It is a miracle

I was drinking too much, unemployed, and unhappy. I'm not sure what I was unhappy about, but I am sure I blamed everything and everyone in my life at the time. That made Kathy and the kids a prime target for blame.

Kathy had a husband who was distant and uncommunicative. She also had the day-to-day responsibility to raise our three kids. Life was demanding for her. And life was a grind.

It was the unemployment that changed my life. Stripped of my career to keep my mind and body busy, I never had to address my guilt, shame, and emptiness. Busyness and making money allowed me to avoid the truth. I was miserable. I had the wife, the kids, the house, the cars, and the private schools, "the full catastrophe" as described by the character Zorba in "Zorba."

His restlessness was my restlessness. His search for a new and bigger adventure was my search. His successes and failures of life expectations were mine, too. There had to be more. Just look at the sky and stars at night. There had to be endless opportunities for me out there. But, sadly, not where I was standing at that time. But my job kept me going.

It gave me a place to go and problems to solve. It kept my body in motion and my mind engaged. This left me no time to think about the "endless opportunities." I simply survived in my life of ignorance and bliss. A quiet and lonely place where there is no adventure to be experienced, but simply numbers on a spreadsheet to be achieved. All so I could do it all next year.

I coped by drinking at the end of the day.

The alcohol numbed my mind and will. The numbing kept me from facing the truth. A change was needed, but I had no idea what to do. I had achieved more than I ever thought possible, and I was empty. I was the dog that caught the car. I had run out of reasons to keep chasing my goals. In fact, I had no goals.

All that was left were the people to blame. My boss, who didn't measure up. The board of directors, who didn't understand or care about me. My management team, who didn't manage. And me, the guy in charge who didn't care anymore to care. I was operating each day in a state of depression. I was unraveling.

But unemployment saved me. For the first time in twenty years, my mind was free to think about my life. The problem was my drinking habit. It kept me from asking the question: “What is next for me?”

The habit of taking something to stop me from self-examination was killing my spirit. And each day as my spirit was repressed, I became more empty. I became unmotivated, unfufilled, and lacking in any adventure. Life was beginning to take on a meaning of being meaningless.

But one night while drinking I had a vision.

If I keep exercising this habit, everything I have in life, including all that I love, value, and enjoy, would be taken from me. My continued drinking would numb me to a point where I simply disappeared. I would no longer be seen by anyone, and worse yet, I would not even see myself anymore. I would be gone, invisible.

This thought was the catalyst to move me to change. I knew instinctively I could not change on my own. All I could do was ask for help. That's all I had to do. It was the obvious next step. It was the only step.

Making that call to an old neighbor whom I knew was a recovering alcoholic was all I thought to do. As I look back, it is amazing he answered the phone. Why? I was an old neighbor. I left the neighborhood years ago. I never talked to him again.
But that day, I called, and he answered.

He answered and listened to me say, "I wonder if you can help me. I think I am drinking too much." That's all I said. he met me for lunch that day. That same night, he had me attend an AA meeting with him.

He only brought me to one meeting. The rest was up to me. He believed AA saved his life and his marriage. But it was up to me to attend meetings. It was my recovery, not his.

The first meeting was difficult for me to attend with him. The second meeting was even harder without him. It was in that second meeting, as I sat alone among a group of twenty strangers, that my life began to change and take on meaning. The discussion leader was talking about praying to his higher power. This prayer, he claimed, kept him sober for the last twenty-five years.

Could God be what's been missing in my life?

For the last ten years, I have asked this question in my sober moments. But after a few drinks, the question would float away or become irrelevant. And now, sitting right in front of me, was a man who used to practice the daily destructive habit of drinking alcohol and stopped over a quarter of a century ago, telling me to talk to God.

Was God really there? Would God care to listen to me? I wanted to kick this habit bad enough that I raised my hand to speak. He called on me. And that's when my recovery began.

