All human beings hold to the tools of their own destruction. -- Barbara Gordon, author of "I'm Dancing as Fast as I Can" [1979]
People who live in the forests and mountains of India have an age-old method of catching monkeys. They do not run after the monkeys, and they do not use ropes. Rather they rely on their understanding of a monkey's behavior. They carve pots with necks as long as a monkey's arm and a base large enough for a banana. The monkeys, eager to collect their food, put their arms down the neck of the jar until they have the banana in their tight grasp. Unable to pull it through the narrow neck, they sit holding their treasure, unwilling to release their grip for fear of losing it. Because they cannot give up the banana in their grasp, they remain immobilized, and the villagers simply pick them up.
We are all afraid of letting go of what is in our grasp, that is why we become prey to the domination of others, whether that be advertising, other people's will pressed upon us, or mindlessly following the crowd. We take a leap of faith when we "let go," but in that leap of faith we might find our freedom in a variety of small or big ways. I will release what my mind is clinging to and refusing to let go of.
What I hold onto holds onto me.
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Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. ~Dr. Seuss
Wow, did I love this reading, that book and that author were so very instumental in my own Recovery, It was based on a true story of a pretty famous woman, who was "hooked" in a major way to benzodiazipines. I read that book, about 20 times, as I was hooked like her, on the same drug, and the book was so very scary. That was why I kept reading it. It was about the problems that we face when we go off of that drug, after some time, and how the very insideous addiction starts, takes a hold, and then will not let you go. Ane when you do, well let me say, that my own withdrawal did not send me into an institution, like it did for her, but probably I should have been hospitalized, for the withdrawal from that drug was or has been compared to Heroin withdrawal.
These two quotes are so very powerful, and so very true to my own experience.
"All human beings hold to the tools of their own destruction."
and then, here comes the solution,
"We take a leap of faith when we "let go," but in that leap of faith we might find our freedom in a variety of small or big ways. I will release what my mind is clinging to and refusing to let go of."
What I hold onto holds onto me.
And Recovery from the other addiction, Alcoholism can and does begin. Feel so very Blessed when I look back at the Recovery from this Cross Addiction.
Step I, "We are Powerless over Alcohol - and our Lives have become unmanageable" That was the starting point.
Thank you so much for this refresher course in Gratitude this morning.
