Gratitude and My Freedom

Well, despite my ill thoughts of this blog, I believe I need to focus on the good and not the bad! When I was in recovery about a year or two ago (I’ve been in and out for three to four years now), my old sponsor used to always tell me to make gratitude lists when I seemed EXTRA catty. A lot of things we take for granted. Like our freedom. I just got out of a maximum security lock down facility for nine months. Prior to that, I was locked up in a local Juvenile Detention Center for two months. That taught me a HUGE lesson of how we take things for granted.

I remember before I was sent away by the state, I never wanted to be at the house, where I live with my dad and brother. It was really a place to eat, sleep and shower. All other priorities took place away from the house at all possibilities, And then I remember complaining when I got locked up: “I want to go home.”

I believe there’s a difference between a house and a home. Within a home, there is family, love, respect, courtesy and so on and so forth – basically mushy feelings. In contrast, I believe a house to be known as physical attributes of our living. Both can be one, but for others it’s one or the other. Before I was locked up, got back into recovery and accumulated some Clean Time, this house was simply a house. That was all. Nothing less and nothing more… My father and brother lived there,m but I was in and out as I pleased, trampling all over both hospitality and fear.

My dad never really knew where I was. I would sneak out of the house in the middle of the night and not come back until the next day or two. I can only imagine what my brother went through. He was pretty much clueless, I think. That’s not my point, however. My point is that today at this exact moment in time, I can say this house is a home. Herein lies unconditional love, mutual respect and family. That makes me happy.

I came back from a road trip yesterday after I was released from lock down and the entire time, I thought: “I just want to go home and lay in my own bed!!” Yet, I took for granted what was around me. I was on top of a mountain, in the middle of bluebonnet fields and I was in the midst of peace, serenity and God’s Creation. The only thing going through my mind until yesterday was, “When do I get to come back home? I can’t wait to get out of here!” Granted, I did do a little photography, a little drawing and a considerable amount of writing, I believe I handled these situations all wrong. Until yesterday.

The only thing on my mind up until yesterday was ‘rush rush, busy busy.’ It was Spring Break – vacation! Not only vacation, but my first week finally free and with my family. On top of all that, we went to some pretty neat places that I completely took advantage of. Yesterday, I was in the bluebonnet fields and trying to make conversation. My dad stopped both my brother and I and asked us to just listen. I bargained with God to please let this moment be over with. The faster that ‘listening’ moment passed, the faster we’d be on our way through the trail and the faster we’d be on our way home.

Except for the fact that something spoke to me during that “moment of silence.” I told myself (or maybe it was God), “Maybe you should just listen. Isn’t this peaceful? It’s serenity.” And then it hit me. I was so busy caught up in my own wants and needs that I was oblivious to what God wanted to show me. After that moment, I said a quick prayer: “Thanks, God. Please let me enjoy the rest of this day.” Later on, my dad shot pictures of my brother, Ryan, and I in the bluebonnet fields and I had a blast. Except when dad lost his cell phone in the field, but that’s a typical occurrence in our family. We’re just clumsy like that, I suppose.

While dad shot Ryan and I in the field, I want at peace with myself. I knew where I’d come from, I knew where I’d been and I knew who I wanted to be. And I was totally okay with that. It was an amazing feeling of utter contentment.

Later on, I decided it’d be a great idea to make a 10-item gratitude list. So I wrote it in my journal. Here it is:

Family
Shelter
God
Recovery
Rehabilitation Centers
My past
My present
My future
My freedom
The ability to sense

I want to challenge anyone who reads this to think of five or more things they’re grateful for and write them down. It’s something that’s always helped when I was having a down day. I guess it’s part of re-writing those old tapes in our heads we’ve told ourselves for years I always thought incredibly negatively and now when I have a negative thought, I’m able to stop, pause, rewind and rewrite it the way it God meant for it to be.

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Tags: AA, bluebonnets, calmness, clean time, controlling thoughts, family, freedom, God, grateful, gratitude, gratitude list, home, house, mountains, negative self-talk, peace, positive self-talk, re-write thoughts, recovery, rush, serenity, silence, struggle, thought process

This entry was posted on Friday, March 20th, 2009 at 12:11 pm and is filed under AA, God, Insight, strength. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.