my daily reflections…

another of the most profound lessons in makin amends came when i attempted to write to someone i had resented for most of my life. each draft i gave to my sponsor was handed back with the same reminder: an amends is never about what they did, it is about what i did. after several rewrites, i finally understood. my resentment and anger had kept me locked in self-pity, turnin every situation into a narrative centered on me rather than on Brotherly Love. what i came to see was that even if i had not initiated the original harm, i had caused injury through the way i held on to bitterness, how i thought about this person, and how those thoughts influenced my actions. to try to justify myself or condemn them would have been an attempt to impose my own version of Justice, not to seek reconciliation. this process exposed the defects of character i had been nurturin and showed me how they had kept me trapped in my alcoholism. freedom came only when i accepted full responsibility for my part and focused on cleanin my side of the street. forgiveness became the release that allowed me to stop measurin myself by anothers actions. forgivin does not erase memory, but it enables me to move forward without carryin the emotional, psychological, behavioral, and spiritual harms from the days of doin my dirt. by practicin this, i no longer live in the pain of old resentments. Justice, in recovery, means responsibility for my own actions and the Humility to make them right. 1 day @ a time...