Anonymity

 I was taught anonymity means giving all credit to God, taking no credit for myself-- for anything. This idea is clearly stated in the other big book where it says “of myself I am nothing, He does the works.” I’m coming to believe there is not me and God. There is only God. Growing spiritually is about me slowly disappearing.

I’m just a channel for God like it says in our Eleventh Step prayer. I practice the steps. I empty myself out of old, mistaken ideas about me and how life works. I become an ever fuller expression of God. Struggle and suffering fall away as I stop believing the crap in my head. I experience moments of bliss as God’s peace, love and power flow through me.

I did not come by this realization quickly.  In fact, God is so anonymous He has me continuing to believe I am doing the work. After all, don’t I decide to go to the meeting? Don’t I drive myself there? Don’t I put my hand out to the newcomer? I want to take credit for this stuff, but then I remember How It Works. “There is One who has all power. That One is God.” All power. Not 99% of the power.

My ego asks, “if everything were God and God is Love, then why would there be starvation, disease and wars and killing? The only answer I can come up with is that God doesn’t will these things to happen, but He allows these things to happen for our highest and best good. In the same way God graced me with alcoholism. I could not have traveled from where I was to where I am today without having a deadly disease that was going to kill me unless I treated it spiritually.

God and I play a continuous game of hide and seek. God tries to stay totally anonymous, but I see God every time I am willing to seek God. God hides in plain sight, everywhere I look. Our book asks me to choose. Is God everything or nothing? I have seen way too many miracles to believe nothing.

Spiritual Fitness Program

 I guess I must be a real slow learner. The promise that I will stop fighting everyone and everything has not come true for me. I continue to have trouble with that restraint of pen and tongue thing. I still need to be right much of the time.  Then there are a variety of pesky character defects that might pop up at a moment's notice if my fear button is pushed. I'm much better today, but I'm not cured. But I'm not complaining. I haven't had a drink or even the desire to drink in more than 26 years. This is truly a miracle for a man who hid from life and truth in a bottle for thirty years.  

The obsession was lifted clean out of me at the very beginning of my spiritual journey. This experience is the foundation of my recovery and the bedrock of my faith in my Higher Power. I still can’t explain how it happened. I just kind of woke up one day and it was gone. Like the promise says, I have been placed in a position of neutrality regarding alcohol. I don’t want to drink. I don’t want not to drink. I don’t even think about it really. It feels like I am bulletproof as far as alcohol is concerned. But I’m not taking any chances. I’ve seen too many seemingly bulletproof alcoholics go out and get drunk. So I continue to take all the actions you suggested to me in my first two weeks: meetings, steps and service. Taken all together these suggestions form my spiritual fitness program.

It is impossible for me to live to good effect one day at a time if I am not spiritually fit. Without a solid connection to the God of my own understanding, ego continuously catapults me into the future where my mind goes round and round searching for solutions to problems that don’t even exist. Or it drags me back down memory lane in morbid reflection, pointing out all the times I was a jerk and all the things I could have done better. The net result of living in the past and future is that I miss the joy of living Now, the only time there is.

Like our book says, it all boils down to willingness. When I am willing to take the simple actions to maintain my spiritual fitness, life is unbelievably good. When I’m not willing to go to the gym and sweat, it gets harder to bend over and tie my shoes.