Diary of a Mad Cow, Part X: "The Adventures of Sober Cow"
p***enger
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: NYC
Posts: 19,047
Originally Posted by Cow 
However, they suspect they may yet have inner resources from which they can draw to aid that recovery, even if they're not completely sure what those inner resources may be.
That isn't something that bothers me now. I'm one of those that have had to admit complete defeat. And admit it over and over again. But tricking your mind into accepting deals that will help you make it through the days sober -- I'm a supporter of pretty much whatever works.
Have a good meeting, Cow!
Marchia in Aeternum
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: Georgia
Posts: 11,094
Dear Cow, "Power" is a strange thing. Some consider it something to wield over others. Some consider it strength. I don't think it's an emotion. It evokes emotion, and exercising it certainly causes emotion.
To me, "power" is standing up when beaten down. It's personal. It's asking life, "Is that all you got?" Power doesn't apply to other people, for me. It's between me and the world. I may get slapped around and beaten down, by my own choices or happenstance, yet I can stand up and live on. That's power.
To me, "power" is standing up when beaten down. It's personal. It's asking life, "Is that all you got?" Power doesn't apply to other people, for me. It's between me and the world. I may get slapped around and beaten down, by my own choices or happenstance, yet I can stand up and live on. That's power.
*Ex Missus
Join Date: Aug 2013
Posts: 410
Power is basically energy. When we are defeated by our addictions and feeling low. We have low energy and sure - feel powerless to fight back. Our feelings aren't us. So I don't think it makes US powerless, we just FEEL powerless. Afterall, we are still able to summon and command enough energy to execute our little deceitful schemes to obtain our fix. I like your tricksy thinking Cow. If you can summon energy. Then you can feel empowered. Then you will have the power to direct your life how you choose.
p***enger
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: NYC
Posts: 19,047
I'm powerless over time, over the effects of drug and alcohol abuse on my body and mind, over my genes, over the aging process. It's not a matter of feeling -- it's a matter of fact.
When I ingest a chemical, I can't un-ingest it. For me, one of the sick thrills of using was surrender to the inevitable -- knowing that even if I immediately regretted taking in the substance, now I was in for the ride.
When I ingest a chemical, I can't un-ingest it. For me, one of the sick thrills of using was surrender to the inevitable -- knowing that even if I immediately regretted taking in the substance, now I was in for the ride.
Member
Join Date: Jun 2014
Posts: 2,775
My war with alcohol is over and I lost. Am I powerless over it? Guess that would depend on how you define powerlessness. All said and done I just avoid that first drink. I keep things simple and don't get to wrapped up in what others think. Cow seems to be doing well and however she comes to grip with sobriety is good.
Last summer there was a member who refused to believe he was powerless over booze but could wrap his head around the concept he was powerless about what happens after taking that first drink. Fine. It's all good.
Last summer there was a member who refused to believe he was powerless over booze but could wrap his head around the concept he was powerless about what happens after taking that first drink. Fine. It's all good.
Member
Join Date: May 2012
Location: canada
Posts: 7,242
Cow,
i never "liked" the AA notion (notion???) that i'm powerless over alcohol either..
no, didn't like it one bit, thought it was crazy and untrue. certainly for me. i just needed to focus on power and focus my intellect on the task of commanding power better.
sigh.
(most of us thought that. it's all over these boards.)
i did experiment after experiment, ever more desperately focussing my intellect on the task of commanding power better.
it didn't work.
maybe you are different.
of course you are; anhedonia and all that.
but you're NOT different in believing you'll do this through more power, or in that you don't believe yourself to be powerless over alcohol.
the "inner resource" comes straight from the BB appendix:
" With few exceptions our members find that they have tapped an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves.
Most of us think this awareness of a Power greater than ourselves the essence of spiritual experience. Our more religious members call it "God-consciousness."
and still speaks to a power greater than ourselves, i.e. can be within us but is not me, or you, or us.
and i don't think this is so for only atheists, agnostics or freethinkers (what are those who aren't freethinkers?? enslavedthinkers?). you could be a theist, deist, pantheist, whatever, and still your understanding of a power greater than you can be an unsuspected inner resource.
and yes, i found the mention of "unsuspected inner resource" giving me tons of room.
i'll try and be quiet now.
i never "liked" the AA notion (notion???) that i'm powerless over alcohol either..
no, didn't like it one bit, thought it was crazy and untrue. certainly for me. i just needed to focus on power and focus my intellect on the task of commanding power better.
sigh.
(most of us thought that. it's all over these boards.)
i did experiment after experiment, ever more desperately focussing my intellect on the task of commanding power better.
it didn't work.
maybe you are different.
of course you are; anhedonia and all that.
but you're NOT different in believing you'll do this through more power, or in that you don't believe yourself to be powerless over alcohol.
the "inner resource" comes straight from the BB appendix:
" With few exceptions our members find that they have tapped an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves.
