Humility and Sponsorship

This past week, I let go of a number of people, anyone who was disrupting my peace. A couple of them were people I had been sponsoring. Sponsorship is an odd thing. I sponsor people because it helps me feel better about myself, when I am selfless. I am not helping other people as much as I am facilitating a recovery program, explaining "How it Works" and what things I do to care for myself in recovery. Most of the time I am listening, sometimes I pause to explain the program, occasionally I make a confession of my own to keep the karma equal and encourage others to be honest. I need to be more honest about my sponsoring people here in the rooms. Please understand, every sponsee is expendable. It is imperative for my recovery to do service work, it is not important who I do it for or how long it lasts. It is also not important if people follow through with my suggestions or continue to work the steps. Every time I meet with anyone, I allow myself to detach with a reminder that I may never speak to them again, it's really not up to me. I have discovered, I am a much better crisis sponsor than I am a long term sponsor. In many cases, people are only willing to speak with me once, then they judge something about me or realize something they do not want to face and the relationship ends. I have ZERO tolerance for people judging me or offering unsolicited advice. I do not care what any of my sponsees think of me and do not want to hear what they think I should be doing. In fact, if they have any urge to guide me or if they offer me support, I know right away that they are not thinking correctly and are focusing too much on me and not themselves. I am not a humble person and frankly, people pay me for sponsorship outside of recovery. I charge $50 an hour and do individual and couples sessions. My time has value and many sponsees take it for granted, because they are not being charged. To help me combat the various potential pitfalls in sponsorship, I make certain I point out when the people I am working with are making healthy choices and I thank them often for trusting me and being honest with me, because that is what we both need. The more open and honest someone can be with me, the easier it is for me to remain in a state of Acceptance and support them through the recovery process. Recovery is an emotional journey. I encourage people to cry, complain and confess to help them manage their traumas. I cry for my sponsees when they relapse, because I know how horrible it is to still be trapped in the addiction. Many times, I cry for people who cannot or will not cry for themselves. I have accepted that for the most part, unless people are paying me, they are probably going to be temporary additions to my recovery and they may even go backwards if things go poorly between us. People with trauma trigger other people with trauma and only when we are humble can we remain teachable. I think that is why I prefer to sponsor women over other genders. I find women are more able to express and release their emotions with me and sadly, men tend to treat recovery like it is a competition and that they need to prove to me that they have something to offer. I honestly do not care what they have to offer, my intention is to serve recovery, not learn from them so they are simply not understanding the point of our time together. I again want to thank everyone who comes to me for support, whether is lasts a minute or the rest of my life. I will always do service work in some capacity, but do not be surprised if you hear from some people that I am a real jerk in private. More than a couple people here and in person have triggered my traumas by judging me and I go from peaceful to pissed instantly when I am judged, and I let them know. It is not unusual for me to curse at someone when they disrespect me and waste my time. Humble people will never see that side of me. When someone is humble and hurting, I am possibly the best person on this platform to speak to because I have been in pain for years. I also know a great many things that are not taught anywhere, because they have arisen from my own self-awareness and research outside of recovery. In short, if you are hurting and really need someone to talk to, I would be very grateful for the opportunity to support you as far as you are willing to go, without judging me or offering me advice. Thank you, bless you and best wishes. May we never share cross words and may you always progress in your recovery, with or without me. Sincerely, Rev. Jeff Rounds