I have previously written, in several shares, about hitting bottom—at the age of sixty—after surviving forty-five years of my addiction to alcohol. In those shares, I focused on my understanding that hitting bottom was the point in my addiction when my thinking, ego mind could no longer identify with any thoughts, images, or concepts that I had accumulated during my life that could end my cravings to escape the mental suffering and physical pain I was experiencing. Everything I had learned, experienced, or believed in my past could no longer support the self-image that I had created to maintain my survival with addiction. My mind and body were exhausted. That was the moment my ego disappeared in humiliation. Finally, my self-ego had to admit it was powerless over its addiction, and the humbled, selfless “Who am I—now?” needed help to re-discover true Self-understanding.
Little did I know then, or in my earlier shares, that hitting bottom is when the thinking ego disappears in the humiliation of lost identity. That was my first powerless act of exercising humility—experiencing selflessness—letting go of my ego and letting go of my past was the beginning of my Recovery from addiction. Allowing the understanding that my primary addiction was not to alcohol but it was my addiction to the past, to my ego-identity, the created self: “who ‘I’ think ‘I am.’” My past is the root cause of all my addictions, the need to escape what I am thinking and feeling now by constantly reliving my accumulated past and projecting it into the future to avoid the present suffering and pain—at all costs.
So, starting Recovery from any substance addiction begins with letting go, the humiliating loss of my past self-ego identity, which is not my true Self: not by forgetting or changing my past lack of self-love, which is impossible, not by avoiding the past, which is irresponsible, but by healing the past with compassionate true Selfless-Love—now. By understanding my past with nonjudgmental, Self-loving compassion and treating myself with loving kindness, I can dissolve the past—now—in the present moment.
The truth is that once my ego hits bottom in substance addiction and starts Recovery, unless I stay humble and selfless, my past, my ego identity—which is all I know—will relapse its way into using again—for its survival. The only way I can stay free of substance addiction is to remain humble by staying aware of my thinking, staying aware of my past identity that is constantly trying to recreate what it already knows: relapsing by thinking, which is the illusion of time (the only place the ego can exist)—to avoid being humiliated and disappearing in the reality of the present moment.
So, staying sober is staying humble by staying aware in the present moment where the self-ego can’t exist. Staying humble is selfless freedom from the self-ego, freedom from my core addiction to reliving the past, which yields freedom from whatever substance the self-ego has “added on” to escape my real feelings arising in the present moment, where the ego disappears, dissolving in the humility of understanding my ever-present, loving true Self!
Love you guys!
[1] “Selflessness is humility. Humility and freedom go hand in hand. Only a humble person can be free.” ? Jeff Wilson.
VAB 01-20-25
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Addiction or no addiction, the ego is insidious… it finds a way to rout out humility. Keeping still (inside) while surrounded by people and their drama, requires more presence than seems possible to maintain. The mind, engrained in much negative experience, from this and past lifetimes, is heavier than one’s tender sprout of liberation. The mind can crush it, in an instant… landing us again and again outside the flow of The Stream leaving us sitting along the water’s edge… waiting to be carried… again. Coming to accept this as natural…not resisting the ebbs in favor of the flows, is another way the ego interferes.
Perhaps one’s addiction is a great gift. One’s motivation to remain present becomes a matter of life and death. Keep going, it’s hard, it is the way. Godspeed ~
Thank you for your support and comments. Yes, wrestling with the duality of living in the world is a constatant struggle. Letting go of controlling the constructed world outside of us, and focusing our subjective awareness on the flowing energy of true Self-Love within is the end of constant objective identification, when the ego-self disappears, and all that remains is Love — in the silent, peaceful, loving state of meditation, being connected in unity with the Laws of Nature manifesting, creating with the activity of selfless Love, the world of consciousness we reflect. Thanks again.