For years, possibly my entire life, I have been conflicted about God.  What is it?  Is it a he?  A she?  Does the God I was taught of  as a child exist (and does that mean I AM going to hell?)  How does one define God if they do not want to accept this as a being that punishes and judges? Why is or does God need to be so controversial when, if left open to individual interpretation it can mean the difference between a life fulfilled and a life in isolation?

But then… that might be the beginning of my own definition of what GOD is or how I have chosen to incorporate a higher power into my own life in order to let go of the power(s) I have called my own to ill-effect and numerous illustrations of sadness or dis-ease.

In my experience many “use” God through their own skewed interpretations of the Bible or their need to build themselves up by separating and tearing down others.  God and the Bible become weapons of choice to lob missiles of hate and point fingers of condemnation.  Whereas this assessment walks a fine line of judgment in and of itself… I speak to it NOT as a means of belittling what others will do with their understanding of God (in all honestly it is truly none of my business), but instead as a way to build my own definition by removing what I feel is not necessary for my point of view, my happiness and my moral and spiritual code.

But just saying the word “GOD” is not always very popular outside of the everyday vernacular (Oh my GOD!) that doesn’t tie directly to how one defines their own foot in the door of religion… or out of it for that matter.  People speak of God mindlessly without any affiliations to what that may mean to them.  It can be somewhat ironic to watch an atheist or an agnostic announcing a surprised (and often fearful) “oh my GOD!” to something that provokes sudden response.

The God of religion is what I tended to run from.  Built (at least in my experience) in fear, the almighty bearded father to Jesus Christ was used to remind me of all the things I was doing or potentially would do wrong.  This sort of blind authority figure, painted largely to control through others sense of morals and opinion, set off a chain reaction of angst, disgust, escape and anger earlier in my life that began a very longstanding disdain for the word and the many different reasons that “God” was for others, but not for me.

But in sobriety I had to change the way I thought.  From the base changes in re-learning how I reacted, the habits I created, the reasons I hid, isolated, hated myself or others around me… to the basis of how one learns to stop destructive behavior in thinking and action through surrender, the word GOD was again introduced and I was left with the choice between health through re-opening my mind or stubborn unwillingness to accept that there IS a power greater than myself and I am most definitely NOT that power.

This is where the definition of MY God then began.

The first thing I had to understand and remember was that God is just a word.  There really doesn’t have to be an image or a package attached to it.  Often God is simply a feeling for me.  Many in the program I belong to are so dis-associated to the word God and may choose to call their higher power by other words or phrases.  Many are so removed from the idea of religion (whether or not it needs to be attached) that they must create different types of images, thoughts, words and methods to work around the word God.

For many years I was one of those people.  For me, the word GOD meant that I was being religious.  I did not want my program to be religious so I would not allow myself to go there.  It was difficult because no matter what the steps of the program were trying to teach and help me with, I was always slightly removed because of my preconceptions and inability to accept the word God.  Everything was wrapped around this sense of “religion” being bad and I was, in effect, only giving a percentage of myself to a goal that would have possibly provided me more with the full thrust of my being.

In meetings I have watched those who use the word GOD get turned off by many members within the room.  It is always going to be a difficult piece (for some) in the sobriety puzzle.  For many of my own years I would carefully choose the words I used within shares and in how I worked with others.  I tread lightly in order to make sure that I didn’t turn off where those, like myself in earlier years, would have possibly decided the answers being offered were not of the variety they felt safe or comfortable with.

Today I will talk about God freely.  God is saving my life.  God is offering me the chances to be the person I want to be, to see the world I live in without anger and fear and to offer myself as a teacher in service in a SPIRITUAL program that requires we remember that we are powerless and there is a power greater than ourselves who can restore us to sanity.  God has come to equal sanity for me.

Whether one uses the word God is needs to be irrelevant within the steps.  What is important is that you remember you are powerless and there is that power greater than yourself.  But for me the inner debate of religion vs. spirituality and the importance of the word GOD as a reason to wonder if a person is going to start reading scripture or attempt to convert you has lost its priority.  It is not necessary to ask this question or consider this option.  It is not relevant.  I am happy with my concept of God.  I am happy to work with others and allow them to find their own concept, but I will always explain mine without judgment in order to be honest about how I work a spiritual program.  God is important to my program and my life…. to edit God out of my service would be, in effect, a disservice.

I am no longer afraid and that shedding of fear has allowed another layer of willingness to emerge.

The onion really does keep peeling.

Be Happy.  Be Well.  Be.

