Unmerited

[varkam]

Lately I've had sort of an epiphany. I was driving to a meeting and I really didn't want to go. I had to force myself to park and go inside. It's strange, because I actually like going to meetings. I don't feel resentful towards them, and I don't feel like I don't need them. I realized that part of me feels like I don't deserve recovery. That for all of the things that I have done, why would I deserve something so good? Does anyone else struggle with that?

At any rate, I called a friend / sponsor of mine and talked to him about it. He told me that grace is an unmerited condition of the spirit being at one with the divine. Unmerited. That word stuck with me. I don't want to believe it's unmerited, for some reason. I want to believe that I'm totally irredeemable. I know that's probably the disease talking or, if not the disease, then a consequence of spending so much time in it. I don't know...my heart hurts.

Thanks, folks. :pals:

[elleng]

1. Varkam,

you have said and done too many things for your recovery to be unmerited, or for you to be irredeemable.

Sorry, but NOT sorry.

[NMDemDist2]

2. who are you to decide God's Grace? s/he gives it, we receive

think of Grace like a radio station broadcasting 24/7

we are the receivers, it's our job to tune to the correct station.

the work you are doing is tuning your receiver to what was there all the time, you just weren't listening. by your works you will deserve what you get TODAY

yesterday is gone, tomorrow is just a promise. What are you doing TODAY?

:hug:

[Fire Walk With Me]

3. Even the big book mentions wallowing in self-pity being ego in reverse.

We're important if we're the best, OR the worst. Ego demands something to be in the spotlight.

Keep up the contrary action! :hug:

[Kajsa]

4. Varkam, you deserve every good thing

that comes to you in life.

My self esteem was on a roller coaster ride for
the first few years in sobriety - Way up, Way down!

It's evened out through the years, as it will with you.

Yes, for me it was the disease trying to control me again.

Hang in there. I hope this helped.

:hug:

[Brucie Kibbutz]

5. "my heart hurts"

I know the feeling. I also think you are right that it's the disease talking and yes, I struggle with it from time to time. Sometimes it can get pretty rough. I'm not much good at giving advice but I think I can understand where you're coming from. :hi:

[Joe Chi Minh]

6. Varka, you have a high libido and live in a culture that wittingly or unwittingly

promotes a culture of sexual depravity.

Why feel self-loathing because you find it difficult to keep away from pornography. I think it was Nelson Mandela who said that a saint is only somene who keeps falling down, but then keeps picking himself up. A high libido is often associated with a potential for great empathy and wisdom. From what I've heard - which may not be reliable, the Republicans and their hireling journalists are such liars - Bill Clinton is still an adulterous idiot and treading a dangerous path, but right now, he's still one of the smartest of politicians on the planet and, particularly for a politician, a most empathetic and charismatic man in other respects. And didn't Nelson Mandela, himself, have a spot of bother with his libido from time to time?"

It's the journey, not the destination. We remain sinners in one way or another until the day we die. "For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief."

I think pornography can be and will eventually be counter-productive in terms of men's sexual relations with women. Looking for similar bodily perfection to a porn star's in his partner, is often cited as a cause for impotence. I think guilt feelings from looking at pornography, however, subliminal, could also contribute.

[varkam]

7. I appreciate your words...

I don't think, for me, it's just a high libido. It isn't just pornography, either - though that certainly is a big part of it. It's almost an attraction to self-destructive sexual behaviors. I do agree with you that this culture certainly promotes a lot of it...not to say that I don't have a choice, though. The USA has sort of a schizophrenic relationship with sexuality - it's something that is in our face all the damn time (and believe me, since trying to reign a lot of this stuff in, I have noticed a lot of it) but it's almost verboten to talk about. IOW, it's the 600-pound gorilla in the room that everyone notices but no one dares mention.

Strange is definitely an understatement.

[IndyOp]

8. Thank you for this share - I've been meditating on it quite a bit

...and it means a lot to me and I wanted you to know that.

:hug: