One popular saying is that, "An alcoholic is an egomaniac with an inferiority complex." It seems that something has struck a cord as a way to explain something many of us had been struggling to put into words. Another I have read here recently seems to get at the same thing, that, "An alcoholic is the piece of shit the world revolves around."
My head would tell me I was better than other people, although it didn't have much evidence of that which I would buy now, and my gut would tell me I was worthless, somehow lacking the skills for coping with everyday life that almost everyone else seemed to have been blessed with. Even when the feeling in my gut was dominant, I thought that, because I was worthless and couldn't cope, that entitled me to special treatment. I found, over time, that the gulf between what my head and gut thought I was worth tended to narrow. I became more content to see myself as pretty average in most respects, and pretty weird, but not really special, in others. Average is actually pretty comfortable now. As an AA friend says, "Second fiddle is a noble instrument." In my job, I just figured that I was probably a bit better than average and that was quite OK, a far cry from the time when, if I couldn't be the best, I would rather be the worst than average. I had to agree when someone proposed, "Dare to be average!" as a slogan. I got back into lawn bowling since moving back to Australia after 20 years in Japan and have found that I am one of the worst bowlers in the club. I still enjoy it but sometimes think that being a bit more average would be quite nice. When I got sober, I kept evaluating my own work as a teacher and thought the principal spent much of his time doing the same, although he had about 600 others to be concerned with. When things went badly, I thought he knew about it instantly. But in those rare times when I didn't think I was about the worst teacher in the school, I thought I was the best because I just could not see myself a average. When anything came along that inconvenienced me, I thought it was done for that purpose. When in a hurry on one of my less spritual days, I can still suspect that the traffic lights are plotting against me. The gut feeling of worthlessness also eased. In sobriety, even when about all I could believe was that saying the Serenity Prayer a lot helped me cope, I saw that I could function all right, even while sober. Even if it was a Power Greater than Myself that was guiding, protecting and using me, I was being of use and could not feel useless. Just being able to stay sober and reasonably sane most of the time gave me a bit of self esteem. I have come to see that I am sanest and most comfortable in my own skin when I can stay somewhere in the neighborhood of humility, as one of over 6 billion people on this earth but the only one I really have any influence over. I can do that by being as honest with myself and others as I can. I still battle with my own self-deception, but tend to believe that the good guy is winning, whoever that is. When I drifted out of humilty's neighborhood, it was as often into self-pity in one direction as it was into false pride on the other. Actually pride tended to be resolved more quickly and easily than self-pity, because, when my ego was inflated, it seemed like a prick would usually come along. After one major pop, when I was in charge of an important public meeting and had forgotten to pick up the key to the hall, I turned on the TV a couple days later and heard someone on a religious program say, "If you pray for patience, God may give you a cranky neighbor, and, if you pray for humility, you may be humilitated." I was. When I was still fairly new, I would come back to my flat from a meeting ,most nights and read a bit of AA literature to increase my chances of getting a reasonable nights sleep. I recall several times reading the part of Chapter 5 just after what is usually read at meetings, about the actorwho is trying to run the whole play. The problem was that I thought that, as a high school teacher, I was more like a producer or director as perhaps ,the most important part of my job was trying to control classes of 40 boys, even though trying to do so seemed to be driving me nuts. I really only solved that by moving to Japan where I could just try to entertain and keep everything in English. I could easily identify with someone who said that, "An alcoholic is someone who wants to be the center of attention but can't stand being in the spotlight." I have heard that women get their feeling of mission and value in life from their family role and men get it from their work. As a retired loner, I don't have either, but I still feel I am doing my bit by trying to do the right things, being self-supporting and just putting more into this world than I am taking out. My role in AA is a big part of this, partly as it is a sort of family, preferable to the other kind in my book. I rather like the idea of being nobody special now. It seems that most people dream of power, wealth and fame. Those who find power and wealth are seldom satisfied with what they find. There is an Asian saying that, The higher the monkey climbs the tree, the more he exposes his backside, and having more than I need or could really use would just complicate things. Steve Irwin, the croc hunter, said that he found fame to be just the downside of doing what he does really well. I prefer to float along in the stream of life, unique like everyone else, but not special. The center of the universe was too crowded. Handling what is in front of me right now out here on the edge is a lot easier and enjoyable. |