I got really good at escaping.
Sometimes it was alcohol.
Other times it looked a lot more respectable. Staying busy. Performing well. Holding everything together on the outside while something inside quietly asked for air.
Prefer to watch instead? The video link is posted below.
For a long time, that was how I lived.
You can see how those old patterns slowly stopped working in an earlier reflection, When the Old Way Stops Working.
Recovery began teaching me something simple, but not easy.
Instead of running from discomfort, I began learning how to sit with it. Instead of escaping difficult emotions, I started paying attention to them. Instead of trying to control how everything would turn out, I began practicing presence with what was actually here.
Because the truth is, shit happens.
Life gets messy. Things go sideways. Feelings come up. Things do not go the way we want.
And I am learning that I do not always have to do something to escape that. I do not have to numb it. I do not have to perform through it. I do not have to pretend it is not there.
I can stay.
Staying does not mean life suddenly gets easy. It simply means learning not to run from my own life.
Most of that work is quiet.
It looks like paying attention.
Telling the truth.
Beginning again when I drift.
Showing up for the life that is actually here.
Over the last year, these weekly reflections have been my way of thinking out loud about life, recovery, and presence. They began as private notes and slowly became something I shared here each week.
This week, something that grew out of those reflections will finally enter the world.
I am grateful to everyone who has walked this path with me.
