LIVING LOVING LEARNING LAUGHING
A New Life - Part 1
What change comes to us in the life of recovery! Indeed, what we experience is a new life that allows us to say we are now truly living. Compare what you do now on any given day in recovery to what you were doing on any given day in addiction. What a difference a day makes - any day. Today we are living - not merely existing. Consider the most simple things you do today to be good to yourself - to be alive - that you ignored day upon d ay in addiction. They are simple, but they are profound. Today you brush your teeth. Today you eat. Tosay you keep yourself clean. So simple, so profound! For these were among the many things we ignored - as we ignored our own lives - in the days of addiction. Today we do these things and much more for we are living with a new enthusiasm and excitement about living. Good enough is no longer good enough for we want o much from living. No longer is life a burden to be endured; it is an opportunity to be embraced. No longer is life a journey of sadness; it is an adventure of hope. This is so for today in recovery we are truly living.
We are living today for now we are truly loving. Yes, we rightly can be counted as among the great lovers of the world. For we have escaped the pit of dark despair; we have broken the chains of endless isolation. Most importantly, we have left behind the times of loathing ourselves and have come to now loving ourselvles. And why not? How different each of us is now - you and I alike. We are truly living and like what we see. We no longer need to avoid a mirror for fear of who we would see but can look in thd mirror and see someone we love - see our very self and rejoice. Better still by far, we can look not only at the mirror, but also in our heart and find someone we love. Find someone within with all our gifts and talents, all our faults and failings and say here is womeone I love. Each of us can rightly love our self for we are changing, growing, coming ever more alive.
As we grow to love ourlselves we become ever more able to l ove our sisters and our brothers, and to l ove our God ever more deeply. This most especially we can do as we recognize more and more that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. This love for self allows each of us to appreciate and treasures our self as one made in the image and likeness of our God. Now, in love, we can accept our self just as we ar knowing is is all right to be me. Personal love leads us toward personal peace realizing I need not be perfect, I simply need to be me. Loving myself, I need not beat myself up over the past, rather I need to commit myself to grow bet ter in the future. Loving myself, I need not live each day in dread and doubt, rather I need to live each day with care and confidence.
Loving myself leads me on to love my sister, love my brother - no matter what their situation or circumstance. As I have come to love myself just as I am, I now come to love others in the same way. As we do this together, what a blessing we discover. Hiding neither from our self nor from others, we encounter people whom we need and who need us. We encounter people lew care for and who care for us. In a word, we encounter people just lide us - needing love, seeking love, finding love, giving love.
In all this, we experience and discover an ever deepening love of our God. As we had turned away from our self, away from our brothers and sisters, so too had we turned away from our God during our days of addiction. Alienation from all was all but total so that love played little role - ifany = in our lives. But again what a difference a day makes. Living a day at a time, we have found anew ourselves, our sisters and brothers, our God. And we have found love. In this we have found God loving us even when we did not. We found God loving us without conditions and without end. In so doing we started a new loving relationship with our God. As now a lover -a lover of God- we can and do treat God as a friend for so God is. No longer fearing God in terror, we are loving God in hope. In a new blessed and loving relationship with our God, we now are growing to know God in faith, having confidence in God through hope, and finding our loving God is bringing us to greater and greater love for all
ONE DAY AT A TIME
Fr. Joe McDonough, S.T.
It is with much joy and gratitude that the Hezekiah Movement celebrates the return of summer! The past months have been a time of many blessing for us. Most important, was the opening of our first Island of Hope. It is through your great generosity and support that this has happened and now more and more people are getting help in their efforts to be free from addiction. We are most thankful to you for all the help you have given. Your help in the past has been so important for us to get this far.
Besides the blessing of our new Island of Hope, we have experienced a growth in the Hezekiah Movement retreats. These retreats are providing wonderful spiritual experiences for so many in recovery who have never had such oportunities before. In addiction, more men and women are joining in with us throughout the week for prayer and meditation and they are finding suupport and encouragement as they go forward in their new life of recovery from addiction. Again all this is possible because of your care and generosity.
Your help means so much to so many. I pray that you will be filled with Easter joy. May this Summer be a time of freedom, peace, hope and new life.
In Gratitude and Peace.
Fr. Joe