"Meeting Needs & Newbies"

No, I'm not making a play on words about meetings. It's something I'm thinking about because of the book I'm re-reading. Here, a quote:

"Many of us have falsely believed our needs aren't important and we shouldn't mention them. Some of us even began to believe our needs are bad or wrong, so we learned to repress them and push them out of our awareness. We haven't learned to identify what we need, or listen to what we need because it didn't matter anyway--our needs weren't going to get met. Some of us haven't learned how to get our needs met appropriately." --Melody Beattie, 'Codependent No More'

When I read this passage, I was taken back to what it was like before I got into Recovery, before even I had thought about quitting. This book was the one that got me started on the spiritual path, which did ultimately lead to my getting sober. Reading it for the first time was more than just having a light bulb go off above my head; it was a spiritual experience all unto itself. Reading the passage above, I found myself thinking something along the lines of, "wow, it really was like that, wasn't it?" How far I've come.

There was indeed a time when I didn't know how to meet my own needs; a time even where I didn't have the faintest idea what my needs were aside from needing or wanting to stop hurting all the time. I couldn't tell anyone what I needed. I had learned too well that I wasn't supposed to have needs, had learned that whatever needs I might possibly have were wrong, or bad, or at best incorrect. I had stopped listening to my needs. I'd taught myself that I didn't have any, just as I'd taught myself I didn't have thoughts of my own, or feelings of my own. Is it really any wonder that I was so miserable all the time? Again I say, how far I have come.

I need to be reminded from time to time that it wasn't always how it is now. I need to remember how bad it really was. And not so much how bad life was on the outside, but really how bad it was on the inside--the never ending emptiness, the hollow shell of a human being that I was, always guessing my way through conversations, hoping and praying that what I was saying was the 'right' thing to say. The constant feelings of guilt and shame, the sheer terror of being approached by a stranger. I was so used to always being on edge, ready to say or do anything just so long as you left me alone! It wasn't an angry reaction, but one of fear.

On the inside, I was dying. And I hated it. And I wanted more than anything in the world to be released from that pain. But there seemed no way for me to overcome my fears about people long enough to listen. I didn't knoqw how to have good people in my life that were worth listening to.

Yesterday, I had coffee with a newcomer and was reminded again how important it is to have someone new around. Some in Recovery put a lot of focus on newbies to talking to other newbies. "See that guy over there? Go talk to him." "I've only got a month. What could I possibly say?" "A month? That guy's got three days. I'll bet he wants to know how the hell you made it to thirty." There's so much more that newcomers have to offer, though.

Speaking for myself, I need to remember what it was like before I got into Recovery, and no one can tell me that better than someone who is new, fresh to the program. Someone who's life is full of chaos, who is still stuck thinking that the their disaster of a life is everyone else's fault. Someone who still causes chaos and wreckage and reaps the havoc of it. I can look at all of that, remember how I used to be EXACTLY the same, and reaffirm my decision to not live like that anymore. I can think of all I have learned, remember all the painful years before I had started working the program, and find a deep, deep gratitude.

I can meet my needs now. One of those needs is to never forget what it was like.