This is an Open Talk from Hanna M. of Ann Arbor. This Episode is exclusively for our Premium Subscribers. Thank you for your support. Your subscription helps us carry this message of hope for the alcoholic who still suffers.
Questions
What is envy?
How was envy a part of your life before program?
How did envy contribute to your addiction/codependency?
When you were new, how did you recognize envy as harmful in your life?
What steps, slogans, prayers, actions have helped?
How does envy manifest in your life today?
What are some of the symptoms of active envy in your life today?
What other shortcomings accompany envy in you life?
How can envy be turned into a good thing?
What basic instinct of life underlies envy?
How can envy contribute to a relapse?
References.
Big Book. p. 145 Chapter 10 – To Employers
The greatest enemies of us alcoholics are resentment, jealousy, envy, frustration, and fear. Wherever men are gathered together in business there will be rivalries and, arising out of these, a certain amount of office politics. Sometimes we alcoholics have an idea that people are trying to pull us down. Often this is not so at all. But sometimes our drinking will be used politically.
Definitions
Envy is an emotion which “occurs when a person lacks another’s superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it” Bertrand Russell said that envy was one of the most potent causes of unhappiness
a feeling of discontented or resentful longing aroused by someone else’s possessions, qualities, or luck.
desire to have a quality, possession, or other desirable attribute belonging to (someone else).
12&12 Step Six, p.67
We live in a world riddled with envy. To a greater or less degree, everybody is infected with it. From this defect we must surely get a warped yet definite satisfaction. Else why would we consume such great amounts of time wishing for what we have not, rather than working for it, or angrily looking for attributes we shall never have, instead of adjusting to the fact, and accepting it? And how often we work hard with no better motive than to be secure and slothful later on–only we call that “retiring.” Consider, too, our talents for procrastination, which is really sloth in five syllables. Nearly anyone could submit a good list of such defects as these, and few of us would seriously think of giving them up, at least until they cause us excessive misery.
12&12 Step Six, p. 66
No one wants to be agonized by the chronic pain of envy or to be paralyzed by sloth. Of course, most human beings don’t suffer these defects at these rock-bottom levels.
12&12 Step 10, p.90
Anger, that occasional luxury of more balanced people, could keep us on an emotional jag indefinitely. These emotional “dry benders” often led straight to the bottle. Other kinds of disturbances–jealousy, envy, self–pity, or hurt pride-did the same thing.
Final Thoughts
http://aa.org/twelveandtwelve/en_tableofcnt.cfm
http://www.hazelden.org/web/public/thought.view?catId=1901
Our next show is Monday, February 24 at 6:30 pm EST (-5 GMT). Our Recovery Topic is Envy. Join us live at The Recovered Podcast Chat Room To help us prepare for the show, let us know something about yourself. Take our survey.
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This is an Open Talk from Dan F.
Sloth is defined as spiritual or emotional apathy, neglecting what God has spoken, and being physically and emotionally inactive. It can also be either an outright refusal or merely a carelessness in the performance of one’s obligations, especially spiritual, moral or legal obligations. Sloth can also indicate a wasting due to lack of use, concerning a person, place, thing, skill, or intangible ideal that would require maintenance, refinement, or support to continue to exist.
Let’s focus on lazy
What did it used to be like?
How are you lazy now?
How are you careless about obligations?
How is laziness bad for your program?
How does slothfulness affect your relationships?
How does being lazy affect you spiritually?
How can laziness lead to relapse?
Interview – media player
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/1444065c9c983224
What tools of the program help?
What slogans?
What prayers?
What actions?
literature
Our book has suggestions. The book says we must stay active or else we drink, The book suggests another way
p. 76 Our Purpose
p. 89 How to fulfill this purpose
Final Thoughts
http://aa.org/twelveandtwelve/en_tableofcnt.cfm
This is an Episode espicially for our Premium Subscribers. If you’d like to become a Premium Subscriber to the Recovered Podcast and help us on this mission of hope, just go to Recovered Podcast Premium Subscription. Thank you in advance for your support.
This is an Open Talk from Kevin P.
As a way to introduce the recovery topic of Anger, let’s see what our listeners think. I asked our listeners:
When you were new, with what/who were you most angry with?
