ODAT63

The big book talsk about being 100% honest, however some alcoholics hold anger, resentment, guilt for years in sobrierty, are they doom to relapse?

CarolD

As you are directing this thread about AA and it's BB....
I moved it to this Forum...so those who follow the program can easily see it...

scrambled2012

Sometimes there is a reason to be angry. That's not a reason to drink, or take out anger on folks not connected with it however.

UpperbucksAAguy

Clarence Snyder resented Bill Wilson and stayed sober

recoverywfaith

Probably not a good idea to have resentments.

DayTrader

For alcoholics like me....... ALCOHOL IS NOT MY PROBLEM. I'm perfectly capable of dying an alcoholic death without ever picking up another drink for the rest of my life. My problem is a malady of my spirit - a separation from God and from His kids here on earth. When I'm living in my disease, I'm miserable......whether or not I drink.

Now......if I were to plan on dying an alcoholic death what would I do?....... Well, I'd quit helping others, I'd think only of myself, I'd let all my selfishness go, I'd live to get even instead of forgive and I'd hold onto resentments until I could make "them" pay.

Maybe others "can" hold onto a resentment.....maybe their recovery is $hit though. I'll never know and I don't really care because I know how I feel when I intentionally stop living on a spiritual basis.......and it isn't something I enjoy.

TSDD

Way to climb the self esteem ladder using the backs of your fellow alcoholics! Why not use those steps the way they were intended and quit taking other people's inventory. That's the most conceited, snotty thing you could possibly say. Kudos to you!


OP. I can 100% guarantee you can stay sober in whatever state of mind you're in provided you don't take that first drink of alcohol. I can say from personal experience and from observing many men and women that a "resentment" is no excuse to go off drinking, and as far as honesty goes, from my experience the only thing I need to be completely honest about is what that first drink does to me and that by myself I have no defense against it.

Don't let any AA bully push you around and threaten your sobriety with the boogeyman of the day or try to belittle you like this previous comment is intended to do. If you make midnight tonight without taking a drink you're perfect IMO and have a great shot at sorting those other things out and having what's important to you in life.

Defend your sobriety and be proud of it, don't let anyone run you down for anything you do or don't do to get through today.

Tommyh

doomed to relaspe?
for some yes...for others no...
doomed to miss out on more happiness and peace...
yes

Sheryl85

When I came to this program I wanted to stop drinking and be happy about it. I didn't want to stop drinking and be miserable. I wanted contented sobriety. The only way to get that was to do the things necessary to remove those things that separated me from God and my fellow man.

Resentments are said to be the number one offender. I feel this to be true though my own experiences. So, if resentments are the number one offender for many alcoholics, that means even those resentments I felt were justified are destructive. I could get just as drunk behind a “justified” resentment as I could with a plain old resentment. Notice I said resentment and not anger. Anger is an emotion. It's not right, it's not wrong, it just is. What I do with that anger is what can get me into trouble. If I hold on to it and not look for a solution or a constructive outlet for that anger, it can turn into a resentment. So, I try to get through the anger thing pretty fast.

I had to work hard to be rid of resentments because they were dragging me down. What I had to do was learn how to separate the act from the actor. I had to learn how to hate the act and not the person involved. And I'll admit to you that it wasn't always easy. It takes time and action and the way I implemented it is through the Steps. (And usually, prayer is the action I have to use.) Once again, I needed to do whatever it took to remove those things that separated me from my HP and my fellow man.

May I suggest that you talk to those people in the Program that you notice have that contented sobriety? Ask them how they handle resentments. Or suggest it as a topic at a discussion meeting and see what folks say.

I guess the best answer I can share with you regarding your question is, “Sure you could probably stay sober...but do you want to just be sober or do you want to have contented sobriety?[/SIZE]

tomsteve

i can say when i held onto( or hold onto) resentments, so far, i havent drank. but i sure couldnt comprehend serenity and didnt have any peace.

TSDD

At the end of my drinking if you told me I could stop drinking and be happy I'd tell you to make up your mind.

I came to AA with utmost certainty that I would be doomed to a life of misery if I could no longer drink and that as far as I was concerned you could take the words "happy", "celebrate", and "content" right out of the dictionary. Personally I was fully prepared to be miserable as long as I could find my way out of the bottle and make all the sickness and drunken trouble stop... as bleak as life without liquor appeared it seemed preferable to the way things were going..... really truth be told I had little expectations that a guy like me (terminally unique) could even stay stopped, much less ever feel "normal".

