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Source: Ellen C – Practicing These Principles – Part 4 – Date Unknown.mp3 File: ellen-c-practicing-these-principles-part-4-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:37:23
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10. I express no opinions on outside issues, especially other people. Hence, my name ought never be drawn into public controversy. That's pretty tricky. I express, it doesn't say I don't have them. It just says I express no opinions on outside issues, especially other people. The principle here is the same principle in Step 10, which is mind my own business. Truthfully, I rarely express opinions on outside issues like politics and religions, others, other people's lives, and so rarely is my name drawn into public or private controversy.
God knows I have opinions, which is just another word for judgments. And when I say judge, what I mean is execute. Because when I judge something, I take it right to the end. I kill it in my head. It's dead. I can usually keep most of what's in my head from coming out my mouth, and most days, that's the best I can hope for, is that it doesn't come out of my mouth. Now, I have people I sponsor who go, oh, I was thinking this terrible thing, and shouldn't I offer an amend? I said, did you say it? No. Then you don't owe any amend. That's a wonderful thing. Just keep it to yourself. Early on, I was impressed with how well this tradition works at our group level. Not only did we not talk about our professions, religions, outside publications, other 12-step programs, or politics and meetings, we didn't talk about others behind their backs outside of meetings. I've been blessed to be part of home groups where gossip has not been a major issue, and I recognize that that is not always the way it is. And I feel very, very, very blessed to be in that kind of situation where we don't talk about each other. Now, on the other hand, if someone's not coming to meetings, and I'm missing them, I need to speak up and say, where's so-and-so? Have you seen him? Has he been in meetings? Or I need to make a phone call and say, where are you? I'm missing you. We talk about each other. We talk about it. You know, we have that thing, thanks to Blanche, we have that thing on the table that says, who you see here, whom you see here, what you hear here, when you leave here, let it stay here. I want to argue with it. Whom you hear here, what they say here. Who said what here? Let it stay here. But if I can't take out what I heard in the meeting, it doesn't do me any good. I've got to be able to use what I hear at the meeting. It's just I don't have to go around telling people who said it. You know, one of the things we do because we're so self-deprecating, we think so little of ourselves, is that we have to attribute these things we've heard to somebody else. So-and-so said, my sponsor said, or I read in a book, or whatever it is, rather than adopting these things as our own truths and speaking them as such. Actually, outside of the meeting where I go to, we don't talk about those other things much, if at all, like politics and religions and that kind of thing, because it's divisive. And the beauty of our group is that we're inclusive. We're all inclusive.
There was an issue in my Wednesday night group where we had some pretty strong political feelings going along for a while there. And they would come up at the meeting and, you know, kind of like a joke, ha, ha, ha, and on we'd move. And finally, after a while, one of the gals I sponsored goes to that, came to me, and she said, I don't know what to do. And she said, I feel really bad coming to you with this, but I'm uncomfortable with that. That is not the way I feel about it. And what I did was encourage her to speak up. All you have to say is, when this conversation about politics happens, I feel uncomfortable because I don't agree with a lot of what you all are saying. And it stopped. But she had to have the courage to speak up. And they had to have the willingness to listen to her.
That's a healthy relationship. The idea that what other people say is their opinion and not the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God, and has to be argued to the death, that was a big ah-ha for me. Knowing that how I feel and think about my own life is important enough to speak up about has been critical to my recovery. So I do voice my opinion, which hopefully is my feelings tempered by my thoughts or vice versa, in appropriate places, like group conscience meetings and in relationships when
[00:05:07]
I can keep the focus on me and not on anyone or anything else. I think one of the places I learned to deal with anger was at group conscience meetings. I didn't like that we didn't agree with each other. I didn't like that we had differing opinions. And I would get so uncomfortable. And people would say, gosh, they just bicker, bicker, bicker all the time in there. Can't they agree on anything? And you know, I got some space from that and I realized, no, that's the way healthy people talk stuff through. People have opinions, they have feelings, they talk it through. Nobody has to die over it. It's just, and after the meeting they go, hey, you want to go to lunch? You know? Like nothing happened.
