Complete defeat

It has taken nearly 11 months of being in Alcoholics Anonymous, and a few binges, to recognize that alcohol has utterly defeated me. I thought I had achieved Step 1: "I admitted I was powerless over alcohol, and that my life had become unmanageable". This recognition was easy: on New Years Eve I did something that cost me an entire group of friends, and 3 nights later, I was in my first closed AA meeting.

I knew that I became powerless over my drinking. I did my best to not get drunk at this house party: I took 3% beer. But I had also brought sparkling wine that I received as a Christmas gift, and though I don't like it, at midnight I had managed to turn it into a Mimosa (again, with orange juice that I had brought, in case anyone wanted to use it, Ie., me.), and drank it happily - to the point I became bitter at sharing. I had also brought a bottle of red Australian wine for the host, and then drank almost the full bottle after midnight.

For years, I knew that my life was being thwarted; in my thirties, in tens of thousands dollars of debt, no true romance in sight, living in poverty, lying to myself and to the world about my health and my ambitions, pretending to be harmless to females about my respect to their relationships, inebriated at every open chance, or even when it wasn’t open and I ditched my responsibilities, going backwards after every slight movement in improvement.

So, looking at my falsehoods at the start of 2012, I felt relief as I admitted that I was a drunkard, and I loved being around my "real" people. Going to meetings was the highlight of my day, and I quit my bartending job to truly commit to the program. But there was still the pressure to get more involved. I reluctantly picked a home group and got a sponsor, though I believed that was doing just fine on my own.

After several months I went back to working in the bar, dropped my sponsor without trying to get a new one, and then returned to drinking within weeks. I drank for the duration of the summer before deciding that I needed to change. I admitted to my home group that I was drinking (which they probably knew because I was a miserable dry drunk before I stopped going to meetings), and I received a "24 hour desire chip" at the other two groups that I went to weekly for seven months before my relapse. But, I still couldn't stop drinking.

Finally, I realized that, whether I stayed in AA or not, I wanted to be clean and clear. I again quit my bar job, and my boss knew what I was trying to accomplish, so she didn't make me feel badly. I had been speaking to a great woman from my home group and who also attended the Sunday morning women's meeting, and we started to talk more once she knew of my struggles. I told her that I had quit my bar job, and unbeknownst to me, I had achieved Step 3, "I made a decision to turn my my will and life over to the care of god." How amazing I felt! I knew right away that this woman had the tools that I needed to learn if I were to get sober.

We met that week for coffee, and it was fantastic: I felt like she really understood my plight. I love working with her, though now, especially since I drank for the next two days after our meeting, I realize the vulnerability that comes with this defeat.

There is zero way that I can maintain sobriety on my own, I have tried for the past four months, and I tried a year and a half ago when I needed to straighten up for a new job as an Executive Assistant (which I lost). Not only does alcoholism destroy intelligence, but it takes intelligence to understand what it even is that I am facing. Now I need people to essentially hold my hand. People who I look up to and who will get me to meetings. Because now I do need help getting to meetings. I would never have gone to the Monday night meeting had I not arranged to meet my new sponsor there the day we met for coffee: I hadn't been hungover like that since New Years Day. But this help was the absolute last thing I wanted. First, I didn't want to be accountable to anyone, but now also I feel that I am being setup for rejection and pain.

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I nearly cried at the beginning of my meeting on Monday. I had decided Sunday evening that it would be a great idea to remove the shank in my pointe shoes (this is done in the upper levels - the slipper is no longer used, and we are to have "soft blocks" [without the shank] by next month). I had no idea what I was doing, destroyed my ballet shoes, and have no money to replace them. I have no time to waste, I am barely holding up in my exam prep program as is. I am twice the age of the average student in this program (fortunately at the studio there is only one other girl, who is a fantastic person). I have been blessed to be put in this program, but I have not built up my strength to dance en pointe (on the very top of the toe). I have gone straight from demi-pointe in the soft ballet slippers, to being in a level that is supposed to be all in pointe; I am doing (just barely, with technique that at this time would fail me) echappés and retirés without the barre for support. I am playing catch up, instead of maintaining previous technique. I feel physically and emotionally sick about what I did to my shoes when I was drunk, and to top it off, I let my friend record it - about half an hour of me literally assaulting them. I am so ashamed, not only because I was so ignorant and thoughtless, but that I did it when I was barely able to walk straight.

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When I was at CAMH two years ago (The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health), there was a man who, god bless him, had so many problems, some of them legal. I had to fight back tears while listening to him at one point. He had to get straightened up ASAP, and he talked once about his efforts in AA. I had never been to AA myself, nor wanted to go, but I remember vividly him saying that he figured out how to work the program - finding the people who have the sobriety and who are working the steps, and staying away from the fair-weathered. I remember what he said about AA because I felt guilty: I deep down believed, and still do, that I wasn't really "working" on my sobriety - I was just going to group and feeling proud that I once more got say I went another week without a drink or toke. But once I left the program, I was binging again within two weeks.

