OTHER LAUNDRY LIST
June 10, from “Strengthening My Recovery” daily reader
“0ur experience shows that the opposites [of the Laundry List] are just as damaging as the counterpart.” BRB p. 8
“Realizing the damaging effects of the Other Laundry List gives many of us our early sense of frustration with the ACA program. Once the elation of finally finding a group of people who get that we were affected by our childhoods eventually fades, we start the slow process of admitting that we may have unconsciously done the very same things to those around us that were done to us. This is a hard reality to accept, but it is the necessary ground breaking that allows our spiritual foundation to be poured on honest footing. With time, we realize we were in denial about our actions. The behaviors that served as a protective way of getting through our traumatic childhoods did not serve us well as adults. We had become used to beating ourselves up and acting out.
ACA suggests that we reparent ourselves and break the harmful cycle we’ve found ourselves in. With the support of our meetings and fellow traveler, the work we do helps us feel embraced by our inner loving parent and our Higher Power. We can now allow the process of coming out of denial and into spiritual consciousness to slowly and gently unfold as we recover buried feelings and memories that drove our True Self into hiding.
On this day I admit that not only was I affected by the dysfunction, but that I also affected those around me. And I will practice being gentle and loving of my True Self as I continue to awaken spiritually.”
My Experience:
This was a hard pill to swallow. To know that I did some of the same things that were done to me. To know that, although I may not have done all the things that were done to me, I replaced them with other, equally damaging behaviors. In step four, you identify and write these things down. That was incredibly difficult to admit. But in step five you voice these traits to yourself, your Higher Power and to another person (in my case, my sponsor). To actually tell someone else the exact nature of my wrongs was frightening. But after I was able to voice these wrongs, like there most assuredly would have been in the past, there was no judgement. My sponsor did not judge but was instead very supportive, which caused me to be gentle with myself and not judge. I came to see that these were bad things that I did, but I was not a bad person!
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