The Pencils
My mind has been flitting around all week from one thing to another as I tried to think of a topic for this week’s meeting. I kept landing on a story that my first sponsor told me in the beginning of my sobriety. It was a story about a cup full of pencils on a school teachers desk. She said that during a normal week that cup would get knocked around pretty good and sometimes fell to the floor. After a while those pencils that were on the outer edges of the cup would get scuffed up or broken, sometimes broken so badly that they were no longer able to do their job. Only the ones in the middle of the pack remained unharmed. She said it was like that in AA. If you stay on the edges you are likely to get all scuffed up and maybe fall to the floor, but if you remain in the center of the pack you will stay safe.
During my time in this program I have found myself on occasion getting complacent and finding excuses to stay away from meetings and isolate. From somewhere in the deep recesses comes the story of the pencils and I am reminded once again that I stay safe by staying in the middle of the pack. My sobriety is contingent on a daily reprieve and that means my connection to God and to you. I get that connection by going to meetings, talking to my HP, my sponsor and my fellow alcoholics and letting you know what is really going on with me. I need to remember where I came from and what is needed to be on this journey. If I have one hand in yours, one hand in God’s I do not have another to pick up a drink.
There have been times of tragedy in my sobriety where, had I not been in the center of the pack I don’t know if I would have survived. If you have had similar times, please share with us. Of course, please feel free to share whatever is on your mind also.