Last night in my AA meeting, we read through a few pages of Step 12 ("Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs") and, though I am at Step 4, was able to participate. I talked about my own spirituality and progress in relation to what was read in the step, "Can we bring new purpose and devotion to our religion?" But others only talked about their jobs, or their gratitude to be there that night. or even other people's failures! I know exactly what this man was talking about now. and I too no longer trust or wish to have support from some of the people.

Even with those who have some sobriety, and who are getting anniversary chips, a person can do anything in a group, especially when they're being righteously reinforced. The main book that we use in AA warns us of the people who are lonely and who use the group for companionship, and so if someone is using the program for anything other than alcoholism, of course they can be, and will stay, on the wagon! I must learn to discern between the real and the fake.

I am also staying away from people who are making up their own god (which, I admit, is all too easy to do in this program because of Steps 2 and 3, along with peer influence). I was at an open meeting on Friday and I saw a woman whom I much like, but with my new found determination to honour my Lord, I walked away from her once she started going on about her own "Higher Power" (A Step 2 term). I wanted to go help pack things up anyway, so I do not mean to sound insensitive: this is simply one example of how I plan to work. It is common that people enter into the program with broken or no faith, and literally create a god "of (their) understanding". Furthermore, AA is Masonic, which is a whole other concern for me. Perhaps *when* I accomplish the steps, I will be able to offer more to others, but for now it is do or die, and I am looking out solely for myself, even at the possibility of rejecting others, whether there is a general unconditional "fellowship" or not.

I compromised my faith and turned my back to my Lord this new year. I allowed AA's New Age spirituality to infiltrate me, but not the steps themselves. I consulted with two priests and received their blessings to be in meetings and to financially support the groups, but didn't believe that they truly understood this offshoot of Protestant program. But now I am back with not only complete protection of my Catholic faith, but also with the determination to work only with people who are genuine.

Still though, I am now dependent on people, one person in particular. What will happen if I can't, or won't, clean up. Who will be there for me if I risk just one more excruciating hangover. Will I lose her confidence and make her turn away. Will I get attached, and be let down. Now, it is not me who can do the rejecting, but rather the one who can be rejected, and this has become far more upsetting than being "brainwashed" into a Masonic "cult".

Nevertheless, I will do my best to do my duty to my Lord, and to try to be not only successful, but more important, happy, in sobriety.

The 99% uprising

I have been communicating with a fellow soldier, and here is my reply to his question, "Do you want to change the world?" The last two paragraphs are add-ons for this piece. 

Me:  Well, I'd like to see the 99% take the 1% down. I do not understand how almost every last person is pushed down, forced into war, willing to consume poisonous food and water, etc. Sometimes I think it's just supposed to be this way. People are inherently flawed. I do not even see newborn babies as innocent. The minute they are able to move around, they begin to lie to cover up their mistakes and accidents, and manipulate others to get what they want.

Maybe it's the same as when Adam and Eve sinned and became aware and ashamed of their nakedness - we have this humiliation (don't know why), and fight against ourselves to cover it up. I think it is possible that this is what gives a select few power over us. I think it's comparable to the War on Terrorism: this "new" war  where we do not even really know who the enemy is. In regards to war, for example, it is where the aggressors are able to win and take control, and in war it is the stronger and more aggressive who systematically degrade in order to subject and ruin the weak and the invaded.

I am convinced that our inherent shame is due to our disobedience to the god of this world (Not Satan as the false prophet writes, but of Israel's god) and can explain injurious phenomena such as the fall of the United States. National pride, and wanting to be served like royalty has caused gross injustice. All the labour is being exported, only to be brought back into the country, so that the US can feel as though it is being "served". This is destroying citizens, other nations, and the environment. To make matters worse, the US increased its debt when its leaders should have started paying it off. I am supposing they think they'll get it back if they spend just a little more on the war, for example.

So, yes, I would like to change the world. But as Jesus of Nazareth fought a spiritual war, so too  I believe we must confront - is it the shame that we take on in our defiance that is keeping us subdued, and if this is so, of what, and what for? For me, I believe I am helping by studying and coming up with ideas, and talking to people like you.

The Book of Revelation says 144,000 angels have the Lamb and his Father's name written on their foreheads. They are the ones who are sealed in the Book of Life, and they are the ones who are saved on the last day. I find this fatalistic, though, and I believe the Lord of this world is merciful. As a result, I try to find a hidden meaning.

I would love to be a key player in the uprising of the 99%, but sometimes I feel that it is not meant to happen in the way that we intend (such as the Wall Street protests). Maybe instead of leading a resistance, we are supposed to help the population repent and turn to our Lord for the redemption that will hand to us the inheritance of the new earth. After all, the Lamb told us not to fight: that we would only die by the sword if we lived by it. Instead he prophesied that we would flee. Maybe he also meant flee from this worldly existence of sin.

