It seems to me that perfect mental health would be about as rare as perfect physical health, and being perfectly sane is something I'm not sure I even want as it sounds a bit dull. I recall someone saying that she used to suffer from insanity but now rather enjoys it. I think of sanity as the ability to adjust to reality, and see our Steps, Traditions, slogans, and Serenity Prayer as aids in being able to do that. I think I can now adjust to reality pretty well, but know that, for me,it is not something I can take for granted as it is something that has to be maintained continuously over time. If I don't, my perception of reality as well as reality itself will slowly become the hideous mess I once needed to drink to try to escape from. In one of the meetings I go to, the part of How it Works that we read at meetings has an error in it that we has to correct on the paper. At the end, instead of saying that no human power could RELIEVE our alcoholism, it says REMOVE. If my alcoholism had been removed, I wouldn't need to do much now that I haven't had a drink for over 34 years as the problem would have been solved. Relief is something that comes a day at a time, and it is not something that can be easily stored for later use while trying to rest on my laurels. It appears resting on laurels eventully causes folks to either get back to work or get crazy enough to drink again |