What is the Voice of Your Truth? What is mine? Can we make it?
My voice tell me to stay sober. What does your say? Two voices sober are better then one.
There's a school of thought in psychotherapy and psychiatry that looks at how our minds develop and function as an inner family of voices, rather than a single entity. It's pretty uncontentious that we have an Unconscious, and that our attention is a thin beam of light focusing on a very limited set of things at any one time...everything else is out of consciousness and some things stay out of our consciousness a very, very long time.
One view of addiction is that we've repressed a lot of stuff for a long time, much of it healthy but which our innocent young selves THOUGHT was unacceptable in our childhood and upbringing to very powerful figures in our lives....the "thought" is important, because it's not the case that we have to have been TOLD to be quiet or whatever, or ABUSED......what matters is whether we, as innocent children, THOUGHT parts of us were unacceptable, or FOUND something in our life strange and frightening and intepreted it in a way that made us NEED to push it from our minds and memories. The feelings of "wrongness" that many addicts speak about, of being different or "not enough" or "bad" is one thing that can result from this very early experience.....
When the time is right, when the various pressures and motivations and desires are in place, including the desire of these repressed parts of us to be heard, they break through in our behaviour....for some people the behavours break through WITHOUT any genuine awareness of what is driving them.....there are a number of powerful moments in my recent life when this happened - one ending in violence and another in driving at 90 miles an hour across our city. Not pretty.
BUT the good news is that this only happens when these parts of us break through while we're continuing to try to repress them. If we learn to really LISTEN to our inner voices we can hear those that want us safe, well and happy, rather than just the whispering of one that might want us addicted and dead.
From this perspective, Step 1 is an acknowledgement to our repressed inner selves that our CONSCIOUS mind is powerless. Step 2 acknowledges that there is a power greater than our CONSCIOUS mind that can restore us to sanity. Step 3 is a declaration to our Unconscious that our CONSCIOUS mind is willing to give up its belief that IT runs us, that IT is who we are, and accepts the role of our Unconscious in running our lives. This is a stupidity that our emphasis on intellect and thought has inflicted on us these past 400 years. We are so much more than our tiny conscious mind, which scientific research has shown doesn't decide ANYTHING.....it's all already decided in our unconscious. Once these psychological safety mechanisms are in place, Step 4 begins to bring us into contact with repressed material. Safety is important because this part of the healing process gets to the ROOT of what is ailing us. Step 5. explicitly brings this material into the open and gives our conscious mind the opportunity to explore it and accept it.Step 6 is a declaration that our conscious mind is willing to change. Step 7 enlists our Unconscious in the task of addressing the issues we've uncovered and making the necessary changes. Step 8. ensures we cover all the bases necessary to relieve the guilt we have repressed...and it's the guilt that has fed those parts in our unconscious that are angry with us for repressing them and not expressing them...our self-hatred...sometimes arising from our own life choices and sometimes from the stuff we introjected as young children about never being right or good enough or whatever. That's why WE'RE on that list.....Step 9 begins to do what we need to do - ACTIONS speak louder than words, and confirms to the wounded inner selves that we MEAN what we say and they are loved and accepted, restoring OUR REAL SELF to health and putting it back in the driving seat of our lives, where we really belong..... Step 10 keeps us healthy, Step 11 keeps us in touch with our genuine emotions, fears, hopes and dreams, allowing us to explore emotions in full consciousness without repressing them or turning to drink and drugs to "get rid of them" - which never happened, of course....they just got repressed into our unconscious and festered...feeding our problems.... Step 12...well I guess this is Step 12.
I didn't use the word "God" in that description of how we can make our Voice of Truth.....it isn't necessary......just as He isn't necessary for someone to get sober or live a good life.......but if you have Faith, of course, you will see Him in there and everywhere.
You haven't lost your Voice.....it's in there, keeping you alive and hoping to be heard....make space in your life and, with the right help and support, just listen.
Good luck!
Martin
One view of addiction is that we've repressed a lot of stuff for a long time, much of it healthy but which our innocent young selves THOUGHT was unacceptable in our childhood and upbringing to very powerful figures in our lives....the "thought" is important, because it's not the case that we have to have been TOLD to be quiet or whatever, or ABUSED......what matters is whether we, as innocent children, THOUGHT parts of us were unacceptable, or FOUND something in our life strange and frightening and intepreted it in a way that made us NEED to push it from our minds and memories. The feelings of "wrongness" that many addicts speak about, of being different or "not enough" or "bad" is one thing that can result from this very early experience.....
When the time is right, when the various pressures and motivations and desires are in place, including the desire of these repressed parts of us to be heard, they break through in our behaviour....for some people the behavours break through WITHOUT any genuine awareness of what is driving them.....there are a number of powerful moments in my recent life when this happened - one ending in violence and another in driving at 90 miles an hour across our city. Not pretty.
BUT the good news is that this only happens when these parts of us break through while we're continuing to try to repress them. If we learn to really LISTEN to our inner voices we can hear those that want us safe, well and happy, rather than just the whispering of one that might want us addicted and dead.
From this perspective, Step 1 is an acknowledgement to our repressed inner selves that our CONSCIOUS mind is powerless. Step 2 acknowledges that there is a power greater than our CONSCIOUS mind that can restore us to sanity. Step 3 is a declaration to our Unconscious that our CONSCIOUS mind is willing to give up its belief that IT runs us, that IT is who we are, and accepts the role of our Unconscious in running our lives. This is a stupidity that our emphasis on intellect and thought has inflicted on us these past 400 years. We are so much more than our tiny conscious mind, which scientific research has shown doesn't decide ANYTHING.....it's all already decided in our unconscious. Once these psychological safety mechanisms are in place, Step 4 begins to bring us into contact with repressed material. Safety is important because this part of the healing process gets to the ROOT of what is ailing us. Step 5. explicitly brings this material into the open and gives our conscious mind the opportunity to explore it and accept it.Step 6 is a declaration that our conscious mind is willing to change. Step 7 enlists our Unconscious in the task of addressing the issues we've uncovered and making the necessary changes. Step 8. ensures we cover all the bases necessary to relieve the guilt we have repressed...and it's the guilt that has fed those parts in our unconscious that are angry with us for repressing them and not expressing them...our self-hatred...sometimes arising from our own life choices and sometimes from the stuff we introjected as young children about never being right or good enough or whatever. That's why WE'RE on that list.....Step 9 begins to do what we need to do - ACTIONS speak louder than words, and confirms to the wounded inner selves that we MEAN what we say and they are loved and accepted, restoring OUR REAL SELF to health and putting it back in the driving seat of our lives, where we really belong..... Step 10 keeps us healthy, Step 11 keeps us in touch with our genuine emotions, fears, hopes and dreams, allowing us to explore emotions in full consciousness without repressing them or turning to drink and drugs to "get rid of them" - which never happened, of course....they just got repressed into our unconscious and festered...feeding our problems.... Step 12...well I guess this is Step 12.
I didn't use the word "God" in that description of how we can make our Voice of Truth.....it isn't necessary......just as He isn't necessary for someone to get sober or live a good life.......but if you have Faith, of course, you will see Him in there and everywhere.
You haven't lost your Voice.....it's in there, keeping you alive and hoping to be heard....make space in your life and, with the right help and support, just listen.
Good luck!
Martin