I believe it is possible that we may fight alongside the 144,000 who are to lead in this war of the physical and economical, but through the instruction and tools given to us to rise against the spiritually corrupting, with the latter influencing the direction on how we value or detach from the former. 

John bows before the angel in chapter 19, but the angels exclaims, "Do not worship me, worship God!". I believe that the angel and his legion are the front-liners who we take orders from. Just as the first beast takes orders from the dragon, and the second beast takes order from the first, so too do the angels take orders from the Lord of hosts, and we take orders from the angels: it is a hierarchy, though no one exceeds the Lord.

Therefore, I believe that the human population can never be of the 144,000 (unless some such as you and I are two of the angels in human form), not only because there will be a new heaven as well where the hosts will dwell, allowing us this space, but also because we can still inherit the new earth, because if we follow the instructions of the angels and the prophets, we could be saved through penance.

War is sadistic

I found the below excerpt to be ground breaking in understanding war.

Coincidentally enough, I was speaking briefly with a friend about war this morning, and said that the reason for the destruction must be about gaining power. Though in my mind I wondered, how could gaining power for a leader be a strong enough reason to be able to be so violent?

In looking up blood and sexual sacrifices committed in cults, I came across this statement from a psychohistory journal about the reason for wars, and how they connect to the energy harnessed in sacrificial rituals.

"Real wars, as I have described earlier, involve nations hallucinating a rebirth fantasy that they are 'pregnant with events,' like a 'heaving volcano,' with a 'tight, tense, trapped feeling' in the air, 'unable to relieve herself of the inexorable pressure' or 'gain at least a breathing spell,' being 'picked up bodily' after diplomatic relations are 'ruptured' and beginning 'the descent into the abyss' as the nation starts its 'final plunge over the brink.' Each of the six elements of cult ritual I have given above are enacted in war. Tribes and nations regress during prewar periods and fear individuation, claiming that progress and prosperity 'makes the nation soft' and 'turns men into women,' making them 'wimps' and robbing them of their potency. Then they go into a trance and use dissociation to deny any empathy for the 'enemies' they are about to slaughter. Then they merge with their leader and put their intolerable feelings into him, sometimes even staging 'merging dramas,' political meetings like the Nazi mass meetings, where people held up their arms like an umbilicus and imagined they were pouring their polluted feelings into the leader, shouting 'Heil!' (heal me). Next they deify the leader, making him into a terrifying figure who can help them avenge their traumas, organize the nation into totalitarian structures and go off to war as a sacrificial rebirth ritual, during which the nation reenacts earlier traumas and rejuvenates its potency by becoming the powerful one torturing and killing the helpless one.

It is less apparent that war, like cultic ritual, is also a sexual perversion. Cults rape, torture and kill with the aim of orgasm; the sexuality is manifest. But it is only our defensive habit of compartmentalizing the various acts of war that makes us unaware that war, too, involves ritual rape, even if we think of it as only incidental 'collateral damage' like all civilian slaughter. Rape occurs because men are turned on by torture and killing. Violence is aphrodisiac. Prostitutes used to hang around the Colosseum in Rome to service the sexually aroused men after they finished watching the slaughter. In the past, according to the world’s leading historian of war, 'The opportunity to engage in wholesale rape was not just among the rewards of successful war but, from the soldier’s point of view, one of the cardinal objectives for which he fought.' Men who didn't rape during war were suspected of being homosexual. In earlier wars, lust as with cults, the killing of children was often preceded by raping them. Virgins were the favorite group rape targets for invading armies until well into the Middle Ages.

I admit it is hard to accept the conclusion of this line of thought and admit that those who watch bodies of people killed in wars pile up on TV are participating in a ritual rejuvenation of their potency. Hard to accept, that is, until we recall that before the Gulf War most of the country felt that the American Dream was 'withering' arid that our leader was a 'wimp', while after the war, after killing 300,000 Iraqis, mostly children, these same people felt the country was strong again, the stock market soared and our leader ended up being approved by 91 percent of the country. It seems to me that during the war we absorbed the vitality of those we slaughtered. Slain warriors in earlier cultures often were eaten in order to internalize their strengths. Early armies used to collect enemies' penises and present them in a big pile to their king. When U.S. soldiers in Vietnam collected penises as 'souvenirs,' we thought the soldiers perverted. Perverted they were, but perverted we all are when we choose to engage in war. Only our rationalizations prevent us from seeing this."

Mars: God of War and Sex

Entering the 4th dimension

- Time and space can be bent. Meaning we can manipulate space to not have any time, enabling us to become immortal (which is really just continuing to evolve through the higher dimensions).

