Okay. I Have Recovered. Now What?

Is There A Life For Us AFTER Recovery?
 

Recently I celebrated a milestone in my continuing journey of working the 12-Step Path. Over the years of this technicolor journey into my deeper self, I have come to appreciate the 12-Steps as a scaffolding to support an Inter-spiritual/ psycho spiritual, ethical way of life, and for this I am deeply grateful.

This path, as I have both lived and continued to teach it, is the basis of my book, “The Gateways- The Wisdom of 12-Step Spirituality”, published by Sacred Stories Publishing and available on Amazon and other booksellers worldwide.

I have developed two growing concerns over the years of my own working of these Steps, both personally and as a professional “in the field”,  however.  This “Recovery” path is described as “A Bridge Back to Life” and while I have found this to be true in many cases, I have increasingly discovered many who become stuck on the bridge. I also have witnessed an increasing move to a fundamentalist , authoritarian, rigid culture within the 12-Step nation...and the combination of these factors is not good.

Is there perhaps a problem with the definition of the condition of addiction as a lifelong illness that keeps people both scared and stuck?

I see many people begin to plateau and then regress, after a number of years in these programs.

I even see some repeatedly relapse so they can be “a beginner” again, and never get past the inevitable emergence of core conflicts.

For Stage One Recovery, “the rooms” are amazing and transformative.

But once all of the Steps have been worked, and some stability and restoration to sanity and purpose are established, it is time to conquer new developmental goals.

To continue for years to define oneself by illness or by one’s past, is the antithesis of real recovery. To courageously delve into causative issues, is so very important. Addiction is a symptom of deeper traumas, and core wounds are persistent if not treated.
The life of the main co-founder of AA, Bill Wilson, is a cautionary tale. His last 5 years of life were complicated by the emergence of his untreated issues. He suffered grave depression and anxiety, a loss of connection to a higher power, and was desperately unhappy until his death from emphysema...from a lifetime of smoking.

He had not conquered his demons, or come to fully appreciate his many strengths.

To me, this is a tragedy, and it is not talked about enough.

After Stage One Recovery, and a dedicated working of The Steps, should come a launch into a lifelong process of integration of body, mind and spirit beyond “illness”, and toward ever expanding wholeness!

Strength based psychology pulls forward the strengths of a person, and develops those...it does not continually recite what is wrong, but amplifies and draws forth greater good.

Even as I feel a deep gratitude for this amazing psycho- spiritual design for living I am blessed to continue to embrace, I encourage any and all on this journey to dare to go deeper...

Sending love across the quantum field,​ Keep on keeping on my friends!! 
 
Dr. Jane