Most of us think this awareness of a Power greater than ourselves the essence of spiritual experience. Our more religious members call it "God-consciousness."
and still speaks to a power greater than ourselves, i.e. can be within us but is not me, or you, or us.
and i don't think this is so for only atheists, agnostics or freethinkers (what are those who aren't freethinkers?? enslavedthinkers?). you could be a theist, deist, pantheist, whatever, and still your understanding of a power greater than you can be an unsuspected inner resource.
and yes, i found the mention of "unsuspected inner resource" giving me tons of room.
i'll try and be quiet now.
voices ca**y
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: St. Paul Minnesota
Posts: 4,360
I would have trouble with saying I was powerless over it too Cow. Against it I know I can't win and that is why I don't even try. Just walk away because you got no shot of controlling this. I will say that when I quit it felt like divine intervention and it seemed like there was something leading me out. I have changed my mind on what it is many times. I know believe it to be a supercool Silentrun but at first I really did believe it to be supernatural. If that is what they are talking about then I didn't identify it as such at first.
Woe is Moo.
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2013
Posts: 2,746
Oh hello, little Kittycat! You keepa go! And welcome little Ninjadog.
fini gonna try and be quiet! Nooooo! Just promises me you never ever stop sighing every time I says something.
Obvious everybody define "power" on their own terms, so I agrees with everybody! Now I just gonna be over here try to amass more power ... ...and then I will smote mine enemies and assimilate those which may be advantageous to me.
fini gonna try and be quiet! Nooooo! Just promises me you never ever stop sighing every time I says something.
Obvious everybody define "power" on their own terms, so I agrees with everybody! Now I just gonna be over here try to amass more power ... ...and then I will smote mine enemies and assimilate those which may be advantageous to me.
Member
Join Date: May 2012
Location: canada
Posts: 7,242
i sigh a lot, Cow.
my sighs are nuanced, depending on scenarios.
truly, in real life i sigh a lot, but mostly think it's just about taking a deep breath.
breaking silence already!
thought more last night about my own struggles with "powerless". just sharing now:
when i got sober, my thinking really was in the "'muster more intellect to command more power to engage more stick-to-it-ness!" even though it hadn't worked that way for me in the gazillion tries before. it was the only lens i had to see it through. even though my own experience didn't fit through the filter.
the whole idea i had of AA and powerlessness was an offensive and obnoxious blur; for basically stupid weak people who needed religion to get through the day. (just telling what i really thought. pretty awful. sigh)
after a year or two sober, i "allowed" the percolating stuff of the disconnect between my own experience and my belief-system about it to come to the forefront. i thought of it in terms of choice. eventually labelled it "the choice-thing". it took me months of conversation on my LifeRing forum. the gist: if i had choice, why would i have kept choosing to go back to drinking when i had chosen not to? and of course i made a choice, except...it never presented as "choice" in the way i understood that in other areas of my life.
if i were truly freely choosing repeated returns to this misery, i must be insane.
i wrestled with this for months. felt like a battle between my own experience and my intellect. i needed to "get it" on an intellectual level. i needed to make sense of something that didn't. because my experience was true.
i did this from a distance, and you're in a much more immediate spot.
the reason i'm writing all this, sigh, is that i finally got it: my choice was impaired. by addiction/alcoholism. i had choice, but couldn't access the power or control to use it the way i had decided to even just that morning. and having choice but being impaired in the access is NOT having it.
i didn't realize til much much later that the entire choice-thing is about powerlessness. it finally clicked.
i had lost the power of choice.
the sigh about that is solely one of relief.
my sighs are nuanced, depending on scenarios.
truly, in real life i sigh a lot, but mostly think it's just about taking a deep breath.
breaking silence already!
thought more last night about my own struggles with "powerless". just sharing now:
when i got sober, my thinking really was in the "'muster more intellect to command more power to engage more stick-to-it-ness!" even though it hadn't worked that way for me in the gazillion tries before. it was the only lens i had to see it through. even though my own experience didn't fit through the filter.
the whole idea i had of AA and powerlessness was an offensive and obnoxious blur; for basically stupid weak people who needed religion to get through the day. (just telling what i really thought. pretty awful. sigh)
after a year or two sober, i "allowed" the percolating stuff of the disconnect between my own experience and my belief-system about it to come to the forefront. i thought of it in terms of choice. eventually labelled it "the choice-thing". it took me months of conversation on my LifeRing forum. the gist: if i had choice, why would i have kept choosing to go back to drinking when i had chosen not to? and of course i made a choice, except...it never presented as "choice" in the way i understood that in other areas of my life.
if i were truly freely choosing repeated returns to this misery, i must be insane.
i wrestled with this for months. felt like a battle between my own experience and my intellect. i needed to "get it" on an intellectual level. i needed to make sense of something that didn't. because my experience was true.
i did this from a distance, and you're in a much more immediate spot.
the reason i'm writing all this, sigh, is that i finally got it: my choice was impaired. by addiction/alcoholism. i had choice, but couldn't access the power or control to use it the way i had decided to even just that morning. and having choice but being impaired in the access is NOT having it.
i didn't realize til much much later that the entire choice-thing is about powerlessness. it finally clicked.
i had lost the power of choice.
the sigh about that is solely one of relief.
