In The Pursuit of God

I have always had a fascination with religion. I grew up in Catholic household, attended church on Sunday and once a week at my tiny Catholic school called Holy Spirit. I was confirmed and baptized as Catholic. I learned many strong lessons in this faith that have guided my sense of integrity to date. "Love they neighbor as thyself" being one of the most important lessons. Also, God is a forgiving entity  and not a vengeful God. 

While growing up, I had a best friend across the street. We played so many days together. Her family belong to the Baptist Christian Church by our house. She used to take me to all her youth functions. I have to hand it to the Baptist, they had many more cool youth activities than the Catholics did. There were marked difference in our faiths. When I would come home from activities from the church, my Dad would often ask me if they tried to convert me. I would tell him "yes they did..." which was true ".... and I told them that I am not allowed to convert because my parents said 'no'". What a bizarre conversation to remember. Both faiths believe in Jesus as the Son of God. We read from very similar Bibles. Our traditions were, however, very different. Again, some of those traditions I still hold very steadfast in my life. 

When I was about 17, I started on this minor "faith" journey. I didn't feel like I connected with the Catholic church so much anymore and I sought to attend other churches. It's funny how those quick conversations with my Dad still stuck in my head. I have attended Lutheran, Evangelical, Fundamentalist, Baptist, Pentecostal, Methodist and Universalist churches in the past. There are some churches I was just taken away by the celebration of faith - the singing and dances and people yelling "Amen!". Coming from a more conservative religion background, I had never seen anything like that and I was pretty uncomfortable because I was used to my more quiet, meditative state of the Catholic church. In fact, I was a little frightened by it because I thought that God didn't like this...He liked our way - chanting, structure, reserved. 

I have been quite open about the fact that I readily and fully walk away from, not only the Catholic church, but God as a whole. I felt I would be so much better. I prayed and nothing happened, I did this, that and the other thing and my dreams didn't come true. Deep down, though, I envied those with this unshakable faith. There were women on my floor in college who would have people over to their room and I believe they had Bible studies, they were often singing and celebrating. They weren't like me - out getting drunk and creating trouble. How did they know and embraced their faith like that? I admit, I judged them as "lame" or whatever. Meanwhile, in the depths of my heart, I wanted what they had. In the AA world, we say "if you want what we have, these are the steps we followed....". What I saw in those women was a commitment to something bigger. They didn't need to party lifestyle, they didn't need the immediate gratification of, well, anything. It was so intriguing to be, but also terrifying. I used to the think they were too narrow of thought and too focus on one thing in life. Simply, they were missing out on all the fun that I was having. 

I avoided AA like the plague when I started to realize that I had a problem. Oh my word, I am not doing the "God thing". No way, no how. While I was in nursing school, our mental health instructor required us to go to an open AA meeting as part of a class assignment. Was there any greater and bigger torture this woman could think up for our class?????? I found a speaker meeting in St. Louis Park. I can still see that church when I am in the area. This year was 2004. A woman told her story. She talked about not going out anymore with friends and choosing to stay home and drink alone. This was starting to happen to me at this point. She talked about a time when he accidently hit her bottle of wine off of the counter and it shattered into a million pieces on the floor. She immediately took a towel, sopped up the wine and rang the towel into a cup. That was the last bottle of wine she had in the house. The hell she was wasting it! She drank that wine, not caring if tiny shards of glass were being ingested. It was like this woman was talking to me since I had done something relatively similar 2 weeks prior when I broke a bottle of rum in a plastic bag. I ran upstairs, stopped up the sink and poured the remainder of the rum in the sink and scooped into a glass. I just bought that bottle. The hell I was going to waste it! 

One might think I would have taken away a message from this. Then....she started talking about all the God stuff. Damnit, you almost had me....then you had to start with all of that. I don't believe in God, I would say. I don't need God....I prayed and nothing happened. There are 6 billion people in the world, why would I think God has time for me? I cried the entire way home because I know I should have reached out, but I stopped short because of spirituality. I wrote my paper and talked openly about the fact that I knew I had a drinking problem and this AA meeting could have changed my life. But it didn't because there is no God. The instructor encouraged me to get help. I did about 6 years later....better late than never in this game.

It was about a year into my recovery before I addressed God the way I needed to address God. By address, I mean get over myself and move forward with God and stop with all the fighting which was totally one-sided anyway. Once I started to embrace God again, I started seeing all these little things that were amazing to me. There was a woman in my treatment who was so desperately struggling to get clean. I took her home one day and say that she was living in a duplex. The guy downstairs was dealing drugs out of the bottom unit and fed her drugs to keep her quiet about the activities. She finally got into a long-term residential treatment setting and in group I said "Thank God. And I really mean, Thank You God." It was the first time that I wasn't saying "Thank God" without actually meaning it. One of my DBT skills was to practice gratefulness. I opted to thank God for every green light I made it through for a week. It was the coolest thing...I still thank God for each green light I make it through and I get this sense of all these little amazing wonders in the world around me.

