The Voices of Recovery

Accountable

(Defined) The obligation of an individual or organization to account for its activities, accept responsibility for them, and to disclose the results in a transparent manner.
“When something happens, consider your part in it.”

“You are only as sick as your secrets”

Early in my addiction I recall looking at the world through the lenses of a victim, always feeling like the world that was created around me was always someone else’s fault. This makes life so convenient.  I mean if I don’t cause it, why would I look to fix it, or change it? It’s not my fault.

This unhealthy thinking gets you stuck and halts or slows any progress you might make. The danger in this thinking (especially in early recovery) is that you can carry over these unhealthy thoughts, ideas, and misgivings. Then as you try to move forward in your recovery these ideas become dangerous tripping points that can either stop or destroy your progress and cement you into a place where you get stuck.

Keep in mind that understanding, and looking at this in your own life, will lead to better understanding and more compassion for others.

• We cannot get well unless we own our behaviors and our actions. Once we’re in recovery, we must own our choices and our outcomes.
• Critical to our process is knowing and understanding how to clean up our side of the street.
• Misplaced or even defective loyalty to the “old code” become critical to the process.
• As you grow in your recovery and take personal accountability, holding others accountable is vital.

These practices will help you as you look at “your” story. The story process is vital because let me tell you right now, the only way out of this mess, is to walk backwards through your story. As you do this and come to understand any of your own accountability you will also gain understanding on how to give other parties their own accountability. This becomes key to the recovery process as you know, you need to clean up your side of the street, and you cannot clean up the other side.

For me accountability came with a measure of self-discovery, it was vital to my recovery because in the process I found the areas where perhaps I was carrying shame or guilt, when you have not been accountable then the Shame and guilt just become your constant companion and as many of you know, carrying this bag of crap gets heavy, it makes you sad, it makes you want to run, numb yourself and of course use.

Here in lies the rub, you may very well get all the tools you need to overcome your DOC while you are in Rehab or early recovery. If you do not address your very real issues, then a year or two from now when you think you are just a great recovering badass, boom the wheels will come off and you will find yourself staring into a dark place. With that word of caution issued, this accountability practice will become a lifelong endeavor.  As much as I love the idea that you are getting clean, and finding your way to learning a sober lifestyle. I am also married to the idea that you deserve to be happy, joyous, and live a life of fulfillment. That comes from understanding that learning the keys to these and the other principles you are taught teach will become the foundation for living in a state of Joy.

So no magic potions get handed out here, this all takes work. I have to constantly remind myself that being accountable is not a default setting, leaning into the uncomfortable emotions that come with it are hard. So it will take practice, it will take effort, so go easy on yourself. You will get better and better at these skills.

Taking accountability for your actions in early recovery will help you start and continue your process in complete honesty and integrity. This will give you the foundation to “weather the storm” believe me when I say there will be storms.  Rehab is a perfect example of the social settings that exist in families and groups of friends, it will be easy to find yourself in the middle of quarrels with roommates, house mates, mentors, and counselors. This is good, even great! Embrace the suck! With these quarrels you can hopefully find your way to your part in them. Here is a news flash for everyone, where ever you are, you put yourself there, no one person stand entitled to more than the rest, if you feel like you are, then you need to take a long look at accountability. That is if you are walking a road to recovery and wholehearted living. Plain and simple Life is hard, it is full or hard choices, sacrifices, and challenges. Having our feet grounded in true accountability will make us better to ourselves, as a result we will be better to others.

Accountability separates the wishers in life from the action-takers that care enough about their future to account for their daily actions.     

John Di Lemme

There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.     

Denis Waitley

So often, our forward movement comes to a screeching halt because we simply don’t keep our word to ourselves. We make promises (“Tomorrow I’ll get up early and go to the gym”), and then break them (“Awww, it’s raining, I think I’ll stay in bed. I’ll go to the gym on my way home”) – often for reasons we don’t even understand. Which brings me to what might be an uncomfortable question: How good are you to your word?

With this very simple analogy in mind, where are we in our recovery? If we are not doing what we say we are doing on even the most minor details in life.

