Still Rough
My horoscope is full of words like “fuses” and “blowtorch” and “conflict” and “personal meltdowns.”
Oh, my. I do place a fair amount of stock in my horoscope, partly because I do believe in astrology (which, I know the dime-a-dozen online ‘scopes aren’t) but also partly because I believe it’s a way that the God of my understanding delivers messages to me. Laugh if you’d like, I don’t mind. But if S/He knows that I’m reading those things every day, then S/He knows to tuck some targeted inspiration into the words for me.
I’m so grateful that I have skills that can net me a lot of quick cash. I admit I haven’t done a very good job cleaning up my gambling messes yet, though I can take some comfort in the fact that I am not currently making the problems any worse. And, as explored recently, not drinking is saving us a metric ton of monies.
But because I’m able to take on so much extra work, I do. And that creates a fair amount of stress and pressure for me. So, it’s a bit of a catch 22, isn’t it?
I’m stressed and pressured from work, so I gambled. I’m stressed and pressured because I gambled away a lot of money we didn’t have. I take on extra work to try and make up the money, but it makes me stressed and pressured. I gambled to try and relieve the stress and pressure. On and on and on and on.
I don’t know what the answer is at this point, but writing it all out - dumping my mental junk here - is really helping. It really is. Being able to see the crazy worms that wriggle in my head on paper helps me get to a place of serenity and understanding.
At Monday’s meeting, a fellow GA member shared something about the serenity prayer that - I don’t know - just clicked for me. In essence, the serenity prayers asks us two questions that can help us determine what to do next.
- Can I change it?
If I can’t change it, forget about it.
If I can change it …
- Pray for courage. “God of my understanding, can you help give me the courage to make the changes that need to be made to resolve this?”
So simple. So easy. I’ve been walking around the past 48 hours asking myself, “Can I change it?” and most of the time, I can’t.
I can’t control what other people are thinking or feeling or doing. I can only control me - and only to a certain degree. I can control what I’m thinking and doing, but not so much how I’m feeling.
Yesterday, I made some progress sitting with my feelings, but I also did a fair amount of steamrolling over them by staying busy, distracting myself, working, working, working. So, there’s room for improvement there.
For now, I really do have to get back to working, working, working.