Table of Contents
My Somewhat Religious Upbringing
As most people are aware, Alcoholics Anonymous has a strong emphasis on finding and trusting a higher power, which many choose to call God. Many of those who hear this and have not attended meetings or even read much regarding AA will often see this as AA being a religious program that requires you to believe in the God of the Christian faith. That’s not true in the slightest; many who walk into the rooms are already believers of Christianity, but many are skeptical of religion as a whole.
Raised and confirmed Catholic, I never truly felt as though I had a relationship with God, at least in the Christian sense. Soon after confirmation, I became an atheist and strongly believed in the absence of a higher being we cannot see or have proof of, but who somehow made the universe and controls everything. A few years later, it occurred to me that I can’t disprove the existence of a God either, and thus identified as agnostic.
How Meetings Kindled the Flame
When I entered the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous, I was turned off by all the God talk. Organized religion was not something I cared for or wished to be a part of. I have never heard God speak to me, and I can’t picture how that would even sound. I didn’t understand what they meant by “a higher power of your own understanding”, though in time it started to make sense.
I came to understand there are powers greater than myself. One of those was alcohol and drugs. Eventually, I started believing in some sort of power that holds the universe together, though I wasn’t sure what that looked like. Then I realized that the men in the rooms who had gone through worse than I have and carry decades of sobriety are powers greater than me, as they can suggest changes I should make in my life that I may not have even noticed.
Getting a sponsor has always been easy for me. I’ve seldom been without a sponsor, but I have gone through five or six before my current one came into play. He’s loaded with wisdom about life and the program of AA, has 30+ years of sobriety, and my uncle was the one who initially got him sober through his sponsorship long before his passing some ~5 years ago. My uncle never saw me finally get clean, and I wish every day that he had.
This is where I began more prayer: when my uncle passed away. Our relationship was close, and I felt inside of me that there was some power or spirit that wanted me to continue down this path of recovery. My own son’s middle name is that of my uncle.
Praying to Whom?
I didn’t know what I was praying to. Praying to whatever God will listen is great, but there was never a point where it felt like God was responding to my wishes.
When I totaled my car drunk driving without getting a DUI, that was evidence of a God out there saving my ass. The luck I had from that night will most likely never be surpassed in my lifetime. That’s when I knew there was something out there, whether it’s God, some sort of spirit working through others, or the universe controlling what happens. I should have died that night.
Praying each night has continued to be a daily routine for me. However, it has always felt like I’m praying just to “tick the boxes” and get it done. I recite the same wishes I always do; praying for health, protection, safety, happiness, and security for those that are closest to me in my life. It didn’t feel like it meant anything, and it’s no way to build a relationship with my higher power.
The Second Step
Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
This is where I fucked up. I didn’t honestly explore my spiritual beliefs when taking this step, other than agreeing that I believed in God, which was a bit dubious as is.
These first few steps are crucial for building a firm foundation for the following ones. Half-assing these steps eventually does come around to bite you. I know this because it always happens to me, I just haven’t identified it until now.
Last night I did some research. I explored different avenues of spirituality through a large handful of various blogs and articles, and came to my own conclusions about what I need to fix this.
I’m getting tripped up at “God could and would if he were sought.” I haven’t genuinely sought out a power greater than myself, I bullshitted my second step and don’t know what my God is. That being said, I don’t need to find my higher power, I just need to search for it.
Someone on Reddit said,
My higher power is not in what I believe, how I feel, or what I think. My higher power is in my actions. My actions toward myself and others demonstrates what I truly believe, how I actually feel and what I really think.
This rings so true to me. I need to live my higher power’s will, every moment of every day, in order to connect with it and discover more about God and myself.
This is when I wrote down exactly what my higher power is to me, what I believe to be true.
What God Looks Like to Me
This is the framework for what my God looks like. It’s not perfect. It’s a constant work-in-progress. I may remove things and introduce new ones. Searching for my God is a fluid process, like the water in the ocean, regularly shifting with my connection to him through my lived experiences and spiritual journey.
- God is not found at a temple or shrine, he is present everywhere and in everything.
- My life is remarkably short relative to the age of the universe. Before me there were countless individuals seeking the answers to spirituality, and after me there will be infinitely more.
- God shows himself to me by telling me what is right and what is wrong. I don’t hear a magic voice in my head, but I understand what is right, I often just choose to do what is wrong.
- My actions define me, and the actions that bring me closer to God are those that come from honesty, being of service to others, meditating, and pursuing spiritual and personal growth.
- The ego in my consciousness wants to do me harm and is fighting against my trust in a higher power. Doing what my God wills for me is directly counteracting ego.
- Living an authentic life is key to discovering more of what God has in store for me.
- Søren Kierkegaard emphasized the “leap of faith” and the idea that individuals must make intensely personal, passionate choices rather than just going along with the crowd. Sartre describes “bad faith” as what happens when we deny our freedom and pretend we are forced into choices by societal roles or external circumstances. That is authenticity to me.
- Prayer is important and comes from the heart, not from talking in my head and ticking off the checkboxes. Pray about what you feel inside. Practicing silent meditation will fine-tune your understanding of what God wants for you.
- My actions and thoughts should not even consider what others may think of me so long as I know them to be true to what God wills for me.
- I do not know what happens after death, and I cannot get held up on what it may be. The life I live in now is what God has given me to experience, I must make the most out of my time here.
- The human condition frequently makes us closer to our higher power, though sometimes makes us feel alone and without it. It’s okay to feel this way so long as I constantly strive to strengthen my relationship with it.
- God is not responsible for the terrible aspects of the world like murder, rape, genocide, and war. This is the result of individuals taking the reins and using their own will against the advisement of God, and he cannot take blame.
As for meditation, I believe in the practice of Zazen, the meditative discipline practiced in the school of Zen Buddhism. Silent meditation separates you from your ego, allowing thoughts to flow through you and pass like clouds drifting over a mountain’s peak.
With these genuine, profoundly personal beliefs finally articulated, I can begin my passage towards spiritual grown and understanding. This spiritual maturing will be a process I live with until death, not something that happens at the snap of a finger, and that is okay so long as I seek to do as my God, defined above, wills it to be.