breakthrough
I went to another AA meeting. I really like them. I like how accepting people are of me. I'm not used to that. It's nice. :)
I always come out of those meetings feeling really good about myself and my addiction, really talkative and content. I like that feeling; I like feeling like a normal, mentally healthy person.
Today's topic was "True tolerence."
I got a chance to talk about it, just like everyone else, but my damned anxiety stopped me from saying much more than the opening lines I concieved in my head before I was asked to talk. I just always draw a blank and feel to self-concious to pause and reflect on my thoughts.
I said I thought I was a pretty tolerent person except when it comes to tolerating the ignorantly intolerent. I believe that's true. I need to remember that ignorant people just haven't had the same advantages as me (and by advantages I mean alot of learning disadvantages) and that I'm not any better than they are, just different.
I am so thankfull that I was born with mental illness. There were those rare times when I thought it was a curse, but I think the opposite of that all the time now. Now I see mental illness made me so understanding about weaknesses. I realize that all weakness is just insight into yourself. That apparent flaws and even "evil" qualities in a person just exist to contrast the beauty inside of them, like shadow to accent an image in a painting, and to teach a person how to help others, how to change themselves.
I used to think, "Why didn't God - whoever he is and if he exists at all - make the world without suffering, like Satan had intended? Why not take away the choice to sin and hurt other? Why not make everyone flawless?" And how ridculous are those questions? Where's the challenge in that, the contrast and consequential beauty?
There's none. I see what James meant when he said suffering is the key to existential knowledge. He didn't mean go out and get yourself hurt so that you can learn shit. He didn't mean abuse your kids so that they can grow up wise. I see that now. What James meant, at least at the core, was LEARN from internal suffering. Manipulate into something existential. He didn't mean that because you will suffer you will learn, he meant that because you will suffer you can learn.
He meant for me to see the flaws that cause internal suffering from an objective, existential standpoint and erradicate them through nurturing myself.
He meant for me to see the beauty in the flaws that make me imperfect. See the great burden you're relieved of because of that inherent imperfection that's expected in everyone.
I used to think humans were inherently evil because they were miserable and wretched by nature but it's quite the opposite! People are inherently evil so they can learn to be conciously good. That's the whole entire point of this life! I can't believe I missed it! Our bodies make us drawn to evil so our minds can learn to overcome evil...transend evil
That's why it's a great honor to have rapist and pedophile and addict tendancies. I see that now clearer than ever. Something (someone?) up there saw that I understood the basics already. Saw that I can overcome materialism, I can overcome petty annoyances, I can overcome intolerance; that I needed something horrible to fight in order to prosper, in order to learn and grow.
I feel truely blessed by, honored, and grateful to have mental illness (addiction included). It's a huge compliment to my mental integrity. I wish that all addicts could see this as clearly as I do now. You don't have this tendancy because you're ethicly weak, you have this tendancy because you're more ethicly strong than others and you needed something greater to fight.
This doesn't make any one better than anyone else. It just makes us farther along in the game than others. And age is out of peoples control so no one should feel better than others because of their experiance. The potential is the same. Potential is in everyone.
This is...amazing. I feel so...enlightened. But it's so simple that I don't feel intelligent or arrogant for knowing, I just want to share it with every addict so they can understand...It's not even something profound it's just one of those basic truths that I've happened to stumble upon. Thanks to James, no I shouldn't say that, thanks to myself; James is just a part of myself. :)