Never say no to an AA Request, Part 2. (But after I wrote it I realized that it's really not about Not Saying No to an AA Request much at all.)

In the essay on the 10th Step in the book "Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions" (more commonly called The 12&12) it says

" ... many of us draw up a balance sheet for the day.  This is a good place to remember that inventory-taking is not always done in red ink.  It's a poor day indeed when we haven't done something right.  As a matter of fact, the waking hours are usually well filled with things that are constructive." -- (12&12, Step 10, pg. 93)

But when does self acknowledgment become self congratulations? 

I want to be careful not to turn this into something where I'm merely splitting hairs, parsing out slightly different definitions to words just in order to support an obtuse point -- yet when I consider my own experience in AA over the years I can feel a big, if sometimes subtle, difference inside between acknowledging to myself the work I've done vs. congratulating myself for the work I've done.

After listening in meetings, listening to sponsees, and my own self examination, I believe that drunks generally fall into two categories:  Assholes and Door Mats.  (There are lots of ways to sort drunks out of course, I'm speaking very broadly here.)

Me? I'm a door mat drunk.  Giving myself credit for work well done, for attempts made, for mistakes corrected -- that's an important part of my spiritual growth.  But in so doing I've discovered that sometimes my ego is trying to slip in the back door, and turn an exercise in self esteem into something much more about pride.  (And of course I don't mean the good kind of pride, I mean the kind of pride that depends on making myself better than others.)

And I think I am especially vulnerable to this when it comes to my "AA Resume."  Incrementally, as the one-day-at-a-times add up, it's a slippery slope to begin to feel you're a "good" AA for never saying no to an AA request, for having X sponsees and X service commitments.  The problem with that of course is that by inference there are then "bad" AA's -- and ipso facto (I always wanted to write that) then a Good AA must be better than a Bad AA... of course put so baldly the falseness of such reasoning is plain -- yet in the mind these things are never so apparent. 

And again, I don't want to split hairs, but words are ideas dragged out into the world, and the choice of my words helps me (re)shape my ideas.  So yes, there are certainly stronger habits to make a good practice of the principles of Alcoholics Anonymous, but though it's a handy shorthand I believe I should guard against labeling people, especially myself (some days the person I think about the most) as "good" in this context.  Healthy? Yes. Strong? Ok. Good, as in better than those that aren't good? Uh oh. Flag on the field.

It's all just various skirmishes in the Ego War.

But I must add that one of the most amazing things about writing this blog so far (this being entry number 221, but who's counting) has been how sharing some of the thoughts and experiences I've had "on paper" -- most especially those concerning the struggle with fear and ego -- has shown me how even 20 years down the road these things can still feel cloudy and complicated in my head, yet when I write them out there's such a "duh!" to it all -- the reasoning, the conclusions, seem simple and obvious.

I think for me there are three key things to pull from this:

1. Don't try to write a thoughtful piece about service, ego and self awareness after eating three vegetarian burritos, because tasty and healthful as they were, all the blood is in my stomach and not in my brain now, and thinking -- already a challenging task for me -- is now extra hard work.

2. The more ego I have involved in anything, the more whatever I'm doing moves away from whatever it started as.  (I think I bent a grammatical rule there but the point is spot on for me.)

3. Whatever bullshit shadow boxing match I engage with my ego vs. my self esteem, it matters far less what I think or how I feel about what I do than what I actually do -- so it all still comes back to never saying no to an AA request, becaue it's ultimately not important whether it feeds pride, self esteem, ego or (more likely) some tangled combination of the three -- what's important is that I say, and continue to say, "yes" to whatever AA asks of me.

Comments

[Syd]

I hear you. Thanks for this. I've been musing about service work in Al-Anon and how I'm wanting to back off.

[Syd]

I hear you. Thanks for this. I've been musing about service work in Al-Anon and how I'm wanting to back off.

[R Worley]

Thank you for writing this. I knew there was something not right with my 3 years of recovery and determined my main issue was one of boundaries. Boundary issues are divided in the same way you described "door-mats" and "assholes." I'm still attempting to find balance myself. I am moving out of my home as boundaries there are slim and 2 people already have taken it personally that I do not want to move in with them. Again, thanks for sharing this.. it is validating to have the approval of taking ownership because after all we have been given a new life or have we not?!