“Every time we speak, we create a road of some sort. The quality of that road, and how far it goes, will be directly related to the integrity of our word.”

The roads begin with us, it matters most and first that we are honest with ourselves, that we do and say what we are going to do. The truth is your recovery starts and ends on this principle. If while you go through this process you can re-instill in yourself the trust that you have lost, then nurture it back into full blown integrity, then you are armed against all sorts of negative behavior that has corrupted you in the past.

Integrity becomes completely interlaced with all levels of our personal success.

Big or small lies effect every aspect of integrity, none more harmful to the recovering addict than that of our personal boundaries

“The dictionary describes the word “lie” in the following way:

v 1. to say something that is not true in a conscious effort to deceive somebody, 2. to give a false impression; n 1. a false statement made deliberately, 2. a false impression created deliberately.

In all four of these descriptions, one thing stands out clearly: that lying is something we do deliberately – that our purpose for lying is to intentionally deceive. Obviously, this type of activity seems at odds with being “nice.” How is it that we can consider ourselves good people and include lying? We may think our lying is for a good reason: to keep from hurting someone’s feelings, to smooth over conflict or to make someone happy. After all, what does it hurt to tell a little white lie every once in a while?

“What lying does, as a rule, is to create multiple realities. When you lie, reality splits – it “dis-integrates.” You now have one reality that you know and live in, knowing the “truth” about a particular issue, and the reality that the people to whom you’ve lied live in, which is designed around somewhat or totally different information. The people to whom you have lied make decisions and choices based on the reality they inhabit, but it’s a different reality than the one you inhabit, so that split will now influence your relationship and your common future.”

Cat Thompson – Walking your path, the path of personal integrity

Overcoming your addictive behavior will be a lifetime struggle, fair to say everyone, addict or not, struggles on one level or another with integrity. It is how we approach this value that actually defines, to ourselves, who we really are. This is a key to moving forward from the unmanageable life you have created.

This requires acknowledgement that getting clean is not the only goal, that no longer searching out our D.O.C. is not the only commitment we should make to yourself. We must foster a sober mentality that speaks to how all of our future problems will be solved. It speaks to stepping up into the messes we sometimes find ourselves in, and using the key principles of integrity to get through them. The really easy way to look at this is on a deserted island…. Okay so as an addict you find yourself stuck for months on a deserted island, no communication and no chance of drinking or getting high, well congrats, you are clean, but what do you think might happen the day you get back to the mainland… of course without thought many of us in our addiction would be high or drunk before nightfall. The reality is sobriety and the decision to get sober comes before the using ended. This brings us to the bottom of a very long staircase called recovery. Hopefully by thought and deed you have a commitment to integrity and sobriety in your program. The ice we will tread staying clean can be very thin. We need to utilize this message and others to provide the tools to stay sober.

Moving to make personal integrity and sobriety a number one goal and focus in our lives, moves us to create an environment of better discipline, wiser choices, better health, and fewer conflicts. As I review my own personal life, then and now, it is astonishing to me how much time was spent outside of anything real, as I continued to lie to myself, my realities changed. I am now more acutely aware of the things I say and do, first and foremost to myself, my children, family, friends, and of course at work. I am careful when stepping through the mine field of being a word class bullshitter. If I tell my kids, my friend, or family something is going to happen, then it happens. Not just for me, but for them, and who deserves it more?

Believe me when I say you build this wall back brick by tedious brick, so many will question so much about what you say and do as you start to recover, and why shouldn’t they? This is about patience and knowing for yourself that you are, who you say you are, making clear choices and moving forward through recovery is not about staying clean, it is about staying sober, and this is really all that you can control. Now that feels and sounds like serenity.

“Do the right thing, at the right time, no matter how you feel about doing it.”

“I choose…to live by choice, not by chance. To make changes, not excuses. To be motivated, not manipulated. To be useful, not used. To excel, not compete. I choose self-esteem, not pity. I choose to listen to my inner voice, not the random opinion of others.”

Found on internet no credit posted.