Egoism, The Promises

PROMISE # 2: We realize a new way to live

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“After having made a clean breast of things we begin to live with a clean conscience. We have made amends, made it right with our God, others and ourselves.

How does one acquire freedom? Freedom is based on detachment. Detachment means to no longer cling to persons, places, things or behavior that cripples or demeans itself or others.

In  our struggle with depression, we had felt that we had lost all freedom and happiness. We now know that we have the key to our prison in our hands and as we move through each of the steps a new fact was discovered, that we don’t have to remain frozen in time with our depression.  We know that now we can celebrate a release from all the old fears, resentments and images that we held of ourselves over these many years.

Our happiness is now dependent on how we look at ourselves, our world and the understanding that we have of our God. I know for a fact that when I first came into the fellowship, I felt like a stranger in a foreign country. My thoughts and feelings were all confused as I began the journey into myself with a deepening desire to discover the engine that drives my sadness.  The battle raged inside of me – a battle that was fought in the shadow of past events – relationships. It was a personal triumph for me to finally see that there was a way out of this despair and emotional atrophy.  I now follow a practical plan as outlined by our suggested 12 Step program.  I make sure that every day that I get into action and do something.  I used to think that if I wait long enough the good humor fairy would tap me on the shoulder and I would be well. This is exactly the opposite of what our program of recovery promotes. Our position is that you have to roll up your sleeves and get to work.

A pill might make you feel differently-but it will never take away the circumstances that brought you down in the first place. The Promises here tell us that we will find a new freedom of happiness – but first, work has to be done. Our lives and the way we look at life are composed of past and present events.”

______________________

SOURCES:     Copyright(c) The Promises of Depressed Anonymous (2002). Depressed Anonymous Publications.

Copyright(c) I’ll do it when I feel better(2015). Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Pages 33-34.

Copyright(c) Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 109.

DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, The 12 Steps

You begin to see yourself as healer instead of victim…

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These Twelve Steps work for those who work the program and who try to live one day at a time. Many times we have been so scared of being rejected once more that we have withdrawn deeper into the anguish of our shame and hurt. We need to air our hurts, our shame, and let others hear our story. There is something healing about hearing ourselves speak to others about our own journey in life and the many emotional potholes that we have fallen into from time to time. We have felt our lives were jinxed. But now we can begin to feel hopeful when other members of the group  shake their heads in knowing approval of what we are saying when we tell our story.  Most have  been where we are now. And the more we make an effort to come to meetings regularly, the more we will find members of the group telling us how they are seeing a change in the way we act, talk, and look. We will accept the group’s comments as being true and honestly expressed. These people speak our language and they all have been where we are now. You gradually begin to see yourself as healer instead of victim the more you work the program and get excited about the possibility of helping others. When you start reaching out to others in the group, it is at that point that you are carrying the message of hope to others. You have a future with Depressed Anonymous.”

SOURCES: Copyright(c) Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 105.

Copyright(c) The Depressed Anonymous Workbook (2002) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.

NOTE:  These two works comprise the Home Study Kit which can be purchased TOGETHER  at VISIT THE STORE.

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A Psalm of Life: By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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 What the Heart of the Young Man said to the Psalmist

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to -morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no future, howe’er  pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, – act in the living present!
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

TO THE READER : Comment on the poem.

The above poem, penned by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, appeared in POETRY FOUNDATION.  I found this poem to be an appropriate encouragement for any of us who are or were feeling hopeless and helpless. Indeed, as the poet believes, we all can make our lives sublime. “Let us, then, be up and doing…”

Hugh

Fellowship

Get connected!

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AFFIRMATION

I  feel affirmed to know that I can always find a group of people who know how I am feeling anytime I want to get in contact with them.

“The isolation of depression begins as a place of safety and goes on to become a place of torture.”  Dorothy Rowe

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

I hear it often in meetings and I see it in the faces of the new members to the group. There is the fear of the new and the different. One has to give credit to those people when they come to their first Depressed Anonymous meetings. They are admitting first of all that they are having a problem. Admitting that their lives are out of control takes courage. Secondly, they are coming out of their isolation and looking for help with their problem. They are willing to give up the safety of their isolation for the pain of telling others that they are miserable and have no hope of ever feeling different.

Every new move I make toward other sufferers when I am depressed takes me closer to another human being and help.  My torture is so great that I am willing to come and meet with a group of total strangers and tell them my story. The amazing thing is that they listen!  No one else wants to or has time to hear me tell my story. I have the key to gain escape from my misery if I just use it.