On some days I just don’t think about faith.  That doesn’t always mean that I am in fear, however.  I have learned quite successfully through the years that my fears are often (if not always) unfounded.  I have written proof that the world which seems to be shifting in front of me from time to time can often simply be a reaction to not knowing what the future really holds, and my failing to remember that I am not in the moment and instead projecting myself to whatever assumed time I am in fear of…

How many times have I told myself that everything happens for a reason?  How many times have I wondered just what that reason might be?  It certainly does take the power away from the perception of whatever paradigm shift  the mind will conjure when certain life twists and turns are presented.  The problem with this fear buffer is in the fact that it is always much easier to ponder when it is not about the fears and changes you are potentially experiencing yourself.

It is true for me that a lot of the dramatizations are just that.  They are the cliffhanger effect (what will happen?) 0r my day-to-day maze runs (a sense of confusion while seeking direction,)  over-exaggerated power struggles and stonewalls, all to help spice up what any normal human would hope to be a smooth sail through and successful journey towards a pleasant sleep at the end of a good day.

Some days are about the fear.  Adrenalin rushes that put a creative mind into storytelling mode.  What if…. I will say to myself.  What if this actually HAPPENS?

Good question.

How do I know that the things I fear are not something that I will end up either liking or even finding benefit from?   And how do I know that anything  I fear is going to happen at all?  Up until this point on my path I have not yet been afforded a crystal ball.  I do, however, have a very powerful sense of intuition… and it has been telling me that things are going to be a lot different than the messages I have been starting to get of late.

Like a game show, however… there may be some bluffing going on.  There could be some pieces that are not quite built in truth.   But things are out there and the future is morphing slightly in front of me.  Funny thing about the morphing…. it can morph back to an original shape or continue further into another one altogether.  What I am feeling today is uncertainty… which is a byproduct of seeing the world out of order…. and not being sure what the outcome will mean.

Fear.

But if I am to continue to learn and grow in this life I must always keep an open mind.  EVEN when the information in front of me is less than appealing or when my intuition rages that the truth is not being told.  Fear is false evidence appearing real.  I am coming to conclusions that are not necessarily the truth.  Even if they were, the fear is the suggestion that they would actually happen.  I do not know that to be a fact.

Coupled with faith comes trust.  Based on the experiences of my current piece of the path I would only have to conclude that I am being shown that something is going to change further than I thought it might in the first place.  But if change is constant and what I thought to be one thing is going to probably end up being another… what is to stop my own personal morphing?  One thing could be a domino effect to another.  If what I see is even remotely a reality for the future… it does not have to be mine.  I have choices.  Many of them.  So what, then, do I really fear?  Do I fear the path that I see…. or perhaps the one that I do not see?  Am I afraid of what might happen where I am or of taking the chance to change much more than I had thought to be possible as a result?

Is 2010 about making one of the biggest changes I have made in years?  Was today the beginning of an end… or the beginning of a brand new start?

Fear can be motivating.  The key is not to react to it.  I dealt with it today by writing.  In the end that seems to have worked.

… as for tomorrow?  I may have to do the exercise all over again.  Being human and uncertain can be very trying.  If that is what it takes… that is what I will do.

Be Happy.  Be Well.  Be.

I am currently in a job “shift”.  Not a new job… not a promotion… not a new boss… but definitely a new environment and way of life.  A restructure of the way we are and the way the business decisions and day-to-day routines will be handled… both by me and by the group at large.

One way of life ended on Thursday and the other begins on Monday… thus my cusp.  This weekend I am in between what I have known and what will be.  It is illuminating, curious and somewhat exciting to not completely know how the world around me will be run.  It is as though I am starting a new.  It is as though there were a giant blackboard wiped clean and with it an opportunity to create an entirely new opportunity upon it.

I live for this stuff.

I am forever talking about change.  I am always looking for it.  I know that each day represents change in the smallest and most obvious ways… but we humans become embroiled in routine and habit and anything that disrupts (whether positively or negatively) is what I tend to focus on as a study in my own life reactions.

Change, and transition are not scary to me.  As I have explained in the past I will feel apprehension if the change is an unknown, where I must guess or patiently await an outcome that will effect me.  But the change itself is a challenge.  I am adaptable.  I am malleable.  I will seize the opportunity to grow and learn, to shift and stretch.  There is no change that I cannot benefit from if I am approaching it with the right attitude.

This, perhaps, is why I am slightly anxious when the change is not illustrated… at least in part.  To know that there is something coming without knowing what is to give an over-active imagination the time to create a scenario that may set the nerves on edge.  But even the end result of something feared is often not something that will come to fruition anywhere near the way I have imagined.  You would think that a couple of examples of this during the course of a lifetime would give me the proof necessary that faith and trust in the path is all up to my reactions and responses to the very things I fear.

