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Resurrection

I'm not much into organized religion, but the Easter story of the death and the resurrection is a powerful metaphor for me.

Toward the end of my drinking I was not as physically sick as some get before they are led to the Alcoholics Anonymous. I didn't get to the point of having to puke up that first drink in the morning to get the next one to stay down to quiet my nerves. I had tried many of the things in Chapter three to control my drinking (I actually did switch from Scotch to Brandy one time) but I was never committed to a health farm or sanitarium. God's grace came to me before the elevator got all the way to the bottom. But I can always get back on and ride down those last few floors.

Physically I probably wasn't dying, but I wasn't fully alive either -- not mentally or spiritually. I was just existing in the world of the half dead. There was no spark or enthusiasm in my life. Every day was the same -- drinking alone in front of the television and existing on fast food. I was a emotional flat liner. Nothing moved me, touched me. By then the colors in my life were only shades of gray. I had no job nor any interest in one. There were no other people in my life except the lower companions I met at my neighborhood bar for happy hour. In this state was physical death really that far away?

It was in this condition that God graced me with a moment of clarity that allowed me to see through the walls fo denial to some Truth about myself. After thirty years of drinking I was able to see that I was in serious trouble. I needed help. Powerful help. And I would find that help in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous.

I am a different person than when I walked into my first meeting 20 years ago. Much of the fear is gone. The cynicism and sarcasm is gone. The lying is gone. And many other character defects are on their way out. I still have a long way to go, but it's not too much of a stretch or me to feel that I have been reborn. That I have risen from the dead.