One of the telltale signs that I am depressed is when I begin to isolate and withdraw from others.  When I find myself wanting not to be bothered by anybody, I just get myself to talk to another person, who like me, understands and can predict the painful path of depression.”

MEDITATION

Our powerlessness lies in  not being able to snap out of our depression. We know now that God as we understand God or our Higher Power is going to get  us through this period of our lives.  We are on no time table with God, but we know that his power is inside of us and we want to be conscious of this power in our lives now and everyday.” (See Step 1.)

SOURCE:  Copyright(c) Higher Thoughts for down days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of 12 Step fellowship groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.  For January 28. Pages 21-22.

NOTE WELL! If there is no Depressed Anonymous group in your community, please consider using the   HOME STUDY KIT. (VISIT THE STORE).

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Misery is an option

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I can make it as long as I know that my life is supposed to have some ups and downs.

“You might now be feeling better for the first time in your life as you continue to make a conscious effort to take responsibility for your sadness.”

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

One of the hopeful sights to see at a Twelve Step meeting is that the people who work their program and who are serious about leaving their depression behind,  start to not only look more content with themselves, their world and their future, but they also seem to be enjoying life once again.

Teresa told me that her Doctor never once said she was depressed after her physical exam and it wasn’t until she got involved in therapy with me did she learn that what she had been feeling for months before was depression. She was relived to  know that she wasn’t losing her mind but only that she was experiencing the excruciating sadness that we all create when we get depressed.

She will feel better when she learns that it’s her life and the way she chooses to interpret what happens to her is also her choice. Misery is an option and if she want to go for that she may, but if she wants to live with some unpredictability  in her life, then she needs to get ready for some bumps in the road –but also she needs to be prepared to smile, laugh and know that her life can be filled with hope.

MEDITATION

God, please give us the wisdom to know that you want us to enjoy this life while we are here. We want to enjoy it, so let us seek to want to be in your will. We can make it.

SOURCE:  Copyright (c) Higher thoughts for down days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of 12 Step fellowship groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. January 27. Pages 20-21.

Grief, Higher Thoughts for Down Days, Step 04, The 12 Steps

I Will Make A Moral And Fearless Inventory Of My Life

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AFFIRMATION 

I will make a moral and fearless inventory of my life and devote myself to the truth about myself so that I might be able to admit my powerlessness over my past so that I might love myself today.

“Accepting yourself can mean resolving the grief left over from earlier years. Say you have lost somebody – or even something – and you were not able to show your grief, perhaps not even to admit it to yourself. There is nothing brave or wise in denying grief, in pretending that that you feel no pain or anger or sorrow.”

 CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

So often I have heard of the various stages of grief. For me to begin to work my way out of grief, I must go through these various stages of grieving. There is no fast way to grieve and it is an essential part of letting go of that which I have lost. One of the initial stages of grief is the shock of the loss of a love object and the need I have to believe that it will reappear again soon.

I have to get in touch with those who left me years earlier in my life and I never knew how to grieve their passing or even that I needed to grieve. I have many years of blocked up energy in my body as in the form of unresolved grief, anger, sadness and a general unease about myself. Somehow all these feelings from the past are like seeds that are trying to bear good fruit.  If left to themselves and never able to yield their fruit they fester inside me and continually keep me agitated, depressed and afraid.

MEDITATION 

God, lead us with the pillar of fire at night and the cloud by day as we move into the Promised land where we with those who have surrendered their wills to you, continue to recover and live with the belief that you will not desert us. You are my food, the manna for my journey through these lean times.

SOURCES:  Copyright(c) Higher Thoughts for down days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of 12 Step groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 19.

Copyright(c)  Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition.(2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. (See Step 4).

Acceptance, DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Depressed Anonymous Workbook, Fellowship, Higher Power, Mindfulness, Miracle Thinking, Step 04, Step 05, The 12 Steps

The Miracle Of The Group

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“By our continual shutting ourselves up in the little world of our own mind, we gradually sink more and more into despair and feel that no one can understand how we think and feel. The biggest freedom that we can gain from confessing to someone else is that we no longer have to have it all together and be perfect.  We can begin to  admit  it when we are petty, selfish and self-centered. We can then admit that we want to have restored a sense of peace by getting free  from  all worry and fear from the past and by turning those over to the  Higher Power. We can then discover that forgiving ourselves and being forgiven by God are one in the same thing. The group will see to it that the more you admit your own fears about yourself and the future, the less terror the present will hold for you.”

