Something very strange and wonderful has happened to me. It has not been a something but it has been building over a number of years. It begins with my loss of faith in God during my crisis years with a woman who worked for me as a research assistant. At that time I turned away from God entirely and made a virtual bargain with the devil that I would be granted special help with my research. As time went on pretty much everything in my life fell apart. Since the death of Frieda I have gradually been working along the way to find spiritual help. In addition to my daily AA meetings I opted to begin rosary and daily mass. But I could not do both so I finally settled on doing mass and rosary on Monday Wednesday and Friday and AA meetings on Tuesday Thursday Saturday and Sunday. I attend the Alachua Presbyterian Church on Sunday as well. I have been reading heavily in the early AA literature in trying to understand Bill Wilson’s concept of God. A relative newcomer to our AA group told me of Sermon on the Mount by Emmet Fox. After I read it I began to realize that much of my conflict lay within the region between formal religion and life of Jesus. The book by Emmett Fox helped me a great deal. I have full stop playing formal religion with the fault that is my own. With the help of techniques offered by Eckhart Tolle and other help from those closest to me I have decided to make a conscious effort to put Jesus into my life as totally as I possibly can. From that initiation whatever is religious will have to tag long as a caboose. Then yesterday I caught the biggest fish of my life a 32 inch red. Then when I got the mailboxes this morning there was an extraordinarily large refund check from the IRS sitting there quietly waiting for me to take it to the bank. There were a number of reasons why this refund check was unlikely. I will not try to explain it now but will in time.
Sunday was a very special day as well because they were caring at the supporting person group workshop. It was a very special day because of that and because of the warmth and caring that I felt in the room. Following the workshop some of us went to dinner at Tony and Al’s. I now feel that if the supportive person group process is going to work it will be because of people that came to the workshop on Sunday and those that wish to, as well. I do believe this Sally D has said that I am a dreamer but I hope that it will be possible in time to bring this kind of group process to correctional officers as a way of improving the overall system of criminal justice.
After the Group Session I realized that the process was a bit stilted because each person is reciting a soliloquy but we really need a conversation. There is a difference between soliloquy and conversation. There is a tremendous effort in AA meetings to avoid what is considered to be cross talk. To my way of thinking part of the problem with that form of interaction is that it detracts from intimate conversation. Although Crosstalk can be a dangerous problem to chairpersons that has to be a way of finding a resolution.• I cannot control anything that happens in AA and do not wish to. But I do hope to improve on what I think of is intimate conversation in our supportive person group. This morning as I chaired I a group I realize that many people in giving their soliloquy address several different problems that are not always related Our minds are full of stuff. Somehow we have to find a way of finding the carrier wave in riding it together.
