Halloween, NYC, 2017
When I first got sober, I heard this 12 Step suggestion many times during meetings: “Act as if….”.
Act as if? What does that even mean, I thought? Act as if….what?
I heard people say, “Act as if you are confident,”.
That’s ridiculous, I thought.
Act as if you can do the job, those somewhat annoying sober people said.
That’s even more ridiculous. I’m committed to authenticity, I thought. I would never be inauthentic.
Ha. I was an interesting contrarian; having been consistently stoned and intermittently drunk for twenty years, I nevertheless was aggressively committed to my authenticity. Yes, I was authentically stoned and drunk.
As time passes and I learn about neuroscience and the transmutation of the brain, I realize what a brilliant suggestion this really is. The plasticity of the brain makes it possible for us to create new neuropathways, changing the brain, the body and behavior. We can literally lean in the direction of a non-habitual response, and begin to repattern the brain to fire in that way. Amazing how the Old Timers who carved out the Recovery Programs in the 1930’s, white men in suits, had such sharp instincts. More importantly, through trial and error, by seeing what didn’t work, they created a sustainable system of healing from addiction, which has outlasted these many decades.
I lived for sixteen years on First Avenue and Fifth Street, in lower Manhattan.
Once a New Yorker, always a New Yorker.
It was a profound sixteen years for me; in that funky, fourth-floor-walkup, I came out as a lesbian, bottomed out on drugs and alcohol, and found my way into sobriety. As it is for many, New York offered me the developmental fast-track.
Once a New Yorker, always a New Yorker.
In response to the terrorist attack in Lower Manhattan on Halloween, I choose some distance from the totality of its angst. I choose to lean away from thinking the worst of the world and of us, its people. I choose to not lose myself inside the this, newest tragedy.
Once a New Yorker, always a New Yorker.
I’ll get to those feelings. I’ll take it in—I’ll feel it and process it. But not today.
For today, just for this slice, this teeny slice of today, I choose to act as if I am wholly in love with this glorious earth.
For today, just for this slice of today, I choose to put the tragedy of New York, my always-city, my always-home, on the back burner.
For today, just for this slice of today, I choose to love the trees, to savor the sky, to breathe deeply the air that has been allotted to me.
For today, just for this slice of today, I choose to tread gently into this terrible news and spare my heart its newest shattering.
For today, just for this slice of today, I choose to trust the goodness of human-ness, us all, remembering that the salvation, the exit from this violent and hopeless time resides in each of our hearts, in each of our actions, in our intentions to connect through kindness and love.
For today, just for this slice of today, I will trust people and myself and our shared human heart.
For today, I will act as if.
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And you, dear readers, is there any issue in your life that would benefit from this practice of “acting as if”? What would that look like? Consider. Contemplate. Relax and breathe. Let us celebrate the lives we have been given. Please keep me posted. I am aruni@rnetworx.com.
All blessings,
Aruni