I'm happy to report I was dead wrong about all that, but it took me some time to get a proper perspective on things.

DayTrader

Thanks...... hang around a bit and you get my sense of humor......and perhaps come to not use the sword of judgement that you claim I used.

scrambled2012

Don't let... AA bully...you... with the boogeyman of the day or try to belittle you like this previous comment is intended to do.

Oh I never would. I'm a cult recruiters nightmare, tried tested and true (not calling AA a cult folks, just speaking about how much I love "collectives" of all kinds). That said, I don't think this was DTraders intention, honestly.

If you make midnight tonight without taking a drink you're perfect IMO and have a great shot at sorting those other things out and having what's important to you in life.

Absolutly. I agree. I make a lot more progress on everything since being sober then when I was drinking every day.

Defend your sobriety and be proud of it.

Always buddy, always.

Gottalife

The book does talk about "rigorous honesty" being essential in this way of life. Those words had a profound effect on me when I first came in. But later, when we get to step 4, we list dishonesty, resentment, fear, selfishness and self seeking as major character defects.
Later again we become willing to have God remove these defects and still later, we humbly ask Him to remove our short comings. Note that the removal of character defects is something that God does for us, not something we can do for ourselves. We become willing, and we pray he will remove them, but the speed of the process is in Gods hands, not ours. AA isn't a self improvement program after all.

When I see someone who "should know better" struggling with a resentment, perhaps he wants it that way (a character defect he is not yet willing to give up), or maybe God is not ready to remove it just yet, maybe there is a lesson to be learned. Either way it's between him and God.

So for me, God first removed the obsession, then over time removed or reduced my character defects to the point where I can be sober and happy. I am not entirely fixed, but I have improved, and I keep asking for Him to keep working on me. I'm a work in progress, but none of the work is mine. God has been doing for me what I could not do for my self.

SOBERINNEPA

Just because I'm alcoholic does not mean I exempt myself from any of the range of human emotions. Emotions happen.

And sometimes anger or fear is an absolutely rational response to a given stimulus or situation. If I think there's a strange man rummaging around in my house, late at night, I SHOULD be both angry and afraid. I can't control that.

What I can control is the obsessive thought spiral that lots of people characterize as "alcoholic thinking". In my personal lexicon, "resentment" is characterized by that obsessive thought pattern. It's terribly easy, and kind of enticing, to take a perceived slight or insult and, with careful feeding and watering, grow it into a major offense.

Drunk or sober, I've come to realize that I don't need that kind of baggage.

DayTrader

Whether and how YOU work the program should be your chief and only concern. Taking all opinions off the table, as they obviously can be misleading and contradict out AA program..... let's take a quick glance at the Big Book to see what it says about resentments. Given that this is a 12-Step Support thread, it makes sense to see if we have a step that talks about handling resentments:

p64
Resentment is the “number one’’ offender. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. From it stem all forms of spiritual disease, for we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick. When the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically.

p66
It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worth while. But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal. For when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. And with us, to drink is to die. If we were to live, we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the brainstorm were not for us. They may be the dubious luxury of normal men, but for alcoholics these things are poison.

That's crystal clear. We're obviously free to choose to believe it or not.

Boleo

My first year as a long-haul truck driver taught me lot about holding and letting go of resentments. There were many days where I wanted to commit suicide and homicide
(not necessarily in that order).

The thing I learned was I could hold on to a resentment for a few days but around day 3, it started to make me feel physically and mentally sick. I never let it go much past 3 days to find out what would happen if I just let it get out of control.

BadCompany

I tried that method. It also involved many trips to the mental wards. I don't recomend it myself.

Music

Never seen "100% honest" in the Big Book. I have read "rigorous" honestly and honest with myself. I've always thought that if I was going to be as miserable in sobriety as I was while drinking, what's the point? I might as well drink and really be miserable. There's no guarantee that I won't have resentments while sober but at least I have a plan to deal with them. As far as keeping resentments....it's like me drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.

TSDD

You have my appologies if I misconstrued your intent. Statements like that are a hot button for me. I have a zero tolerance policy for bullying

I wonder did you straighten out that stuff drunk so that you could get sober or did you stay sober and work on straightening that stuff out over time?

For me, AA is like a raincoat. It wouldn't be much good if it only worked on the sunny days when I was tiptoeing through the daisies hand in hand with my HP.