And the truth is, nothing happened. We just, issues came up that we felt strongly about. And that has, I covet group conscience meetings. I covet the opportunity to hear other people, particularly newer people, struggle in there to come up and voice their feelings on something. Just as important as everybody else's, but it is critical that we say them. I have an individual responsibility to act as I see right upon the issues of our time.
This doesn't mean that I don't do, that I'm not sending money to Haiti, because I am. I'm doing what I feel responsible to do. But I don't have to, that doesn't have to be your business. One of the things they told me when I was new in here that I should not shame the alcoholic, but there were times when I needed to report. There would be plenty of times when we would get up the next morning and he was in a blackout the night before and he didn't remember what he did. And I would have to go report to him, last night when you came home drunk, you put your hands around my neck and you tried to choke me.
That's what happened last night. And she would say, report and leave the room. This is not up for discussion. This is not a, this is, we're not going to have any back and forth on this. He doesn't remember what happened standing there. He's only going to get defensive. So you just go on, but you report what happened. That's my job, is to report. Now I've kept these grandchildren more on than off for the last 12, almost 13 years now.
And my daughter got divorced in the process. My son is getting divorced in the process. And I've watched the wear and tear on those children as we've gone through that stuff. And I have found a couple of times in there with each family where I've had to say to their parents, I just need to report to you what I see. I'm not carrying tails. I'm not telling them what to do, but I need to report what I see. This is what's happening with your child. I'm going to tell you this really bad story.
Okay, so back when they were all four little and they were like one, two, three, and barely four. I'm sure she was not four, but around in there. And we're sitting around my little kitchen table. And we're having, you know, like a Norman Rockwell lunch, you know, with grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup, you know, I'm sure, something like that. And Tristan must have been about three. And he leaned back in his chair and he goes, so mean, what the F is happening? And Madison's eyes are like this big, you know, and I'm trying to, I'm going to make, I'm going to hear something else. That is not what I heard.
I said, did you say what the heck is going on? He said, no, what the F is happening? And I'm like, ooh. And I said, Tristan, that is a really, really, really bad word. And that word does not come into Mimi's house. And the light bulb goes on. He goes, oh, it's out, we keep that one out in the yard. I said, no, you never, ever say that word, never. And Madison goes, well, unless the other car is coming really, really fast and you have to. And I had to report that incident to their parents, my children. And I had to tell them, if this comes up in your dinner table conversation, this is what happened. And they both immediately flashed me back, you know, a message that says, I have no idea where they heard that. Whatever. Let me tell you, if this is a place that's really hard for me to do, but I practice this. And I practice it with, you know, what I'll do with someone in the program is I'll say to them, I want to practice doing this relationship healthier.
And I want to know if I have your permission and your agreement that if even, you don't even have to do what I'm doing, but will you be willing to listen to me and let me
[00:10:03]
practice? And then I will go to them and I will say, these are my feelings and my perceptions. I'm not asking you to change. I just need to say them. I feel blank when you do blank. It helps me own my feelings. It helps me speak up when I need to speak up. And it helps me realize, you know, it's like the, I heard an AA lady say one time, she said her children were telling her what a horrible mom she'd been. She just ruined them and they were always going to be horrible because she'd been a horrible mom and blah, blah, blah. And she said, you know, I recognize that all your problems may have my name on it, but all the solutions have your name on it. And this is one of those places where I know the solution has my name on it, not their name on it. This is mine.
I've had to do this with my husband because he will, some things will happen and I'll get scared. And I've had to go to him and say, I'm really scared. I'm not asking you to change. I'm not asking you to do anything different. I just need to speak up and tell you that I'm scared. And it's amazing the calm and the peace that I feel after I've done that. It's like when my daughter announced, you know, she was 18 and announced she was pregnant and I thought it changed everything. And now I had to be responsible for her and I'd have to be responsible for this baby she was bringing into the world. And my sponsor said, you know, there are only so many bad feelings in every relationship. The bad feelings you're feeling are hers and let her have them. And I recognize that the pain I felt one more time was the pain of holding on when it was time to let go because the pain is always in the resistance. It's never in the release. It's always in the resistance. And when I resist acknowledging my feelings, when I resist speaking up about them when I need to. And a lot of times I've got to clear that stuff with my sponsor, you know. When I resist that, they get bigger and bigger and bigger and I get smaller and smaller. It's been a very long time since somebody said I heard what you said about me and it really hurt. I am so grateful for that. Am I careful to keep confidences? If not, why not?