Guest
Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: The Deep South
Posts: 14,636
Originally Posted by fini
i had lost the power of choice.
You lost the power of choice for moderate, normal drinking.
That's how I see it anyway.
I don't think much about power, for what it's worth. It must be an instinctual thing in my world. I might sense power. But I don't find myself consciously thinking about it at all. I feel pinched in some areas, so maybe there's a lack of power there? I feel wide open in other areas, more power? I dunno. I must see power as possibility instead. Limited or limitless possibilities.
Woe is Moo.
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2013
Posts: 2,746
Borg Cow awake and ready to assimilate many hour of Australian Open tennis today.
Meeting last night was okay, excepting one woman go ON and ON about her story, after we was told to keep short so everybody can talk, and plus also, we already had speaker who tell his story. But this lady would no shuts up. Was obvious everybody getting frustrated and was glaring patiently at her cuz she taking up their time to talk. (Is it sign of my sociopathy that these type of situation delight me?)
Anyway, talk to couple cool people after. Explain my anhedonia/stimulant/booze cycle to them. I gonna has to come up with better way to explain anhedonia, cuz I realizing is very hard for lot of people to fathom.
And how is you all today?
fini, I understand my decision making organ is not only manipulated by addiciton, it also physical damage and altered, and the anhedonia make it so one choice not that different to me than other choice. Cuz is nothing driving choices but my intellect. Like I was tell them last night, nobody story "inspire" me, or give me "hope", or makes me feel I "belong" and I can do it too. I just there because I try find way to strengthen my power to make better choices even if I not feel motivated by anything to do so. Everybody say you not can "think" you self sober, but, you know, it kind of ALL I GOT.
Meeting last night was okay, excepting one woman go ON and ON about her story, after we was told to keep short so everybody can talk, and plus also, we already had speaker who tell his story. But this lady would no shuts up. Was obvious everybody getting frustrated and was glaring patiently at her cuz she taking up their time to talk. (Is it sign of my sociopathy that these type of situation delight me?)
Anyway, talk to couple cool people after. Explain my anhedonia/stimulant/booze cycle to them. I gonna has to come up with better way to explain anhedonia, cuz I realizing is very hard for lot of people to fathom.
And how is you all today?
fini, I understand my decision making organ is not only manipulated by addiciton, it also physical damage and altered, and the anhedonia make it so one choice not that different to me than other choice. Cuz is nothing driving choices but my intellect. Like I was tell them last night, nobody story "inspire" me, or give me "hope", or makes me feel I "belong" and I can do it too. I just there because I try find way to strengthen my power to make better choices even if I not feel motivated by anything to do so. Everybody say you not can "think" you self sober, but, you know, it kind of ALL I GOT.
Guest
Join Date: Jun 2011
Location: The Deep South
Posts: 14,636
Originally Posted by Cow
Meeting last night was okay, excepting one woman go ON and ON about her story, after we was told to keep short so everybody can talk, and plus also, we already had speaker who tell his story. But this lady would no shuts up. Was obvious everybody getting frustrated and was glaring patiently at her cuz she taking up their time to talk. (Is it sign of my sociopathy that these type of situation delight me?
She would make my blood boil. So I had to leave. To protect myself, lol. And others
She insulted me openly once and I let her have it. She fled the room in tears. But that didn't stop her. She was right back at her snarky, insults the next time I saw her. So it was either get up and leave her presence or put up with her BS. The counselor didn't do much to stop her.You seem to handle that situation much better than me, Cow
Woe is Moo.
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2013
Posts: 2,746
Really? So, my delight in this sad woman being oblivious but sincere yappy jackass while whole room suffer through it, is handle it better? Sweet!!!
PS. ^I has to admit, AA catfight would has delighted me. My monies is on SJ! For the take down! TKO!
PS. ^I has to admit, AA catfight would has delighted me. My monies is on SJ! For the take down! TKO!
Member
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Washington, MO
Posts: 2,306
Hey Cow! I just had a colonoscopy on fri and got the stomach flu at 2:30 am last night. I got the trash out, daughter fed and puppy is ongoing. Having like 10 calories in 60 hrs has me weak but has had no effect on the whole I-don't-drink thing. Apples and oranges.
Self recovered Self discovered
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: Toronto Canada
Posts: 5,148
Everybody say you not can "think" you self sober, but, you know, it kind of ALL I GOT.
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