“Is that because you don’t trust the group or you don’t trust yourself?” I asked Anita.
“I guess it’s both,” Anita answered. “You don’t really know me,” she addressed the group, “so how can you say nice things about me? And if I believe the good things that you’re saying, then I might not keep working on my life.”
Like many who struggle with addiction, Anita believed that she needed to be hard on herself in order to make any changes. She was convinced that if people really knew her, they would be similarly disgusted with her, so she could not rest in any compassion or kindness. As she looked at the other women in the group, she experienced one of the gifts of community. “I feel so lonely,” Anita admitted. Community, as imperfect as it is, can awaken within us the longing for relationship.
“How long have you felt this way?” asked one dear woman, a middle-aged soccer mom addicted to marijuana. She, too, knew the pain of isolation.
“All of my life, I think,” Anita answered. She was beginning to tell her story in community, and as she dared to look at the longing in every other woman’s face, Anita knew that she didn’t have to be alone. Market Bullitt-Jonas beautifully wrote of her own healing experience within community: “What saved me? Putting down the food. Finding a story. Speaking the story. Feeling the anger and the pain …. Finding people to listen, people who wouldn’t let me settle for overeating but who wanted to hear from me, wanted to know the story. My story.”8
FORGIVENESS IN THE MIDST OF SHAME
Anita participated in every group session, but she stayed stuck, stuck in her inability to receive. She often expressed her frustration at “not getting it,” while she kept retreating to overeating and going through the motions of doing the “right” thing. After the group ended, Anita stopped coming to counseling. I ran into her a few months ago at the grocery store.
“How are you?” I asked.
I saw the veil of self-contempt come down quickly over Anita’s face. “Oh, I’m about the same. Still doing the same stupid things. I guess I’m one of your failure stories?” Her last statement was a mixture of shame and curiosity.
I really didn’t know what to say. Self-contempt is a powerful force that enables a person to feel in control. If I said, “Oh, you’re not a failure,” Anita wouldn’t believe me and would write me off as disingenuous. If I said, “Yes, you are a big failure,” Anita would retreat in anger and hurt. Both pathways were ways to escape connection.
I simply said, “I really miss seeing you,” and continued on into the grocery store.
What kept Anita stuck? What keeps those who struggle with addiction in a prison of negativity, self-hatred, and alienation from others? It is the last addiction, a belief that I must somehow be good enough and an honest realization that no matter how hard I try, I can’t do it. When these two beliefs stand alone—I must do it and I can’t do it—the natural human response is self-contempt.
It is not easy to surrender control, especially of our efforts to be good, feel forgiven, act serenely. The prospect can be terrifying to someone who has believed that being in control is the goal. But being good, feeling forgiven, and experiencing serenity cannot be willed. In fact, the harder we try, the more impossible it all becomes.
The sense of being forgiven—forgiven for my failures, my foolish attempts, my lifelong strategies of being in control—does not result from my effort. That’s the last addiction. It comes only from openness.
HARD WORK IN THE MIDST OF HOPELESSNESS
Openness is most profoundly revealed in prayer. Prayer that comes out of my inability to “do it” finally leaves room for God. It acknowledges that I am not god. Thérèse of Lisieux said it best, “Prayer arises, if at all, from incompetence, otherwise there is no need for it.”9
The main shift that takes place when we live in this posture—“God, help me. I can’t do it. I need You”—is that we begin experiencing a new self. We stop blaming others or shutting them out. We accept responsibility for who we are and acknowledge our core need of something Other. We stop seeing our lives only in terms of who has hurt us and who can’t be trusted, and begin to see who we have hurt and our need for forgiveness.
Anita still continued to see herself as victim, victim of others and of her own choices. Her injuries from others and from herself became barriers to relationship rather than the means to a healing relationship that would give her courage to be vulnerable in relationships again. Anita had reached the point of acknowledging the truth about her life, but she would not surrender to the Truth that would set her free. She continued to be her own god, believing that the answer to her struggles was her own effort, but she plunged into greater despair when she failed to achieve her goals.
Perhaps you identify with Anita. You’ve tried everything and continue to find yourself in the bondage of an addiction. The experience of trying so hard, only to find yourself picking up the pieces once again, is debilitating and confusing. Or maybe you have a family member who struggles with addiction. You find this chapter is discouraging, even a little scary. You’re afraid I’m saying that your loved one should stop trying and simply start praying.
I’m not. The hard work of experiencing redemption in the midst of addiction requires that I take complete responsibility for the harm I have inflicted on myself and others due to my addictions. When I fully and deeply acknowledge my responsibility in all of this, I know—heart and soul—that I need a forgiveness that I cannot grant to myself. A profound transformation begins when I know—heart and soul—that I have been completely forgiven. I am able to rejoin human community without shame and contempt when I know that I have been forgiven.