Does gossip make me feel part of? There's a gal I sponsor and have for a long time whom I admire. She's a very well-educated, bright, darling woman and I love her. And she has a problem with, she's the only person I've ever sponsored who's been like this, but she has a problem with me mentioning anybody else's name that I sponsor. She feels like I'm breaking anonymity when I do that. And I don't share what other people have shared with me most of the time because I don't remember. But I, and I recognize that this is not my issue.
I think if this was an issue where I was really guilty, there would be more than one person speaking up about this. I recognize that it's her issue, but it's very, she's very sensitive about it. And I, I'm very careful around her. Am I publicly critical of others? Privately critical. How does controversy affect me physically, emotionally, and spiritually? Ooh, conflict. It's a difference of opinions. One time my daughter said to me, Mom, when you have to confront something, you confront the issue. You don't confront the person. You both want the same thing. You want resolution of the issue. So confront the issue, not the person.
And that has made a huge difference for me because I don't get so defensive. We're talking about this issue. It's separating the personality from the principle. We're going to deal with the principle of what's going on here, not the personality. Do I express myself, my thoughts and feelings on inside issues? When? Do I recognize the difference between an argument and a discussion? When I express myself, can I keep the focus on my own experience, strength and hope, and not on the perception of others' thoughts, actions, and motives? This is mind, you know, back to the mind reading again. I think I know what you're thinking. And, and I'm thinking that I know what you're thinking about me or about this, and I base my, you know, base what we're doing on that. Can I allow others to disagree with my ideas without feeling rejected and or being defensive? Do I often allow my decisions to be swayed by others' beliefs or opinions? Do I call it to anyone's attention when others are not living the way I think they should?
And you never do that, do you? No, we wouldn't dream of it. You notice how often
[00:15:07]
that comes up? That's almost every tradition. It's just worded a little different because that's, you know, it's like, it's like when we read the opening we say we're not, or the closing, we're not perfect. You know, we say that at every meeting. AAs read chapter 5 at every meeting that says we're not saints. Well, who are we trying to convince here? Oh, that's right, I'm not perfect. Well, yes, I am. As a matter of fact, that's one of those ones I'd argue with because I believe I'm perfectly exactly what I need to be today. I'm perfectly exactly what I need to be today. Tradition 11, I best demonstrate my purpose by actions rather than promotion, by walking rather than talking. Anonymity. I show my beliefs and principles by walking the walk and not just talking the talk. The tradition assumes I have beliefs, principles, and that I act from them. The only reason I do is a result of working the steps because I didn't have any when I got here. You know what happened to me when I would have told you I was here because of his unacceptable behavior and the truth was I was an al-anon because of my own unacceptable behavior. I'd turned into somebody I didn't like, somebody I didn't trust, somebody I didn't know. Every principle I had, I compromised. But it's a lot different today on a spiritual basis to have principles and be true to them. My belief system is not a static thing because I continue trudging the road of happy destiny and more is revealed. Which is it you know I want God to get where God's going to be and stay there and that doesn't happen either. And yet the longer I'm here the less I know about God and the more okay that is with me. My sponsor said one time I said well I just can't figure that out. She said honey God is a mystery and if you can't figure it out it means God's at work. I'm getting remembering new aha's daily, letting go of old ideas and adopting new ones, taking what I like and leaving the rest. Sometimes new ideas conflict with old ideas and the process of transformation can be ugly and even painful. But I don't grow in my comfort zone. We don't grow there. Ships are safe in harbors that's not what ships are for.
