The 11th Commandment

Ooops. I forgot one!

I've been thinking a whole lot about the messages I tell myself, the way I react to me, and how I handle decisions.

I figured something out that anyone with a grain of sense could have seen. Easily. But you know how the seeing things thing is, and how you just don't until you just do.

I have...trust issues. And by 'trust issues' I mean the kind that you have with the most important person in your life. I don't trust ME.

I notice that when it comes to making decisions I waffle all over the place. "Well, maybe this? Or that? Whatever could be good, too. If I do this then will that be mad? Blah blah blah." I also think I tell myself in that destructive whisper-y voice that you can't hear with ears or your head but the one that you just know in your heart that I'm not doing it right. Ever. That I can't be trusted. That I don't know what's best for me. I have zero credibility with myself. My motives are always questionable. That I have been given the opportunity time and time again to do what's right and I failed. Miserably.

I was listening to The Bubble Hour again yesterday. It was the one about early sobriety. The first guest was a  woman who had to move herself and her young child in with her mother. Her mother was having a hard time trusting her now that the woman was sober because for years the mother had been lied to. Let down. This is me. I am the liar and the distrusting mother. Talk about a tough crowd.

Learning to trust someone after twenty some years of letdowns is a big big big deal. Sometimes I can feel myself not even wanting to try, having given up on me so many times- and maybe even for good years ago. Don't get me wrong, I am trying so hard. And I want to try so hard. I haven't ever wanted anything more in my whole life. It's the knowledge that the person that hurt me the most is ME that blows me away. It's knowing that my soft place to fall has it's arms crossed and is eyeing me suspiciously. It's that I can't be trusted to make even simple, seemingly easy decisions without the scrutiny squad tearing them to bits looking for hidden agendas. And I'm paralyzed and frustrated and skeptical. And brimming with self-doubt.

So I suppose this all boils down to instincts. And hearing. And trust.

And my 11th Commandment: Honor Thyself. Because if the neighbors can be part of it, then I can be part of it, too.

Those two words give me such pause. Honor Thyself. I would have never though to do that before. Hold me in high esteem? Me deserving respect? Having dignity? Credibility? Whoa. No wonder I'm feeling a little awed at the prospect of bestowing myself with all that. No fucking wonder it's hard to trust that, and that something like that is confusing to hear. Especially since I haven't really ever done that, and so I'm extra extra out of practice.

Sobriety is hard, but really life is hard. When you choose to get sober and turn around to face your life you just can't imagine all the remarkable things you're in for. When I made the choice to quit drinking forever I declared my intention to honor myself. Out loud, into my universe, to my higher power, to myself. Every day  is an act of building trust. A lesson in self respect. Every day I stay true to the promise that I've made to myself strengthens my integrity, my self worth.

If I can choose to honor my higher power, the lives of others, a day of worship and rest, and to not lie about my neighbors or want their stuff then I can make a new commandment too. A commandment to be taken earnestly and holding monumental significance. Maybe the most important one of all.

HONOR THYSELF.

Every one of these eighty-six days shows me that my word has value. And that I am not a liar after all.