As a preparation for my trip to Honduras, I participated in some Bible studies and other "religious" (for lack of a better term) activities as a way to prepare ourselves for being missionaries. I had become very confused about my faith for the past year or so. Maybe I am in a growth period, wanting or needing more of something. I know things have been rough and they yearning may be for more than just religion. I am longing my recovery program which is my connection to God. I felt out of place a lot of times in the meetings. I felt like I was a "faker". I am not exactly sure why. I meant everything I said in those groups. I was preparing to be of service to others. Maybe because when I think of religion versus spirituality - I am most comfortable in my Catholic roots. When I think of spirituality, I think of my connection with everything around me and how this connects me with God. They are two very different things in my world. Oddly, they don't always mesh together as well as one might assume. 

My roommate from my mission trip invited me to a concert with a bunch of Christian performers. I have not heard any song from any of these bands, but I thought, what the heck? I love music, my roommate was very cool. I got nothing to lose.  I held a little skepticism that I might be in a situation of attempted conversion. It wasn't that at all. It was one of those "right time" things. The first band came out and they spoke about how women need to view themselves as worthy and strong. Women are not to be used and thrown away, women are to be respected and most importantly respected by themselves. I gave a high 5 to my roomie. Damn straight, I was just telling her about being in a relationship with a negative Nelly and I was lacking in a sense of closeness for over 5 years. Humph. That was pretty cool.

There was a a few song which actually brought me to tears. The first song was called Come to the Well. It's a song about trying to hard all the time to do everything and still being thirsty at the end of the day. God has the plan and the will, just come and sit. I just so deeply connected with this song. The plan has been laid out yet instead of walking the path I am zipping to the left and to the right, around the path. I just wear myself out when all I have to do is slow down. Additionally in this song, the band sings over and over: Leave it All Behind. They sang about the trials people have with addiction, divorce, losing jobs, losing hope - leave it all behind - reconnect with God. I was really moved by this song. The second song was sung by a woman who has every reason in the world to question her faith in God and the world. She had such a beautiful voice and she sang "I surrender". As she was telling her life story in this song, I was so reminded of the most important spiritual principle of my recovery program - surrender. "Made a conscious decision to turn my will and life over to God as I understand Him." It was during these two songs, I had a moment of clarity. I had stopped surrendering. I was trying to force things that were not meant to be forced. I just have to exhibit some patience.

I am nearing the completion of school and starting down the path of looking for work. I applied for a position that I had been eyeing for quite some time. I was in a position of being offered this job. Meanwhile, my heart is still where I work and I had not been officially told "no" that a position could be made for me. I spoke to my Mom and my therapist and some friends. It was all pretty clear to them what I needed to do. So I prayed and I cancelled the second interview with the other company and waited to see what might become of my current job. Almost immediately after I cancelled the interview, I got an email from my boss that her and the Director of my program wanted to meet with me about the potentiality of building a position for me. I was so excited and I started to get my hopes sky high that this was it! I was going to get the job. 

After going to this concert, I took away so much personal insight into life right now. I decided that I wasn't going to pray to get the job, I was going to pray to have the right thing happen. Whatever the offer was or wasn't, it was the right thing. Something changed in my heart, in a very positive way, when I talked to God on Sunday night. My prayer was simply "I pray for the right thing to happen tomorrow. Whatever the outcome is, I believe it to be the right thing." Maybe because I wasn't asking for something this time, maybe because I am in a place of better acceptance, whatever it was, there was this immediate rush of peace I felt. I had butterflies in my stomach - of course this is the position that I want. Want does not mean deserve. Want does not mean "I get". Coming from a place of acceptance either way seemed to release the tension of anticipation. I have options and paths to take whatever the outcome of the meeting would be.

When I sat down with them today, they told me that they could not immediately put this position together BUT they believe if I could hang on until the fall time, it would be very likely to happen. So there suggestion was to come back as a nurse and help/work when and where I wanted to. The Director encouraged me to look into an on-call position to keep the counseling skills going while we put together the final pitch to develop the position. I can still work for them which I love. I could do part time there and part time in addiction's counseling and not get burnt out on either. I will have income. I even contacted a potential employer that is interested in me from my internship a few semesters ago about a part time position. I am excited. We talked about things and the potential of creating this new position. I have absolute faith they will do everything to follow through with their actions. Meanwhile, I have the opportunity to look around cautiously and deliberately without worrying about money. So, yeah, I think the "right" thing happened. 

I feel since school is coming to an end and the major hurdles are done, I will have an opportunity to continue to explore this part of my life. That concert reminded me that the spiritual part of me is a bit under attack by stress and chaos. I long for my recovery program. Now, I will finally get back to this place and this journey. I have found in recovery, I need to continue to grow and expand my recovery. If I stop, I become stagnant and start to feel "restless, irritable and discontent" which are the three words that really mean RELAPSE.  I put my recovery on auto-pilot during this program which was huge gamble. Fortunately, I beat the odds but I am starting to see not by much. It might be a bit of an exaggeration to say that this concert "saved my life" but in a small way it did. I am starting to feel connected again. I went from sleeping 13-15 hours per day to 7-8 hours in the past few weeks. I am getting out of bed and feeling ready for a challenge. Bill W. and Dr. Bob talked about moments of enlightenment....I have had them before, but nothing to the scale like this last weekend. That concert really tapped deeply into a spiritual emptiness that was causing such restlessness. I went back to Step 3 and turned it all over and now......peace.

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