I have been aware of my current transition for months.  There was a period that I did not know what it meant.  There has been a very long period that much may have been slightly spelled out… but parts could not be realized because of proximity and the mere fact that certain things must occur in order for others to do so.  In the coming week we will come out on the other side of the physical part of the transition.  Mentally we have all been preparing and now the real life proof of concept is going to be in front of us.

I, for one, welcome the next piece of the puzzle being added.  I am relieved to finally be where it is that I am next supposed to be.

But in the meantime I will live in this odd cusp between the past and the future.  It is an opportunity like no other to live very much in the moment.

Be Happy.  Be Well.  Be.

Fear is incapacitating. It drives the car. It makes the decisions. It chooses the fates. It is so very easy for me to know how things are going to turn out because of experiences I have already had. If it happened before it is bound to happen again, right? History repeats? What’s the point of doing something if I know how it is going to turn out and Buddha knows it is not going to turn out well.

Does anybody know how hard that is on an intelligent thinker? It’s mind-boggling that I am able to put thoughts together rationally or complete sentences on some days much less work through the myriad of problems, jobs, challenges, fire-drills and flash floods that the world tends to gift me with. Tied up in a bow none the less…. handed to me with a smile and a knowing malevolence. Give it to Mikey, he’ll eat it.

But then… isn’t that what life is all about? Working our way through the maze? Some days I can navigate that puppy without a hitch. Left then right, then right and right again, left and back, up around the corner and WHAM… I have found my way through and to the other side of all the many things that I am here to accomplish.

Other days I am lost. I carry the shovel and find myself unconsciously digging until there is a hole that I am looking up from dazed and confused as to how the hell I got there in the first place. Funny thing about those holes, however. Look carefully. In every hole that I have ever gotten myself into there was a means to pull myself up. A ladder, some steps, a rope…. a means of obvious and easy escape from a trap that I have undoubtedly built for myself.

So… one might ask… why continue to dig the holes? Hell if I know. I suppose that is why I write these blogs… here is where I find my answers (outside of my journals where I can write about you without you knowing.) It is a known fact that we mere humans can talk ourselves into things and just as easily talk ourselves out of them. I do my schizophrenia much better in written form.

I am a very well adjusted man. I am a thinker. I am smart and I am aware. My human side is built on emotion and experience. I have had many of each. I live in my world sympathizing and empathizing. I abhor injustice but I cannot find myself too embroiled in the anger that is necessary for that side of the human spirit. Perhaps that will be my next glorious step on the path. I do know that when I find myself in fear in places that I have been in fear before there is a reason. It means that I am creating it and it may be time to move myself to different pastures… stop in the path and take that right or left into a new avenue.

Change.

But, then I ask myself. If I change… what will happen to this. Where will that be? How will I be able to that? Who is going to…? So I stop and I decide, instead, that I will plot out the path step by step and decide what the answers will be… even if I am not all that happy with what they may be. Sound familiar? Fear: False evidence appearing real. It stops me from growing and changing. It stunts my moments and stalls my happiness. It isn’t something I would suggest and it is something that we all experience whether we want to admit it or not. Can I stop it? I wouldn’t dream of it. Some of the fear I have experienced has provided me with the most cathartic and amazing breakthroughs in my life.

Right now I am about due for another one.

But fear isn’t how I will get there. Letting GO of the fear is. I am tired of many things to the point of fearing they will not end. By fearing this I am holding on to the results because I am trying desperately to figure out the way that I can manipulate and push them into the model of clay that I see fit for what I would “presume” my best answer.

Historically the best results come from heaving the heavy sigh…. and letting go of the results. Let the chips fall where they may. I walk through my day with the best intention and the promise to be and do my best. The results will happen but they will not be mine to choose. But the process is illuminating and free of the fear that causes the problems in the first place. The brush is already clearing on the path. Somewhere up ahead I will see the turn. I am packed and ready to go… I travel light. Breathing… breathing… sighhhhhhh…

Be Happy. Be Well. Be.

Tomorrow I am going to do my second stint as the co-anchor for the a news program for our division at work. It is a slightly campy, quirky and simple turn as an anchor with a lovely young lady named Denise. Truth be told it is easy and quite fun.

It also scares me to death until the camera is on.

All my life I have been a ham… mostly when I was drinking, but I’ve completely come out of my shell since then as well. I loved being out in front. I craved attention and I would “perform” appropriately (and perhaps sometimes NOT appropriately) to achieve this goal.

For me the art of performance is a love / hate proposition. I love the IDEA of being in front of the masses. I like the attention that it could provide (key word is could). I am fond of the idea of being a “star” … but I am and always have been my own worst critic.

