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LEADER'S SHARE ~ STEP ONE
Dear God,
This is where we first met, I mean really met, some years after my initiation
into the fellowship called Overeaters Anonymous of which I am still a bona
fide member after 26+ years. Amazing is it not? Step 1. WE ADMITTED WE WERE
POWERLESS OVER FOOD - THAT OUR LIVES HAD BECOME UNMANAGEABLE. It is no wonder
this silly man had trouble with this step for such a long time. It just
might be written backwards for me because I believed that the unmanageable
state of my life was what turned me into a food addict. We could debate which
came first the chicken or the egg, and after much long-winded discussion, be
nowhere closer to the truth than we are now. Speaking of now, in spite of all
you have taught me, still the doubt creeps into my mind until it is noticed
and prayed away.
It was the WE of step one that first gave me hope as I was certain no one
else had this inability to stop eating once started. Alone and hopeless
without any possibility
of escape. Which is worse, alone or hopeless, I still don't know? Only once I
was beaten to my knees, without hope and alone, could my restoration to the
human race begin - from the bottom of the barrel be it booze or food. Death
or insanity whichever came first, I no longer had the will or desire to fight
what was staring me in the face. Looking at step one from my knees gave me a
totally different perception of both the step and life after the step. Does
it really matter which part of step one comes first? Not for
me. I just wanted to live, just one day at a time.
There are for me certain foods which I am not able to tolerate, peanut butter
and any flavor of ice cream - oh God I get excited thinking of them. SATAN
GET THEE BEHIND ME!!!!! In my earlier days of gray sheet, abstinence about
850 calories a day, I would laugh at some folks who could not bear the
mention of certain foods. In twenty-three months over 300 pounds fell off my
frame enough so that my aunt Sadie passed out when she saw me and thought for
sure I was in the last stages of some incurable disease. From 537 to 212
pounds in twenty-three months. I was proud of myself and gave me all the
credit
and rightfully so because while reading the words, I did not believe them.
The pounds so easily lost were easily found, not a pound but an ounce at a
time, until it was back to the junk yard scale. For reasons I do not
understand, during the years it took to get back to 409 pounds, I never left
the rooms and people were there to love me when it was impossible to love
myself. My life was unmanageable to the point where
holding onto a job or the respect of my family was not going to happen. Once
when passed over for a good promotion,
my boss told me he picked me, however the V.P. whom I'd be traveling for did
not think I could impress customers when I was unable to do something as easy
as keeping my weight under control. He died and I did not attend his wake
even though half of me was gone.
There were, God of mine, so many painful memories, most of which are just
history now because of the first nine
steps, however they must begin with step one: the admission that like Popeye
"I yam what I yam." Just like the three little pigs, my house must be laid on
a good foundation: You are my mortar and brick. The work is mine to do, the
results belong to You. None of these steps are to
be considered optional and to borrow a phrase, I beg of you who read this, to
be fearless and honest from the very beginning. Since the day step one became
part of me, I have buried many good people and heard some real nice eulogies.
I want to be remembered as a man who as flawed as he was, always tried to do
the next right thing.
I know because You told me there are as many ways to do step one as there are
people, so, God of mine, light a small light in Your people, to share with
all who read this. Give every single one who reads this Your strength and
courage, to share with You and with me and with each other how it is for them
- even if they have never shared with a group before. Let me know I'm not
alone. "If you don't share you aren't here." My sponsor told me that and I
have not shut up since.
To my fellows who are in the depth of the black pit of
despair, stop digging. My God will do for you - I know it to be true. AND
WHY NOT.....Danny
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