Here comes the set-aside prayer. I've done this the last few times I've worked the steps. I've done this a couple of times with other issues. God help me set aside everything I think I know about whatever. About the steps if that's what I'm going to do is work the steps. Because you know what gets in my way are my old ideas. What gets me in trouble more trouble than anything else is what I'm sure of. That's what gets me in trouble. It's what I don't know and I'm willing to explore that helps me grow. Help me set aside everything I think I know about the steps for a new understanding of you and to learn the truth. And if I set aside everything I think I know the world becomes new again. And I've found out amazing things when I take out what I think I don't what I think I know. Now that is a big-time risk. But I'm you know what I'll tell you you can trust that.
If I don't risk, if I don't step off that cliff, if I wait to act to live my life until I know the real truth, the final answers, I'll miss it all. Life is what happens to us when we're making other plans. So while some of my truths are immutable, life is good. Einstein said it always it all came down to one question do you believe the universe is a friendly place or not? And I believe it is a friendly universe. You have convinced me of that. God loves me and you all the time no matter what. That's an immutable truth for me. I believe this came to pass. I believe there are no accidents. Others of my ideas are in constant flux and that's good but the unfolding can be two steps forward and three steps back and sometimes my life isn't very attractive to me. Sometimes I'll say more can you believe that I would say more yes more about something that is prudent for your approval or your attention and then I beat myself up because I did that. Then I get to share with someone how I'm feeling and what I
[00:20:03]
did and didn't do and how less how less than it should be, old idea, my life looks. So in doing so the power is removed from the problem and I'm free to demonstrate the solution. Usually by changing my behavior, hoping my feelings will catch up. You know I want to feel differently and then I'll do differently but that's not the way it works. I got to do different and amazingly I'll act, I'll feel different after that. It is uncomfortable for me to be in relationships with people who continually look for validation by telling me how wonderful they are, how perfect their life is or how miserable they are and how much their life sucks. Both have the same goal, pay attention to me. Those people are probably sharing their beliefs but it's not very attractive. Neither of those views can be real. Wonderful a guy whom I adore will let him remain anonymous and I heard him I was listening to him the other day and somebody said boy what do you do what words do you use at step two so you can move you know now you need a new you need a new God you need a new understanding you need to move on so what do you say to yourself at step two so you can move on he says I say I'm an asshole and my life sucks. Yeah I kind of go there. I'm attracted to people who tell the truth about themselves even when it's not pretty. Do I have my own belief system? Can I describe it? Am I true to it? Am I ever embarrassed or humiliated by my friends or family members actions? Am I expecting them to live by my beliefs? Am I guilty of promotion of myself my ideas rather than attraction? Do I keep promises I can't keep? Now the place I do that more often than not is with myself. I make myself a promise and then I won't do it. It has the same outcome. How do I feel when someone criticizes the way I'm trying to live? I have a daughter who's nearly 20 years sober. I have a son who thinks it's a cult and he thinks I see under alcoholics under every rock and I do and I had pretty much given up the idea that you know he just would kind of roll his eyes and you know I've been in the program since he was 10 years old. I gave up the idea he was ever going to get any kind of peace with us and I was telling my story at a local anniversary one day and they and they didn't have a clock so I had my I had my phone and I was using my phone clock. Now this phone had a voice thing where you could say somebody's name and it would it would call him but I could never figure out how to work. I didn't know how to do it so I never set the stupid thing up. I mean I'm pretty sure that isn't what happened and besides I don't usually say my children's names when I'm sharing. I usually just let them be my children and at one point I picked up the phone and I looked at it and I put it down and I finished I had like another 25 minutes to go and I picked up my phone to walk off the podium and I looked down and it said I've been talking to my son for 35 minutes and I'm like disconnect, disconnect, disconnect, disconnect, oh and um he immediately called me right back and I'm like oh I'm so sorry oh I'm so sorry I didn't mean to tie up your phone or anything I'm sorry that was total accident I have no idea how that happened he said mom I just called to tell you I love you. Now what he heard the last 35 minutes was my daughter's alcoholism and how it affected me and how I perceived it affected him and what it did he used to tell me I should have done drugs and alcohol you to pay more attention to me and I said I hope you don't have a sick child because you're gonna find out what that does and that's what he heard. Now I did not plan that and things have been different since then. He doesn't criticize matter of fact he lets me take his girls to Crested Butte Mountain Conference every summer for a week and lets them go to workshops every afternoon for children whose families have been affected by the disease of alcoholism. I think he recognizes they belong there. I had nothing to do with it. Do I share my experience strength and hope when requested but only when requested? Can I express this is the basis of that is can I express my experience strength and hope without judgment and I have to be able to do that before I can do this
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with any kind of ease. I've developed a level of skill with huh sometimes that's all you got to say huh wow yeah and I'll say I never thought of that. Just move right on you know move right on. Serving next serving 72 that's why I feel serving 72. Okay tradition 12 anonymity is a spiritual foundation of all my traditions ever reminding me to place principles above personalities. This is the expression of humility. We have the sense of that at step 7 and at tradition 7 we get the we get the spirit of humility but this is where it's expressed. Humility is described as the who and what of us. The traditions help me practice the principles the what of me through my personality the who of me.
