Whenever you find yourself feeling irritable discontent bored with your life or depressed it is likely that you may have skipped meditation or prayer. In these situations, I feel further from God than normal and then I wonder who moved me or God and the answer is always me. It is strange paradox, the more you focus on helping others, the more you discover how much you matter. “As we understood him” — which means when I speak about God, I am really referring to my own experience, which is all I know — it has been revealed to me individually. If you have not had sex, you might understand it intellectually, you may have even watched a movie about it, but the personal experience in unknown–it is alien. But once you have had sex, you now have recognizable benchmarks to identify the experience.
Finally, someone explained to me that those things are not the insanity that the Big Book talks about; nor are those things why the alcoholic’s life becomes unmanageable. By using this approach, a recovering addict can experience a notable change in their outlook. Following this program will cause them to feel less Learn What Spiritual Malady Is And The Role It Plays In Your Recovery alone or closed off from the messages of life, thus relieving them from the burden of isolation. Addicts and alcoholics may rid themselves of their drug or alcohol dependency by completing the Twelve Step process. This will allow them to undergo the required shift in thought that will free them from their addiction.
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If you’re struggling with the concept of God, try to find a sponsor who shares your views. That way, they’ll be able to relate to your experience and offer advice from a place of understanding. Self-reliance can also be dangerous because it can lead to pride. It leads to judgment, isolation, and a feeling of superiority.
If you’re struggling to find a Higher Power in AA, know that you’re not alone. There are many people who have been in your shoes and have found creative ways to work around this issue. Remember to keep an open mind and heart, and eventually, you will find something (or someone) who can serve as your own personal higher power. Finally, self-reliance can be dangerous because it can lead to complacency.
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This resistance to anything spiritual is the biggest obstacle some addicts confront. To beat their addiction, people must face the reality that there is indeed a power larger than themselves. Therefore, they must make an effort to establish a rapport with this higher power.
To conclude, it’s not my body — my allergic reaction to alcohol — that’s going to take me back to drinking. It’s really not my mind — the mental obsession — that is the underlying root of what will take me back to drinking. It’s the “spiritual malady”, as manifested by my EGO (selfishness-self-centeredness), that can eventually lead me back to drinking or sometimes even suicide. It simply means we are spiritually blocked off from the Power of God, which enables us to remain sober, happy, joyous, and free.
Filling the Hole: Fixing the Spiritual Malady
In AA, one of the main goals is to become sober and stay sober. To do this, members must rely on their support system which includes other members, sponsors, and meetings. When people become too self-reliant, they often start to think that they don’t need AA anymore. They may start to skip meetings, distance themselves from their support system, and eventually relapse.
- None of these things are conducive to a healthy recovery.
- It is the emptiness we feel on such a deep level that we turn to self-medication in order to alleviate the sadness and despair that go hand in hand with.
- People in the rooms refer to this as a ‘god-sized hole’.
- For a while, that seemed to work for us but once we stopped using substances the discontentedness came back to the surface in sobriety.
Addiction is a spiritual disease because it represents an individual’s attempt to disconnect from reality and any sense of spirituality. Simply put, they feel a terrible loneliness at their very soul or center of being. However, this does not mean, necessarily, they’ve abandoned their faith.
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Even if you don’t believe in God right now, it’s important to keep an open mind. Things may change over time, and you never know when or how your beliefs might evolve. The important thing is that you stay committed to your sobriety and continue working the program – eventually, everything else will fall into place. In sobriety, it is so important to maintain conscious contact with a higher power and count our blessings. Being spiritually maladapted can come from a lack of gratitude.
You should also try to find other people in AA who share your beliefs and struggles; they can provide support and fellowship as well as offer helpful advice. Just remember, even if you don’t share the same beliefs, everyone in AA are https://en.forexdata.info/mash-certification/ united by their shared experience with addiction and their desire to stay sober. If we do not get spiritually connected with meditation or prayer with a power greater than us it will bring us closer and closer to that drink or drug.
