Hello Everyone,
This week we read up to page 197 Exercise: Living Amends. We discussed the importance of sponsorship in the amends process and about your intention/motivation for making the amends and being aware of causing no harm, as well as the timeliness of the amends not always being clear.
Today's discussion question is to consider the way that living amends have affected your recovery journey.
I know that for me, living amends is the most important part of the amends process because it is an ongoing thing.
One of my small ways to make living amends is to always clean up garbage left on trains by previous passengers. That's because in my addiction, I so often was f'd up on trains, smoking crack in the bathroom, and sniffing inhalants right in my seat, and just generally not caring who saw me or how I impacted the others on the train. I can't make amends to those people, but I now ride the train with an awareness of going the extra mile, and always giving my seat, or picking up the trash or just generally trying to be extra kind. It's some small way that I can pay it back.
What about you?
The question of considering the way living amends affect my recovery seemed hard to figure out. I thought about it for a while and was reminded that one thing I do is live in a way that doesn’t require me to have to make future amends. It means ego deflation and listening and accepting hard truths about when and where my ego and my acting on that ego leads me to step on the toes of my fellows causing retaliation. Maybe living amends requires continuous inventory for me.