Retire?

A subject that never came up in the circle of addicts I grew up with is retirement. I don't think any of us thought we'd survive that long. So why even talk about it?

It was only recently - when one of my children brought it up, that I even thought of it at all"What would I do with myself at 77? I asked. "Sit on the porch and swat flies?

The suggestion was that I could watch television. Take trips. Get a hobby. Do a lot of things I'd been wanting to do - but couldn't because I'd been working.

But in my case, that's not the situation at all. There's nothing that I want to do that I'm unable to do. I work when I want - and because I like what I'm doing. I go to the office five to six days a week. I go to several different kinds of business and recovery meetings. I'm in my final hours of a 300 hour course to get my mindfulness instructor certification. And I have a mindfulness based stress reduction course lined up to take when this one is finished.

My wife and I take six or seven vacations a year. They range from long weekends to two weeks at a time. Right now we're planning a Panama Canal trip to celebrate my oldest daughter's fiftieth birthday in late May. Plus we might spend a month in Hawaii sometime in August.

So, when looking at all this stuff going on is there anything about retirement that sounds appealing? Not to me...

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Human Being? Or Human Doing?

When I got sober a long time ago I vowed to stop fighting with anyone about anything. A philosophy of total acceptance that took hold as I got deeper into mindfulness and recovery as a way of life.

But I've discovered it's easier said than done. No, I don't fight with anyone about anything. Except myself.

Yet I still mostly think of myself as a human doing, as opposed to a human being. Because I was raised in a place where only the aggressive get ahead, I feel like a loser if I'm not doing something. Not learning something new. Not challenging myself. It's almost a part of my DNA.

I discovered this during the past week during a minor medical procedure. The doctors wanted me off my normal routine. Which meant no going to the office, yoga or gym for a week. I thought "Great, I'll get to lay around for a week, and read, write, and study, and clean up my computer."

But somehow my brain figured out right away that I was doing nothing productive and pushed me into a state of restlessness. I got little or nothing done that I planned on doing. I caught up on nothing.

Eventually, I got around all of it by accepting that my brain just works that way. That's when I got more into being and my neurons settled down.

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Things Change

Over twenty years ago I went into a small town bank in Arizona to apply for a loan. I had my eye on a small apartment complex. I had plans to fix it up and resell it. Or perhaps operate it for a while and live off the profits.

I was shocked at the loan officer's response.

"This bank wouldn't loan you money if J. Paul Getty cosigned for you." And he said it pretty rudely on top of that.

And of course I shouldn't have been shocked. Everyone in that town knew my story. I was a drug addict on the run from a couple of warrants out of Califonia. I was a three time loser with not a lot to offer the business or work world.

Yet the world can change. It took years for it to do so. But it changed. And it changed because I changed. I got into recovery. I repaid all those I had ripped off. My credit got better.

Instead of me having to look for money, bankers started comng to me to loan money. It goes to show

that things can turn around when we start living right.

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Pray with Caution

Sometimes we must be careful about what we pray for.

For example, I've found myself asking God for patience while dealing with a problematic client. But what happens? You guessed it. I get to spend my entire afternoon dealing with this person non-stop.

But then, I did pray for patience didn't I? And what better way to learn patience than to spend several hours dealing with one of the most frustrating creatures on the planet.

If we pray for money, God's not going to give us the winning lottery numbers. But he might put us in a situation where we have an opportunity to make better money. If we're willing to work hard and creatively.

We may have a specific thing we pray for in life. But it might be the worst thing that could happen to us were we to get it.

Maybe we're praying for a relationship with the hot blonde we've been drooling about in the next office. But later we're sorry because we learn the hard way that she's a big spender with a borderline personality disorder - and those are her good qualities.

Like I said you may have your prayers answered. So be careful about what you ask for.

Helping Mom

Sometimes I fantasize while writing this blog about being a cool philosophical guy. One that drug addicts come to for advice. How they can stay clean and sober. How to control their anger. I see myself dispensing wisdom, sharing my experience, strength, and hope.

But that rarely happens. Not much. Maybe once in a while.

But what surprises me is the group that does ask for help. Women.

And it's not women who are having husband or boyfriend problems. With my relationship history I wouldn't know what to tell them anyway.

No. The women who ask for help are those who have children hooked on heroin, crack, meth or alcohol. Those are mostly the drugs they write about.

They do use other things. And when I write back I tell them it's not what the kid's using. They're all bad.

The problem usually focuses on the kid misusing the mother. He/she will be sponging off of mom. Using her car. Eating her food. Bumming money.

Then if mom complains, the kid drags out a litany of complaints. The reason he's the way he is because she married a bum like his dad or stepdad. Or they were poor. Or he went to a shitty school. They lived in the wrong neighborhood. The kid drags out anything to make her feel guilty.

And my answer is for mom to throw the kid out. That's right, if he's too unhappy to follow the rules go somewhere where he can live by his own rules.

The only thing I've found that any of these mothers have done wrong is to not throw the kid out sooner. As soon as he/she was 18 she should have sent him packing if he was becoming a problem.

It's amazing how grateful a human being becomes when he/she has to care for themselves.

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Contracted:

1. Written or spoken agreement, especially one concerning employment, sales, or tenancy, that is intended to be enforceable by law.​

​2. A voluntary, deliberate, and legally binding agreement between two or more competent parties. Contracts are usually written but may be spoken or implied, and generally have to do with employment, sale or lease, or tenancy.

​I posted these two examples of contracts here to answer a mother's question. Which is, essentially how she expects someone to behave while living under her roof, in her home.

​I forget the details of her situtation; But I do know she lives in a nearby state, the son's in treatment, and wants to live with her when he graduates.​

​This is a perfect scenario for a contract. She needs to put in the contract what she expects from him: Rent, utilities, curfew, who cooks, does laundry, buys food, drug and alcohol free. Everything she expects from him. In turn, he needs to put in the contract what he expects from her. In his case it shouldn't be much more than a roof over his head​​ - maybe a few lunches to get started on his job search.

​​A contract should be between two people and should serve both of their goals so they can live in peace and harmony.

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Self - Care

 "Take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live." Jim Rohn

I love this saying because it carries an important message wrapped in a bit of humor. If you follow the link I've provided here you can read about this remarkable author's career.

While Jim Rohn was called mentor to the masters I'm only focussing here on what he said about the importance of heatlh. And I go there because I've known too many addicts who get clean and believe that's it. There nothing else to do. But they are so wrong.'

Most of us come into recovery a human wreck. Hep C.  Kidney problems. Meth mouth. Emphysema. This is only a partial list.

Many addicts keep smoking. Glutting down the non-food handed out through drive through windows. They exercise just enough to work the remote or open the refrigerator door. But that's about it. If health maintenance takes any kind of work they're done with it.

I'm aways ragging on those in recovery about their health - and with mixed results.

I don't think any of us got clean or sober so we could develop health issues. Yet what kind of choices are we making if do nothing but ignore the greatest gift we've been given?

Duh...

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