safe and distant

attended an AA meeting recently wherein i heard a fellow member use the phrase "safe and distant" during his sharing.
i immediately experienced a rush of pain, grief and sorrow, enough to bring me close to tears, clearly identifying with what he had revealed about himself.
i too have existed for years with a profound fear of intimacy....withdrawing from human society for fear of ever again suffering the intense heartache i'd experienced since my most recent love relationship had ground to a traumatic and agonizing end in 2005.
there seemed no relief then, as if an iron fist was permanently clenched around my heart....unending....for days, weeks, months....there was no relief.
except, of course, eventually there was mary-jane !
some speak of drowning their sorrows in booze....for this dude, it amounted to numbing the suffering with marijuana.
i am a typical addict/alcoholic, once having taken that first toke from that first joint, i would immediately kick into life as a chronic user.
meaning....smoking all day, every day, from waking til bedtime, attempting to maintain just the right dose so as to "feel no pain" and be free of symptoms of depression or acute PTSD episodes.
all the while i believed, maintaining "functionality".

i guess those stretches of pot-smoking as a life-style could be called "binges".
the pattern being that upon eventually becoming physically, mentally and emotionally exhausted from extended use and abuse, i would be able to stop smoking, and sometimes go for weeks or months clean and sober before the next inevitable binge.
,
safe and distant....life on the fringes....the weed seemed to make it much easier to associate with others, "greasing the social wheels" i've heard it said....providing the illusion of intimate contact with others....as long as i was under the influence, of course.
the recent entry entitled "a love letter" speaks to the profound dependence i experienced with marijuana, on any and all levels.

thanks to the powers that be, i've been shown a workable methodology towards mental/emotional/spiritual health.
this being embodied within the philosophy and teachings of the living program of recovery known as Alcoholics Anonymous, it's 12 steps and 12 traditions, as well as the recovering alcoholics/addicts within the meeting rooms.

i have been relieved of the obsessive compulsion to smoke marijuana !
this i could never achieve on my own....having tried....and tried.....and tried !

safe and distant ?....these days, much safer and far less distant than ever.
intimacy still sometimes seems quite a daunting prospect, but there's no doubt that by continuing to do as suggested, and sticking to this life-saving program of recovery, intimate relations will happen as a matter of natural course.
in fact, they are, during everyday life and in daily communications and relations with fellow addicts and alcoholics within the recovery circles.

i have no interest at this time in pursuing a "significant other" type of relationship.
this fact being so obviously a good thing....since i'm finally beginning to know and like....

ME,  MYSELF  AND  I !!!

it will happen in my higher power's time....or not....and i am quite okay with that !

i now experience a definite sense of purpose, already feeling more ready, willing and especially ABLE to make myself useful within the AA community....and society at large.....

after so many years of making myself  utterly USELESS !!!

this is not an overnight process, but progress obviously achieved, as well as a level of predictable serenity that a short time ago seemed unimaginable, is more than enough concrete evidence to spur me on.

thanks to the powers that be !