When I watch myself on film I am usually not very pleased. I hold myself to a higher standard than I would anyone else. I have my own stilted idea of perfection and the person I believe myself to be will never be within that idea. But with the growth of my ability to love myself (whether in front of others or on my own) has come the acceptance of the ideas of success and doing the very best that I can. This isn’t about Academy Awards and accolades. In the end it is merely about self-expression and the building of confidence in doing the things that I have always wanted to do.

When I went to the first filming for this new newscaster “role” that I have undertaken I was a bundle of nerves. All I could think about was the idea of being awful and doing so in front of a camera. It isn’t bad enough that one can be or look foolish but to do so where everyone can see again and again… is not necessarily the smartest career move ever made.

Oddly enough when I reached the studio in April I found myself amongst friends and in a very comfortable environment. It was painless and one of the easiest “jobs” I could ever ask to do. Every single fear that I had felt on the way over melted within moments and in no time at all I was finished and craving more.

Tomorrow I will do it again. I have read through my lines and most of them, as silly as they seem, are going to be easy to deliver. I feel as I write this today that I am not at all afraid of the shoot…. but at the same time I am positive that I will feel the familiar butterflies on my way over there.

The most important part about anything that exhilarates and scares is to walk right through it. Do it. Finish it. Experience it. Enjoy it. Come out on the other side and know that you have done what felt so difficult to move towards. All I know is that I watched myself after the first time and I was proud. I had done something that I enjoyed and didn’t feel the fool.

I’ll take that any day.

Be Happy. Be Well. Be.

They say that all the world is an actor. Some are definitely better at that job than others. But some, you could say, are amazingly good without even knowing…

How convincing are you at showing the world and the people around you on a daily basis that you are who you want them to see you be? I’d say I am getting much better at it… but underneath… there is another personality.

The angry guy.

Some days both of these people converge and become one. Other days I am succeeding in the common overtaking of the negatives and the anger seems irrelevant… and out of sight.

What is important for me, however, is not in hiding the anger… or denying it exists. We are human and it would be unhealthy to not recognize that the world around us is going to present us with people, situations and frustrations that are less than stellar. On good days I am able to work through these things. I am able to allow the frustrations to brush right through me knowing full well they aren’t really about me at all.

If only I were that healthy all the time.

The true ZEN in character comes in acceptance of ones-self. Those who truly know who they are can be and probably are the most well-adjusted in their worlds and around other people. More and more in my world I am able to find myself happy and look at the irritants as tiny little challenges throughout the course of a day. Let’s face it… most of what bothers us is repetitive. We’ve been there before. We’ve been angry at them and dwelled on the negative often shifting our entire psyche into a new direction… which could very well continue down that path throughout a day. The true accomplishment in character is recognition of the irritant, awareness that its effect is only damaging to YOU and then moving on down the path that aids and benefits us.

More important, however, is to acknowledge that those challenges do exist. I remember when I was young in sobriety I thought the ultimate goal was to get rid of fear and anger. I’ll fight it, I said. I kill it and be anger and fear free. That will happen… when I am dead. Finally I figured out that I should probably concentrate on goals and accomplishments that suited living people…. and the fact remains that fear and anger are a part of all our lives whether or not we want them to be.

So awareness (and I talk about this a lot) is my friend. Fear and anger are not anywhere near as dangerous as I would have them be if I can look at them and remember that their effect is truly up to me. If I see something that angers me and allow it to change my mood I become angry. If I see something that angers me and put it in its proper place… I am able to move on and get the full potential out of the day ahead.

It is an exercise in priorities. It really all boils down to one of my favorite “Agreements” by Don Miguel Ruiz. “Don’t Take Anything Personally.” It reads like this: Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering.

The days that I am able to put the things in front of me into perspective are the days that I am most proud of who I am in the world.

But being angry doesn’t make us a bad person… that is a vital tidbit that I believe we all tend to forget. That would be like saying that being human is not good. We have to be who we are and the world dictates that sort of emotional behavior from time to time. If I didn’t feel anger I am not sure I would be able to gauge the difference between it and love. We are confronted with pros and cons everywhere we go. To deny that the cons exist is to live half a life and not truly get to know who you are capable of being. It is a denial of self and of the growth one can receive by understanding the very natures of where the angers are coming from. Awareness and acceptance can lead to understanding if practiced regularly.

In the big picture I have ONE personality with many facets and moods. I like to think that there are days when that personality is compromised and I “become someone else”. I suppose it is easier to explain behavior or situations if we do something out of our better character. But nothing is necessarily going to ruin my existence… it doesn’t have to.

How many personalities do you have today? Get to know them… you’ll be surprised at what you might find out.

Be Happy. Be Well. Be.