“My dear friends, it is this spiritual experience, to feel that God is with you, and that this joy is the joy that will restore your youth and renew your spirit.  We no longer have to be the way we are -we can choose to feel and be different. Others are doing  it-so can you!”

“Depression feeds on hurt, pain and self-doubt. When we are depressed we have a need to bash ourselves for our misguided errors and sinfulness. The Fifth Step  if done genuinely and prayerfully, will in time help restore our sense of freedom and belief that we are truly forgiven.  It is in the miracle of the group and its acceptance, love and nurture that helps the depressed person feel secure without recourse to depression.”

THE DEPRESSED ANONYMOUS WORKBOOK, examining Step Five, asks the following question at 5.21:  List what action you will have to take if you want to respect yourself again? Remember, it’s our past need to tell ourselves how bad and unacceptable that we are that keeps us depressed. This is a “wrong” if there ever  was one.

HOME STUDY KIT

SOURCES:  Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition.(2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 64 (Book One of the Home Study Kit).

The Depressed Anonymous Workbook (2002). Depressed  Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 52. (Book Two of the Home Study Kit).

VISIT THE STORE   at this site for ordering online.

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“Sunspots” and the LAW OF THE THREES. .

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The following  article is one of the items which make up the Depressed Anonymous “toolkit.”

“Jim, as a member of our Depressed Anonymous Fellowship, learned that he needed more “SUNSPOTS” to bask himself in. These “SUNSPOTS” are meditation times where we can focus on all those pleasurable events, people, places or things that can make us feel happy.  The trouble with most of us when we are depressed is that our whole life seems  to go into a deep pit with  its eighty foot hole  and an eight foot ladder.

One good way to escape from this prison is to get with a group of people who by joining each other’s section of ladder, will all eventually get to the top and out of this deep dark hole that we call depression. Think upon these small  “SUNSPOTS” throughout the day and know that you are gradually coming into the light of a new day. Prepare a list of memories which at one time in your life were the cause of some joy and pleasure:  try to recreate that activity in your imagination as often as you can. At first, all you might be able to do is just make a mental decision to do it,  though at the time you don’t feel any particular pleasant emotion.  Keep at it and with the continued encouragement of the group, you will be able to recapture a little joy and peace. You will begin to have more mastery over your life  and the world: this in itself can lower your feelings of sadness. When you have a negative image or thought which produces an unpleasant feeling, replace it immediately with three positive and pleasant thoughts or mental images. In Depressed Anonymous we call this THE LAW OF THE THREES.” One negative thought is immediately replaced by three pleasant thoughts and or memories.

SOURCE: Copyright(c) Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.

COMMENT  At times we find that our thoughts become cyclical.  As we continue the rumination process we  complete the circle where we end up where we started. Many of us see this  compulsive thinking  behavior as a deciding activity affecting us physically and emotionally.  The unending worry, fear, gradually wears  us down, much  like the grit of the grinding wheel. So, when we STOP our negative thoughts we can  cut off the resulting emotional residue which follows and continues to numb and  immobilize   us.

Hugh

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Martin Luther King day: Lift every Voice and Sing!

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The Negro National Hymn, Lift every Voice and Sing was written in 1900 by  James Weldon Johnson and his brother to write a song  to celebrate the birthday of Abraham Lincoln.  James  wrote the words and J. Rosamond Johnson wrote the music. This song was taught to and sung by a chorus of five hundred Negro school children.

I think it appropriate to share this Hymn on the birthday of Martin Luther King, an American patriot and prophet, whose dream is still for all of us,  that  light on the mountain top.

“Lift every voice and sing,
Till earth and heaven ring,
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the listening skies,
Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.
Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us.
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun,
Let us march on till victory is won.

Stony the road we trod,
Bitter the chastening rod,
Felt in the days when hope unborn had died;
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,
Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we started at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.

God of  our weary years,
God of our silent tears,
Thou who hast brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who hast by Thy might
Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee,
Lest, our hearts drunk with the wine of the world, where we forget Thee,
Shadowed beneath Thy hand,
May we forever stand.
True to our God,
True to our native land.

Copyright(c) Poetry Foundation/Complete Poems(2000)

Hope is just a few steps away!