Personalities people come and go and that's good news and bad news. The miracle is that by practicing the traditions in all my affairs the principles that I learned and you know people say well tell me what the principles are. I'll write those down. Well it's like I wanted you to define sanity for me so I'd know whether or not I was saying. I wanted you to describe meditation to me so I'd know how to do it and that's not what this program is about. You have to find your own definition. Sanity has changed for me through the years. Sanity when I got here was waking up waiting up until 230 in the morning with the second or third dinner of the evening cooked because the first two had burned up or dried out waiting for a guy to walk in the back door who might not remember that the first step into our house was up you know but that was sanity to me. I had a different idea of sanity today. The principles at each step are really your principles you have to find as you go through the steps. People can tell you what they found but you have to find your own. These principles continue to be building blocks of my new life as an intelligent agent a spearhead of God's ever-advancing creation. Now that's right out of that's right out of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous that's in we agnostics and it's one of the lines that when I read that I went I always believed that. I'm an intelligent agent of course I am and I'm a spearhead of God's ever-advancing creation. I take God with me where I go and God can't go to the places I go if I don't take them. I don't take them. Ever-advancing creation.
Anonymity allows me to be real to be me and not be limited by my story my identifications. It allows me to know not only that if it's good for me it'll be good for you but also if it's good for you it'll be good for me. It has allowed me to have a different childhood. A past that changes according to my perception. Do you know that's just magic the way that works. There's another AA speaker these days who's talking and he says you know if you listen to my tapes back in the mid 70s when I was telling my story for the first time and you listen to my stories today you'll find out I had a much better childhood today than I did back then. We are allowed in this program to restructure our past just because our perception has changed. My sponsor used to say well what when I called her about when Melissa told me she was pregnant and oh it was so horrible and I've said horrible things to her for about two hours and finally locked up my house kicked her out locked up my house and got in the car and drove to Crested Butte and I went right to her bed to my sponsor's bed. I went right there and she said Ellen rewrite that story in your head. She said will you write it with a better ending with another ending that you'd be happy with and I rewrote it and she said you know what you can't change your mind your mind knows what happens but you can change your body and what what injures us in this is our stressful reactions to the rescinding rescinding rescinding of that information and what happens when I do that is it gives me a choice about how that really went. It gives me another way to look at that stuff you know I look at my parents today and I recognize I could not have been loved anymore than I was loved by those two people. Now was it enough for me? No. Is that about them?
No. No that's not it's about my receiver you know it's about my receiver. So anonymity allows me to stick to the principle of me and not get caught in my story. You know how we get we get me and they'll say, I'm a cancer survivor, and I, and I say to them, I want so much more
[00:30:02]
for you than just to be a cancer survivor, you know. How about you be a liver? How about you go for that? But I, you, people get stuck in that. That's who I am. That's who I'll always be. If I don't have to make that the principle, principle of me, if I can let those things just be things that happened and I can move on, I got a chance at a whole new life beginning to end. The who of me grows by being fully present, practicing the principles, the what of me, in every relationship with God, with others, and myself, by being honest, open, loving, and willing to learn from everyone. The promise is that we all progress toward our best selves when I live this way, and the family, work, friendship, love situations are bound to improve. We have such wonderful promises in our opening and our closing, bound to improve. This tradition reminds me to recognize these principles, God, at work in people rather than focusing on how what they do or say affects me. And to focus on the what of me, being grateful my personality, the who of me is perfect just the way it is today. My journey, my journey, I don't know about you, but what holds me back more than anything in this program is yeah, but. Yeah, but. I hear what you're saying, I know, I know, I know, but you don't know how bad it is over here. Yeah, but I know that sounds like a better way, but you don't have my life. You can't do this. I would rather be miserable and be right. And that's what that is. I'll be willing to be miserable if I can just be right. My journey in this program has been from yeah, but to thank you, thank you, thank you, for everything exactly as it is. I wouldn't change a thing. Not a thing.
