned. Maybe I'm finally ready to learn it.

I always say I want to have a job where I can be authentic; what happens if I start being authentic in the job that I have now?