# Recovery

Christianity is not about changing other people—it isn’t! It’s nice if people do change, but that’s God’s work. It’s about changing ourselves, and that never stops.

recovering a sense of self and purpose

Drinking helped me be the person I thought people wanted me to be. Recovery helped me find the person I actually was and to live the life I was meant to lead.

the emotional literacy section of the manhood handbook was ripped out somewhere around second grade and replaced with “just walk it off.”

“Spiritual bypassing is a term I coined to describe a process I saw happening in the Buddhist community I was in, and also in myself. Although most of us were sincerely trying to work on ourselves, I noticed a widespread tendency to use spiritual ideas and practices to sidestep or avoid facing unresolved emotional issues, psychological wounds, and... See more

As a member of this Program I love that I am here to not just avoid the liquor store, but also practice healthy, sustainable living.

But of course calling oneself a monster can be a form of self-aggrandizement. The worst part of myself is my occasional feeling that I am a very, very special kind of monster. A dumb story I can get caught up in is this one: No one is as big a monster as me. The grandiosity of my self-loathing (and its attendant self-pity) could blot out the sun if... See more

Basically I was trying to gather impediments in my mind to pull me back from pushing myself outside my comfort zone.

the thing I did that seemed completely impossible at the start was this: I started to live my own life, the one that was meant for me.

I stopped listening to what other people said, I stopped listening to what I imagined people were saying. I stopped listening to the nonsense I said. I started listening to my heart. I stopped pretending and started... See more