Clint Hodges used to say that acceptance was glad willingness. It was very different from tolerance, which is when I put up with stuff I don't like it, but I'll put up with it. And it's hard to get to glad willingness with some things in our lives. It's a hard place. We've had some really tough things happen to us. And I can't get there with everything, but I'm willing to. That's what I'm aiming for is glad willingness.
I love that. Do I confuse the message with the messenger? Do I treat others one way in public and another way in private? Can I do and do I do thoughtful things for others anonymously? You know that thing in the Just for Today that says I'm going to do something for somebody and not get found out. If I get found out, it doesn't count. I love people who come to meetings and say, oh, I got to tell you the thing I did.
I'm sorry, you can't tell us or it won't count. You'll have to go do something else. A friend of mine was told by her sponsor a while back, she said, I want you to do something every day for 30 days. I mean, she was so caught up in how bad it was and how bad it had always been and how bad it was going to be, her sponsor said, here's what I want you to do. I want you to do something every day for somebody and don't get caught. Boy, did it change her attitude, I'll tell you. Can I do, can I and do I do good things for myself without having to mention them to others? Can I practice selflessness when I hear this is a selfish program? What has helped me most in placing principles above personalities?
What has helped me the most is recognizing that the God of my understanding is a principle, not a personality. I try really hard to give God a personality, try to make him human, but that doesn't work for me because humans have, there's too many, too many ifs. I need a, I need a for sure God. Do I trust that when I follow spiritual principles the solution will be the greatest good for the greatest number?
There's, it seems like such a simple question, but boy, does that stir up some stuff. If I don't, then I need to go back to tradition one. It's been a good day. You've done a good thing. You have some more work to do before you're done and then we'll get some raffle things, but I want to tell you, we've, we have developed a relationship today, me and you, and it isn't always as good with a room full of people, especially a room full of people who've been sitting here since nine o'clock in the morning. We've participated
[00:35:03]
with each other for our mutual benefit because I needed to do this and it's so much better to do it with you, so much more helpful than it is for me to do it by myself. And I know God's been at work. I've heard a couple of you say it and that's all that matters is it's been a couple of us. Some years back, back in the day, I used to go around, a lot of us did. We went around every month to a different club taking the steps and you'd go there like every Wednesday night or every Tuesday night or whatever their step meeting was and you'd share your experience, strength and hope with the steps for four Wednesdays or four Thursdays and I was doing it pretty often and I was working hard at it and I really was enjoying it. I thought I was doing a pretty good job and I went to talk to this group that was way far away. It was like a 45-minute ride out there in the dark in the boonies and I don't know where I am and I get out there and by the time I left that meeting I was sweating. I was working so hard to engage those people and I couldn't do it.
And the next day, my good friend in the program called and I let the club remain anonymous but I said, maybe I shouldn't be doing this. Maybe I just, I think I'm okay at this. Maybe I'm really not. And I said, you know, I told her what happened and she said, let me guess. You were at blah, blah. And she told me the name of the group. I went, yeah, how did you know? She said, I was there last month. They're painted on the chairs.
And that was when I realized that I can't do both parts of our relationship, you know, we do have a relationship. And the energy that you offer up makes all the difference in the world in you. And I want to thank you for that. If it hasn't been helpful, take what you like and store the rest. It might come in helpful later on. All right. You guys are going to work. Let's see, when do you want to do raffle stuff?
All right. So, you've got until 3.15. I was going to make a rule, but I'm not going to.