Doing a Personal Inventory – Who are you hurting by not making a change?

Tags

12 step programs, AA, Change, Eating Disorders, healing after abuse, making a change, Making Amends, NA, OA, overcoming abuse, personal inventory, PTSD, PTSD from abuse

A few years ago I posted a blog correlating my healing process with a 12 step program similar to the 12 steps for Alcoholics Anonymous. I received quite a few positive responses at the time about how it helped others to have this simple direction that has proven successful for over 80 years.

It came to mind again this morning in prayer. Over the past year I feel as if I’ve been doing a ‘personal inventory’ of where I am in life, where God desires me to be, and what I need to do in order to move forward out of a stagnant place. Making a personal inventory can be simple, implementing and sticking to the changes you know need to happen is the difficult part.

Moving forward means change that breaks you from a comfort zone. Even change from something negative to positive is difficult when you’ve become accustomed to the negative. This could be a move away from an abusive relationship, friendship or even employment.

Sometimes we don’t make the move because we convince ourselves it would hurt others. What is worse is when we become the martyr convincing ourselves to stick with it because bettering ourselves would only topple the organization or the lives of those around us.

The danger in the ‘martyr’ mindset is when the reality is misconstrued. The definition of martyrdom is ‘a display of feigned or exaggerated suffering to obtain sympathy or admiration’. Often martyrdom hinders and hurts those around you rather than keeping them ‘safe’.

• You don’t want to speak out because it’ll hurt those around you to know the truth. But because you don’t speak out the same abuse can happen to those around you causing that much more pain.

 

• You don’t leave the abusive relationship because you don’t want to break up a family. However, if you don’t leave the members of the family continue to witness or partake in the abuse often becoming the abuser or ending up with another abuser because it is their ‘norm’.

 

• You don’t leave an abusive environment (employment, friendship, etc) because of loyalty or fear you’ll never be able to replace what you are leaving behind with something more healthy. In reality that environment most likely is already ‘moved on’ or capable of moving forward which is why the environment is unhealthy.

Trusting in God’s plan for our life also means to embrace the fact he wants us to lead happy and healthy lives.

This truth is where I am today. Below I’ll reprint my original version of the 12 steps. Where do you believe you are in the process?

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To best understand this let’s take a look at the Twelves Steps for AA (Alcoholics Anonymous as per Wikipedia.com)

1)  We admit we are powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable.

My Case – The moment I realized I didn’t want to be the person I had become (abusive, negative, mean, depressed)

2)  Come to believe that  a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

My Case –  I saw Christ in Ryan that day that I realized Step 1, and that is what sent me face down on the floor

3)   Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understand Him.

My Case – I surrendered to God that night, on the floor, ‘take my life and do with it what You will’

4)  Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

My Case – After that evening I began to recognize the areas that I was sinning.  The behavior was no longer attractive to me or desirable.

5)  Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

My Case  – RECONCILIATION  – getting ‘right’ with God

6)  Were entirely ready to have God remove all of these defects of character.

My Case – I stopped the behavior as I recognized it.  It was day by day.

7)  Humbly ask Him to remove our shortcomings.

My Case –  I prayed on my knees daily to become a better person.  Still do!

8)  Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

My Case –  I can’t say I made a list, however, I did see the need to contact those I loved.  I sat down a year or so after that key moment on my bedroom floor and wrote a letter to all of my siblings telling them that I loved them.  Honestly, it could be another ‘step’ I revisit because often I don’t feel that I’m there enough for them as I am for so many others.  But then again, I feel the least understood or accepted by them as well.

9)  Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except to do so would injure them or others.

My Case – By the grace of God I’ve had the opportunity to meet with people from my past that I have needed to extend and apology to.

10)  Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admit it.

My Case –  as in the above…God gave me the grace to achieve this even when I didn’t realize it was a step needed to be done at the time.

11)  Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understand Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

My Case –   I live this daily

12)  Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all of our affairs.

My Case –  It has been my ministry to speak out and lead others to Christ.

I think we can all see how pertinent these steps are in ALL OF OUR LIVES.  It isn’t a weakness to admit failure, it is only a weakness when we don’t try to do better.  If you know someone who has succeeded in these steps through a program such as AA, give them a hug and acknowledge the work they’ve done to better their life.

A great 12 step program to help those who have suffered PTSD from abuse is Celebrate Recovery. They have CR meetings all over the United States. To learn more visit:  Celebrate Recovery.com

If you or someone you know suffers from addiction, depression or eating disorders please go to the following sites to find your local meetings:

Alcoholics Anonymous:  www.aa.org     Narcotics Anonymous:  www.na.org

Overeaters Anonymous:  www.oa.org    Eating Disorders Anonymous:  www.eatingdisordersanonymous.org

Depression Anonymous:  www.depressionanonymous.org

ALANON  (Friends and family of those in 12 step programs)  www.al-non.alateen.org

Blessings

Shannon

 

Make a Move (Day 230)

Tags

encouragement, Faith, inspiration, making a change, making a move, self-improvement

I love to read. In particular I love to read fiction stories and memoirs about every day people that tell the story of a situation they face and learn to overcome. The ending doesn’t have to be a fairy tale, ride off in the sunset, everything is now perfect type of ending. For me it is about entering into the life story of another, journeying with them through a life-altering time, and bearing witness to the moment they recognize what needs to be done to move forward.

There is an exhilaration I receive when the character comes out of the darkness of whatever tragedy, displacement or self-induced sorrow and begins to catch ahold of the little rays of hope that pull them out of the pit. In the end what is left is a time of life that was hard and undesirable and yet the character is better for it because they can appreciate their current status of strength and renewal. Freedom.

Actually, it could be why I love doing what I do with Hopeful Hearts Ministry. When I work with survivors I sometimes speak to them at various stages of their ‘story’ but the transformation is exciting for me to witness.

Today, I received two updates literally one after the other, about two women I’ve been working with. They are both at a chapter in life that is beginning on a fresh, clean page. The chapters of their lives up to this point have had their own tales of abuse, suffering, and bad choices that have kept them tethered to the darkness.

Individually their stories are unique and I wouldn’t dishonor them by trying to clump them together but what was so interesting today is how they both started writing a new chapter in their life by making a move on their own to better their lives and the lives of their family. A page has been turned and it is thrilling for me to be a witness to the insurmountable opportunities and possibilities that lie in wait for each woman.

You can keep staying on the same path and go around and around in circles or you can make a move to go forward and see your life change direction.

This is so exciting I can hardly contain my enthusiasm and joy! To bear witness to survivors who’ve been so covered in shame and lack of worth finally have a moment that they claim the love and dignity they deserve. They came toe to toe with the enemy (as I mentioned yesterday) and are fighting back fueled by the almighty power of God.  And I’m on the sidelines, dancing on my tip-toes unable to contain my excitement hollering out, “Kick some booty and don’t turn back! You’ve got this!”

Can you see me? Rocky is every survivor I work with…and I’m the ornery old man with the raspy voice telling them to GET BACK UP and GO KICK SOME BOOTY!

As I told one of the women this morning, “It is so empowering for me to hear. Really it encourages me because you are so active in bettering your life and your kids lives. Makes me that much more encouraged to keep bettering mine, to never stay stagnant, keeping improving.” I want to keep making those page-turning moves.

Are you at a place in life that you know it’s time to make a move and ‘turn the page’? What’s keeping you stagnant? Your life is an active journey not a walk on the treadmill. No one but YOU can make that change. Go with God and be amazed.

Blessings Shannon