Different dictionaries define serenity in different ways. But their definitions all boil down to the same thing: a peaceful and calm state of being.
But if we pay close attention to this promise it doesn't say that we will have serenity. That we will enjoy serenity. All it says is that we will "comprehend" the word serenity. In other words we will understand what serenity means.
In my opinion, after nearly 26 years of sobriety, serenity is an ideal that we hope to achieve. While it is a state of being, I have seen very few individuals always in a state of serenity. I think maybe the founders put that in there as an ideal to reach. Because once we're serene we have no reason to pick up a bottle or put some other substance in our body.
My belief is that achieving a state of serenity is not something we suddenly arrive at. I believe that achieving a state of serenity is a long and winding path. The road is sometimes rough. It sometimes is a winding, rocky path before we achieve anything approaching a state of serenity.
My belief is that we all experience serenity at some at some point. But then a challenge comes and it suddenly disappears like the mist on a warm morning. It might be that we lose our jobs. Or get a bad grade in school. Or someone runs into our car in a parking lot.
So we naturally are feeling upset. Or enraged. And while we still comprehend the word serenity, it's not something that we're practicing at the moment.
When we're living in a state of serenity nothing seems to bother us. The 12 step programs have taught us to not only comprehend the word serenity, but perhaps live in a state of serenity regardless of what life presents us with. We have reached a state of philosophical depth that we know that each day is different. We lear, in fact, that the only thing we can count on in life, the only inevitability, is that things will be different each day. Or in maybe a shorter period than that.
I believe that true serenity descends upon us when we accept whatever goes on in our lives – when we learn to live with whatever the outcome.