After my relapse I went through the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous with a sponsor. When I came to the ninth step—”Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others”—I was terrified. I couldn’t imagine asking forgiveness from my children, my parents—my ex-husband. Wouldn’t that just open the door to more shame and condemnation? And besides, they had hurt me and misunderstood me. Why open the door to more hurt?
One night I was on the mental merry-go-round of these realities. I wanted to be free of the guilt and shame, but I was too afraid to seek forgiveness, and I really couldn’t feel God’s forgiveness. I believed that Jesus died on the cross for my sins, but I also honestly believed that there were some sins that I would have to pay for for the rest of my life.
I picked up my Bible and turned to an often-quoted verse of Scripture: “In kindness he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change.”10 In kindness. Could I believe in the kindness of God? Or to use another principle from the twelve steps, could I turn my life over to the care of God? (Third step: “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God … ”) I recalled Brennan Manning’s words:
The tenderness of Jesus frees us from embarrassment about ourselves. He lets us know that we can risk being known, that our emotions, sexuality, and fantasies are purified and made whole by his healing touch, and that we don’t have to fear our fears about ourselves. The wisdom gleaned from tenderness is that, as ragamuffins entrusted by God, we can trust ourselves and thereby learn to trust others. When the healing tenderness lays hold of our hearts, the false self, ever vigilant in protecting itself against pain and seeking only approval and admiration, dissolves in the tender presence of mystery.11
I remembered a time years ago, when my daughter was learning to swim. She loved to stand on the side of the pool and jump into my arms. She could paddle to the side of the pool and jump again and again, for what seemed like hours. I was always careful to make sure that her life preserver was fastened securely around her little body before we began our game of jump, catch, and release. One afternoon we had played until we were both exhausted. I took her to the side of the pool, unfastened her life preserver, and dried her off. I told her that she needed to rest for
a while. I headed to the deep end of the pool to dive and swim by myself.
I guess we’re simply not meant to understand some things. Bono, of U2, who is a Christian, says that his favorite song is “Amazing Grace” and his second favorite is “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” and most of the time, I have to let it go at that.
—ANNE LAMOTT, Plan B12
After one dive I came to the surface and saw my three-year-old toddler running toward the deep end. I was barely catching my breath when Kristin leaped into the middle of the pool toward me. My hands reached blindly toward her as she plunged beneath the water. Somehow I was able to tread water and grab her.
“Honey, what are you doing?” I exclaimed.
With a look of pure joy, she said, “Mommy, I knew you would catch me!”
I have never forgotten the feeling of my heart being stuck in my throat as I held back a harsh admonition. I couldn’t bear to discipline her because of her fierce trust in me.
That night as I pondered my recovery from addiction, I wondered if I could just jump like that into the kindness of God and trust Him with the results. I prayed a prayer that I have prayed a thousand times since then: “God, forgive me. Help me believe.”
Two nights after these ponderings, I announced to my then fourteen-year-old daughter that I was going to the grocery store.
“Are you sure that’s where you’re going?” she asked suspiciously.
I saw the evidence of my relapse on her face. She lived with a fear that it could happen again. One of the great costs of my alcoholism was that I had betrayed my daughter’s trust. She wasn’t so ready to jump anymore.
Leap, and the net will appear.
—JULIA CAMERON, The Artist’s Way13
“Oh, honey,” I said. I am so sorry that you’re afraid. I’m sorry that I hurt you by drinking. Will you please forgive me?”
Kristin jumped in. “Mom, I already forgave you. I’m just glad that you’re not drinking.”
My daughter’s response reminded me that forgiveness cannot be demanded of others or of myself. It surprises us in the midst of our willingness.
8
JIM’S STORY: SEX, DRUGS,
AND ROCK’N’ROLL
You do not have to change for God to love you. Be grateful for your sins. They are carriers of grace.
—ANTHONY DE MELLO, Wellsprings1
Jim is my brother. His is a story of years of struggle with alcohol, cocaine, and meth. During the nineties, Jim was the lead singer of an industrial metal band called Rorschach Test. It took him more than a few years to read the signs in his own life and understand what all his crazy addictive behavior was about. Jim did his detox in a jail cell. In the process, he discovered that his drug addiction was a sort of spiritual reversal. I’ve learned a lot from Jim about drug addiction, but he has taught me even more about seeking a spiritual life from the inside out rather than the other way around.
Jim did not set out to be a bona fide, chart-topping heavy metal rock star. No, instead he began his adult life as a bright, talented, ordained minister. He could easily translate the Greek and Hebrew of Scripture and was especially gifted in speaking words of faith to his congregation. What moved him from the pulpit to prison? How did his passion shift from the things of God to drugs and alcohol? The answers to these questions can help us understand the momentum of addiction.
Jim’s story reveals that even a life steeped in religion does not protect from or solve addiction. After studying many addicts, Dr. William Silk-worth comes to this conclusion in the “Big Book” of Alcoholics Anonymous: “[U]nless [a] person can experience an entire psychic change there is very little hope of his recovery.”2 An entire psychic change. In fact, it is often the realities of addiction that help save us, that reveal to us—more powerfully than any sermon or intellectual grasp of theology—true spirituality, what it means to experience a total psychic change.
