Beer Binger

I used to be a beer binge drinker. I have been sober now for over two years. I have gone to many 12-step meetings. I know that I will never drink again because I hit my bottom and every drinker must hit bottom before they decide to quit for good. I have experienced this so it is true for me.

In A.A. we are taught to turn our will over to the care of a Higher Power. This can be anything one chooses as long as it is greater than you. We pray for the willingness to do the will of our Higher Power, circumventing the ego's wants and desires. Like Tao, A.A promotes going with the flow, keeping it simple and taking it easy...not getting too caught up in the material world.

I have found many correlations between the two paths and I sincerely think that Taoism can blend with any path; it is all-inclusive. However, who do I pray to? A.A. talks a lot about having a 'personal God,' and frankly I've never had a 'real' conversation with 'God"-though I have fantasized that I did. I think it was only my own mind speaking to me. I have found the Universal Spirit through humans, signs, synchronicities and lucid dreaming. Perhaps I am Agnostic. I do believe in the Way because I have experienced it. The totality of existence makes since to me but I have not felt that yet. I have experienced life after death and other realms of being. I have walked the pathless path and I have fallen from it. I know the difference. And I choose today to follow Tao.

But is Tao greater than me or the same as me? If we are one with Tao and everything is connected, are we not 'Gods;' are we not Tao ourselves? Are we not a microcosm of the totality of existence? However, if I made 'myself' my Higher Power from where would I draw the Power to stay sober like A.A eschews? A.A. contends that 'God' keeps us sober. But if I don't believe in God...how am I sober?

There is that fear that runs through A.A.; that if you stop going to meetings regularly you will get drunk. I don't like the meetings anymore. I'd rather hang out with other Taoists and like-minded individuals. I know in my heart I will never drink again but A.A. has brain washed me a bit and I am a little afraid of not sticking with the program.

I seek to connect with the Power that is Tao. I don't have to understand it. And I can't name it. I wonder if it's loving and close...or far away and detached. Will it allow a personal relationship or must I rely on only the proverbs in the Tao Te Ching? What does Tao mean...is it everything and nothing? Is it infinity?

I can not grasp Tao. But I want to love it and I want it to love me. Does it know me, does it see me? Is it just energy...the energy of creation and the void from which creation is birthed? That would be everything and nothing...like yin and yang. Perhaps I have been conditioned by childhood western Christianity and A.A. to think there is a God because it is comfortable but in my heart of hearts I think Tao is greater than any God. Or are thy the same words meaning th same thing? I personally recoil from the word. 'God.'

Alan Watts was an active drunk until he died, yet I love his Tao books. I'm glad I'm sober because I couldn't handle life t all when I sucked down a 12 pack.
I seek the peace of knowing, yet Tao tells me not to strive for this. I am a bit lost and confused. Been that way all my life...I just don't understand the world at all. And this gives me a since of loneliness and anxiety.

[Spiritlite]

I understand that feeling of a sense of loneliness and anxiety related to being a lost and confused soul at times. I never really knew myself until about a year ago (which was when I was 34)....pretty weird huh. I was just living life blindly.
As for whether to stop the AA meetings or not....I can't say, that's your feelings and your life.
However stuff in life happens and has anything bad happened to you while being sober that makes you just want to drink again? I have several friends who quit drinking then turned back, however two of those stopped on their own without AA or counseling and the third did go to AA but stopped going to the meetings. I'm not saying that to scare you.
I am not familiar with Tao. have you looked into other spiritual practices? Such as budhism? the peace of knowing, what does that really mean? Knowing what? And do we really know, really truly know?
I hope you find some peace... in all this.
Spiritlite.

Hi Spiritlite...Unlike you, I think it will take a lifetime to discover who I am.
I still live blindly in a dreamworld but am practicing awareness again after many months. It is helping a lot.

No, nothing has made me want to drink again...I know I am finished.

I looked into Buddhism but found it very intellectual, complicated and grandiose. Tao is a gentler way and I am a gentle person.

I also don't like the word Dharma and chanting and ritual and robes and bald heads. I just like what is without all the trappings.

'Knowing' meaning understanding the machinations of creation and the entire Universe, why life is, why we are human, why we are here...Maybe enlightend or self-realized individuals truly 'know.' But I don't and I want to. However, I am a wife and Mother and an employee and choose not to devote my life entirely to spiritual ascension. I am not terribly self-disciplined with meditation but am doing better.

Sometimes it all seems so unreal...this world. And what is the reason for existence? I know, I know...let go of striving 'to know.' Just bounce along and be happy.

Hi,

On the question of who to pray to.

Here is an eastern concept you may or may not know of, it is helpful for me when I feel unsupported by the unconcerned universe around me.

follow these steps - whatever you find at the end, pray to that

breath, meditate softly to get your body supple in a comfurtable position, sit up so you don't sleep. follow your 'individuality'. let's start from the main boundary we believe in. our skin...

in your mind. see your heart, now your blood, the oxygen in your blood, the lungs at work, the air in your throat, the air outside of your mouth, the air of the planet, the trees which clean the air, the trees which feed and home millions of species, the species which pollenate and balance nature, the nature which resides in the atoms of every chemical you are now breathing all of the creatures are you not?

the chemicals that reach beyond the atmosphere, the balance which allows them to be forged in anti-matter, the anti-matter which stretches out into all objects one of which is every single being you've seen and not seen including those who lived billions of years ago, you are now breathing the universe are you not?

continue until you reach the limit of your mind, and that which is beyond you, I guess you could pray to that.

if not, then trust that you have a level of undertanding of purity and virtue within you by nature, and that you can simply converse with it's voice in your mind.

[psychoslice]

You will never grasp Tao, it will always slip through your mind that clings, you are Tao and also everything else is Tao, if your drunk or sober you are still Tao, you are a sober Tao or your are a drunk Tao, Watts was a drunk Tao.

Yep...Watts was a drunk Tao! Lots of writers are for some reason! The less I think about Tao, the better.

[Silver]

Originally Posted by windwhistle

Yep...Watts was a drunk Tao! Lots of writers are for some reason! The less I think about Tao, the better.

I'll drink to that! {Forgiveness, please!}