There is a method to sharing at AA. You give your name, followed by the admission that you are an alcoholic.

I began, "My name is Charlie, and I'm an alcoholic." It was the most challenging thing I have ever said in my entire life. The implications of this statement to me and to the world were mind-boggling. This admission said:

I was powerless over alcohol.

My life had become unmanageable.

I was out of answers.

My life was meaningless.

I was losing everything I loved and valued.

I was blaming the world and everyone in it for my behavior.

I was letting people down and letting me down.

I was shirking my responsibilities or short-cutting them.

I needed help!

And all I said was, "I'm Charlie, and I'm an alcoholic."

I don't even remember what I said after I made this personal introduction and admission. It didn't matter what I said after that. What mattered was that I just completed Step 1 of the 12 Step program. I was on my way to not drinking one day at a time.

I started to talk to God. I didn't pray church prayers. I simply spoke to God just like I would talk to anyone. I told him what I was feeling. I talked about my fears and frustrations. I shared my resentments and deepest secrets.

After six months of meetings, literally one hundred and eighty meetings in one hundred and eighty days, the topic of the higher power came up again. I was acutely interested in this discussion. The leader asked, "Who is your higher power?"

One man shared, "My higher power are the people in this room." Another shared, "My higher power is my sponsor." And then another shared, "My higher power is the blue book of AA."

Sitting there, I realized I've been talking to God daily.

And in those six months, I've not had one drop of alcohol. For the last twenty years, I couldn't go without alcohol for more than eighteen hours. I was like Pavlov's dog. When five o'clock hit, I wanted a drink, and I never missed.

Being cold-stoned sober for six months was a miracle. This was unreal. This had to be a miracle. Was it God who did this miracle in my life? This had to be supernatural. I asked myself, "Who is this God who did this miracle in my life?"

It was incredible what happened right after I asked that question. It was like God told close friends and business associates in my life that they should talk to me about Him. They were there all along, but I must have shut them down whenever the topic of God came up.

But not now. Now I wanted to know; I wanted to know all about this God I've been speaking to. Was he knowable? Was there more that he had planned for my life now that he got me sober and clear-minded? Was there meaning and a richer life awaiting me that I thought wasn’t even possible? After all, he did the impossible to remove my desire for alcohol. Was there more impossible changes out there by knowing him personally? Was this even possible?

Where were all these questions coming from?

Within two months, I found myself saying the "Sinners Prayer." I confessed I was a sinner who was in desperate need of forgiveness. I invited Jesus into my life. I asked him to take over my life. And that was the day my life began to blossom. It was like the sun came out, and I could see life clearly. It was a supernatural event that I was not in control of.

Little by little, I began to be changed from the inside out.

It wasn't anything that I was doing. It was just happening. I didn’t even realize I was changing until close friends would tell me how I’ve changed.

The only thing that I kept doing was prayer, staying in conversation with God. But the door was now open. I was His and He started to do with me as He pleased. Looking back, He even put the desire to know Him in my heart. I found myself yearning to read the Bible. To discuss it with others. To hear what God was saying to others in my life. To see what God was doing in their lives.

I was experiencing a daily miracle. The more I pursued knowing God, the more He revealed Himself to me, and the more he changed me from the inside out. It was and still is a miracle. I am still being changed every day.

These changes affected my marriage, my relationship with my children, my family, my friends, my work, my community, and my neighbors. I found myself with new friends, God seeking men, who reinforced my relationship with God by sharing their relationship with God. Friends who stood by me and mentored me. Who showed me what might happen to me just as this relationship changed their lives. It was, and is, all very exciting.

At one point, in reading the Bible, I realized what happened to me and continues to happen to me was predicted by Jesus. It is a simple truth. He said,

"Ask, and it will be given. Knock, and the door will be opened. Seek, and you will find."

And to think all this started by me saying, "I'm Charlie, and I’m an alcoholic."

And then I began to ask God for help. I’m still asking. He is still answering.