Some of the responses we received included:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/analyze/JQWCt2t_2BgbS8n_2Bre9RGhDIxy3nFgJeTitshdHJljIxw_3D
Anger can be labeled anger, mad, cranky, frustrated, irritated, irate, agitated, seething,
and many more. Many alcoholics/addicts and their family members are surprised that to find
that the newly recovering person continues to experience a lot of anger. There are many
reasons why a recovering person would continue to feel angry once they have quit
drinking/using.
Let’s start at the beginning of recovery. Initially, detox may have something to do with it.
Thoughts on anger at the beginning of recovery and the physical withdrawal from substance and the effect on mood.
Swetha, Many alcoholics/addicts and their family members are surprised that to find
that the newly recovering person continues to experience a lot of anger. What has been your experience your observations within the al-anon community?
Sometimes the newly recovering person is still angry about how they came to be in
recovery. They may be angry at law enforcement, the judge, the boss, the wife, the
family in general, or society for not condoning active addiction. What has been your experience in regards to those closest to you in early recovery?
Swetha, what are the common expressions of anger for the new al-anon?
The newly recovering person, still not very adept at processing feelings, may project blame and
responsibility for their feelings onto others. Although they may be angry with themselves, the family may still be getting the brunt of it.
The family members of alcoholics/addicts also have anger. Instead of the addict being
grateful for family members getting them into treatment and saving his/her life, the addict
is angry at them. They cannot understand this because they remind the addict that is, and
has been, the family that has been holding down the fort, making all the payments, taking
care of the kids, the bills, the house, etc. The family member has been taking care of
everything and the addict is mad at them!
The addict does not understand why the family member is not giving him/her credit for
his sacrifice and understanding how difficult this has all been. The addict is angry that
when they do make efforts to do the things that family members have been asking them
to do for a long time, that the family member either does not notice or that that family
member just expects it. From the family member’s perspective, the fact that the addict
wants a reward for doing what everyone else is expected to do, is inconceivable. Neither
understands the other’s frame of reference.
Ryan Interview use the itunes player
But we at Recovered are all about the solution. What are some of the tools of recovery that you use?
What steps?
What slogans?
What prayers?
What about sponsors?
What about sponsees?
What about service work?
What about your higher power?
what our book says
…If we were to live, we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the brainstorm were not for us. They may be the dubious luxury of normal men, but for alcoholics these things are poison. We turned back to the list, for it held the key to the future. We were prepared to look at it from an entirely different angle. We began to see that the world and its people really dominated us. In that state, the wrong-doing of others, fancied or real, had power to…
…running the show, humbly saying to ourselves many times each day “Thy will be done.” We are then in much less danger of excitement, fear, anger, worry, self-pity, or foolish decisions. We become much more efficient. We do not tire so easily, for we are not burning up energy foolishly as we did when we were trying to arrange life to suit ourselves. It works – it really does. We alcoholics are undisciplined. So we let God discipline us in the simple…
…Try not to condemn your alcoholic husband no matter what he says or does. He is just another very sick, unreasonable person. Treat him, when you can, as though he had pneumonia. When he angers you, remember that he is very ill. There is an important exception to the foregoing. We realize some men are thoroughly bad-intentioned, that no amount of patience will make any difference. An alcoholic of this temperament may be quick to use this chapter as…
…In some circumstances we have gone out deliberately to get drunk, feeling ourselves justified by nervousness, anger, worry, depression, jealousy or the like. But even in this type of beginning we are obliged to admit that our justification for a spree was insanely insufficient in the light of what always happened. We now see that when we began to drink deliberately, instead of casually, there was little serious or effective thought during the period…
…but frankly said that he was not ready to stop. His wife is one of those persons who really feels there is something rather sinful about these commodities, so she nagged, and her intolerance finally threw him into a fit of anger. He got drunk. Of course our friend was wrong – dead wrong. He had to painfully admit that and mend his spiritual fences. Though he is now a most effective member of Alcoholics Anonymous, he still smokes and drinks coffee,…
Final Thoughts
http://aa.org/twelveandtwelve/en_tableofcnt.cfm
http://www.hazelden.org/web/public/thought.view?catId=1901
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Our next show is on Monday 2/10/14 at 6:30 pm EST (-5 GMT). our recovery topic will be Anger. Join us live in the chat room at
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