Jim tells his story of church and altar calls as well as cocaine and sold-out concerts, not to glamorize his experience in the music industry or to denigrate his experience in the church, but to reveal the truth of the human condition—that there are longings within each of us that pull on us more strongly than any addiction. Jim’s fellow musician and addict Kurt Cobain wrote in his journal, “When you wake up this morning, please read my diary. Look through my things, and figure me out.”3 Sadly, Cobain never figured himself out. Addiction took his life when he was only twenty-seven. Whether a person is a pious man or woman in the church or an out-of-control musician in the entertainment world, we all risk trying to soothe the deep cravings of our souls by our own efforts, only to find that we have completely lost ourselves along the way. I am grateful for my brother’s courage in looking at himself and finding help to guide him on this journey.
No matter what we accomplish or accumulate, if we are honest, we have to admit that our souls always desire more. Jim’s story reveals an earnestness and a recklessness in trying many avenues, from seminary to the world of rock’n’roll, only to find that the emptiness within was even greater than it was before. I asked Jim to write about his experience with addiction. Here is his story, in his own words:
I grew up in a very strong fundamentalist, Bible-believing home. I have extremely vivid memories from a very young age of my Sunday school teacher, my childhood pastor, and even my mother telling me how to be sure that I would escape the eternal fires of hell. I also have many terrifying memories of that time, because in spite of the good-intentioned efforts of the aforementioned evangelists, I simply did not understand. I spent countless long nights of terror-filled agony praying variations of the prayer, “Jesus, please come into my heart,” over and over again. This continued throughout my entire childhood and even into the beginning of my adolescence—right up until that magical summer of 1981.
That summer at a church camp I heard a sermon by a preacher from Alabama. He sounded a whole lot like Elvis when he preached. He looked into the audience that hot July night and said, “There is probably someone right here tonight who is wondering if they have done everything absolutely right to be saved. You have said your prayers a million times, but you still are not sure if God has heard you. You have tried so hard and have wondered if you have tried hard enough. Well, you can stop wondering and trying, because the Lord Jesus Christ has already done and completed absolutely everything necessary for you to be saved. When He said, “It is finished,” He meant it. He finished the work so that He could have a relationship with you.”
Suddenly it was as if the light came on. I believed. All of the confusion made sense. This was not about whether or not I had done everything, said everything, prayed everything. This was about having a relationship with Someone who had already done everything for me.
I wanted to learn everything that I could about this new relationship. Suddenly all that did not appeal to me about Christianity became intriguing and exciting.
I wanted to be around the people that I once dreaded and even feared. I wanted to go to the places I once avoided—church, home Bible studies, etc. I wanted to learn all about the religious practices—communion, the doxology, different creeds of faith.
I even learned a new language—Christianspeak. The words rolled off my tongue: “Amen. Praise the Lord! You are such a blessing to me. I’ll be praying for you.”
I became willing to do anything required of me in order to experience a deeper level of devotion. I was drawn to those who had made a total commitment to faith—to pastors and those in full-time ministry. They often indicated that they thought that maybe it was God’s plan for me to be one of them. I was becoming more and more willing to give it all.
I went to Bible college and seminary and became a licensed pastor. I found a position as the assistant to the senior pastor in a small church—the very church that I had grown up in. Suddenly my whole life was set in order right before me. My path and my future were
clear.
This was truly the most exciting time in my life. I never experienced anything that packed the thunder of that summer of 1981.
Except maybe the summer of 1990. That was the first time that I tried cocaine. That was just after the church that I had grown to love asked me to leave.
I met a girl on my rise to ordination at one of the summer Bible conferences that I attended who told me that she was also called to a life of deeper devotion to God. We fell in love and married shortly after I graduated from seminary. One Sunday evening I returned home from a weekend youth retreat and found my wife curled in a tight ball upon our bed. When I asked her what was wrong, she finally told me. She had been having an affair for the last sue months and didn’t love me anymore. In fact, she didn’t even think that she believed in God. She wanted a divorce.
I ran to my senior pastor and in tears he hugged me. He said that he was sorry and that he would be praying for me. The following Monday morning I received a telephone call from the lead elder on the church board informing me that I had been relieved of my duties.
I was devastated. Suddenly the life that I thought was set before me completely unraveled. I was hurt and confused. Fear began to set in. What had I done that was so wrong? Where was God in all of this?
A few weeks later I responded to an ad in the newspaper that basically stated, “If you have a pulse we will hire you.” I began to work at a collections agency where I met someone who introduced me to cocaine. Right after I snorted my first line, it was like my eyes opened and the light came on. I wanted to learn everything that I could about this new relationship.
Suddenly all that did not appeal to me about drug use became intriguing and exciting.
I wanted to be around the people that I once dreaded and even feared. I wanted to go to the places I once avoided.
The Last Addiction Page 12