Connection...

So I am at this conference, 2000+ people, and I wanted to stay in my room last night.  I had to be cajoled out of it and into my life already in progress.  I am not sure what is going on with me but I am apparently not so brave when I am missing my running buddy.

It is amazing the stories my head will tell me when I am listening...

No one cares

No one will notice

You aren’t important

You don’t matter

No one likes you anyway

All of the above feelings and thoughts fueled my self destructive drinking.  Just me and all of that making a decision on the daily to just do myself in on the installment plan...

Luckily I have been this crazy for long enough that I know not to listen to those voices in my head, they lie and absolutely want to separate me from the herd, just to pick me off.  It is a very weird thing to be afflicted with a brain that is constantly trying to take you out.  And a brain that quite desperately, not only wants to remain living, but also wants to help others remain this side of the dirt as well...

Alcoholics and addicts are the only people I know, the only fucking ones, that have this completely malignant idea that is persistent, forever, that you can be connected to other humans by disconnecting from other humans...

My head tells me ridiculous shit all the time, over and over again.  And every once in awhile I believe it.  Last evening that was the case. I took a nap, which is odd for me, I am not a napper, and then I just felt tired and out of sorts.  I didn’t want to get out of bed, I didn’t want to people, I didn’t want to shower and get dressed.  But I did.  I forced myself.  Pushed myself, called my mom and my BFF and told them where I was and how I was feeling and they both encouraged me to get in the shower, put on some clothes and then go act as if I am a normal person who doesn’t have this person inside her that wants to alienate her from the rest to humanity...

So I took a shower, got dressed and then asked for help.  I actually told another person, here at the conference, that I was having trouble connecting. He was encouraging and helped me not feel completely isolated in a room full of people...Ask and ye shall receive.

I had a good night and ended up not getting home until about midnight.  I wasn’t completely myself.  But I did a pretty good job of being present, as unselfconscious as I could and did my best to be interested in others.  The fear was crippling but I survived it.

One more time that my disease told me all the things listed above, where they took root and grew, but I got my spiritual weed whacker out and cut them where they stood (asking for help being the spiritual tool In play last night).  I will never be connected to other people by disconnecting from them.  No one is going to come knocking on my door begging me for friendship, a date, support, or love.  No, the universe is always going to require me to put myself in the way of beauty, love and friendship.  I have to allow the feelings of worthlessness to pass and take right action despite the way I feel and the futile feeling of it all.

The payoff?  Feeling like a human among humans.  I just got to be another sober person last night.  Nothing special, nothing not special.  I was just supposed to show up to my life and talk to the people that God put in my path.  I would love to tell you that I felt comfortable and interesting and lovely.  I didn’t.  But I didn’t feel the way I felt sitting in my hotel room pity party either.  So much of sobriety for me has been living in that middle space, that place between not enough and too much, between great and horrible, between happy and sad.  I’m not always going to feel great, think great thoughts and feel like I belong in this amazing life I have.  Not everyone is going to like me, want to date me, love me, or give two shits if I’m even there.  But some people will.  And those are my people.  But I am always fucking going to have to make the effort.  If I want to feel connected and involved I have to do the things that everyone else does to feel connected and involved.  I met several new people last night.  Cool people.  Shane in the coffee line. Lovely chap.  Kelly who totally saved me last night and seemed to know without knowing just how lost I felt and kept me close all evening.  Scott for giving me his seat and then making sure I was included and connected...

People ask me all the time why I am still sober and doing this whole deal...and I will tell you it is because I still have a head that wants me dead but will settle for me drunk.  And it starts, my alcoholism, with nights’ like last night where the committee in my head that believes with a resoundingness that is quite next level that Erin sucks and will take me out if given the chance.

I am so grateful that my fragile self worth was not ruined last evening.  That I was able to take right action and do the next right thing.  I am grateful for all the other people who feel just like I do, maybe not last night, but sometimes, who went out of their way to make me feel included, wanted and perhaps, maybe, even loved.

Turns out I apparently needed yet another lesson about the fact that I will NEVER get the feeling of being connected to others by isolating and practicing being disconnected, never.  I am so grateful for a daily program of living and all the people that live it too, that remind me when I get lost and cutoff, even while I am standing in a hotel full of like minded people that the only way to feel a part of, is to actually be a part of.

Again, still...

Having so much fun with AI...