- To recognize the universe (again, the 16 particles that build all life and material) is the same as us. When we can bend the space-time continuum, we can erase both, and have only this moment, with no mistakes of the past, and no fears of the future.

• To be in the now.
• To lose the ego, which means no hatred or envy which lead to insecurity, anger, violence and morality.      (And in that order, I believe).
• To accept and to love, even if it is only self-love that we can manage indefinitely.

I'll probably add to this later after some more brainstorming.

"Whenever there's a drought get your umbrellas out, because that's when I brainstorm." - Jay-Z

Jesus is Saviour

"They birthed great giants, whose height was three thousand ells: Who consumed all the acquisitions of men. And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind." - Book of Enoch VII 2.

"My flock lacks a shepherd and so has been plundered and has become food for all the wild animals." - Ezekiel 34.8

"I swear I am coming against these shepherds. I will claim my sheep from them...I will save my sheep." - Ezekiel 34.10-1

"I am the good shepherd." - John 10.11

"He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms." - Isaiah 40.11

The folly of the New Age movement

I love, and I earnestly mean that word, the New Age movement. Before I became a Christian two years ago, yoga healed me and made me strong. It made me likable (except when I was zealous), it took away frustration, it allowed for me to bless a person who did wrong against me, whether it was as little as cutting me off on the road, or as hurtful as slandering me.

But a year ago, for whatever reason, though I'm sure at the time it was a good one, I detested, and again I use that word intentionally, the New Age movement. I rebuked all yogis, I hated my "spiritual" friends for helping to usher in the anti-Christ, and everyone who was not for Jesus was against me and the world. The fear in my being was so strong, I truly believed that Satanists were trying to kill me. And I am not exaggerating; I was crippled.

After entering AA in January, my fear immediately dissipated, and again, I was healed. I loved yoga; I did not practice it (I gave up yoga years ago to focus on ballet, except for the odd class), but I meditated on my Sat Nam to once again be my fearless and trusted compass. I still took the Eucharist at least once a week, but I was teaching myself how to reconcile my own life, and my two opposite spiritual paths.

I have been enjoying playing upon this unification, but I still see one fundamental problem within the New Age movement: the teaching that we are gods.

As it is written in Ezekiel:

"Because you are haughty of heart,
you say, 'A god am I!
I occupy a godly throne
in the heart of the sea!'—
And yet you are a man, and not a god...

Therefore I will bring against you
foreigners, the most barbarous of nations.
They shall draw their swords
against your beauteous wisdom,
they shall run them through your splendid apparel.
They shall thrust you down to the pit, there to die
a bloodied corpse, in the heart of the sea.
Will you then say, 'I am a god!'
when you face your murderers—
No, you are man, not a god,
handed over to those who will slay you."

What are some of the characteristics of being god?  Immortality.  Forgiveness.  Love.  Power.

When we have our backs up against the wall, when we have been treacherously violated, are we able to do any of the above? Absolutely not. When the yogi is about to die, he will see that he is not immortal, and that he will not be able to love the person before him. 

I see hypothetical questions constantly, and everyone answers so righteously: "Yes I would die for that stranger", "Yes I would forgive the one who killed my family", "Yes I would love the one who robbed me", "Yes I am powerful enough to change my destiny". I was never ceased to be amazed at such falsehood.

When the yogi "faces his murderers", he will indeed see, that he was never a god.

A kingdom not divided

"I was sent only for the lost sheep of the House of Israel." -  Matthew 15.24. This essay is to be appreciated by all, but of course we are not all called to be warriors. Peace to those of all faiths and non-faith alike.

Yahweh is the teacher. He has control over his students. Satan is not his child, rather he is the angel to another god, but Yahweh was still able to punish Satan, because Satan was in his classroom (Eden).

When Satan seduced Eve causing the fall of the humans, Yahweh said, "Now they have become one of us, knowing good from evil" (Genesis 3.22), meaning that we are now engaged in battle; we truly fell from innocence. We became either of the darkness, which Adam and Eve became, or of the light, which belong to Jesus.

As a result, when Jesus was accused of healing a man through the power of Beezlebub (Luke 11.14-5), Jesus said a kingdom divided against itself will fall (17). Since Yahweh reigns on earth, which the Jews knew, Jesus demonstrated his authority. Note that while this is currently Satan's world (2 Corinthians 4.4), this is not a contradiction to God having the ultimate dominion of earth, because God has allowed for Satan to participate, as he did with Job (Job 1.11-2).

Therefore, Jesus says to us, “Be in the world, but not of it.” (cannot find actual verbatim in scripture). This of course leads to conflict and therefore at times painful acts of reconciling the body (earthly) and the spirit (heavenly), but this is why Jesus repeatedly said to not worry, giving us his peace, because he goes before us (Matthew 28.20). To recognize Jesus’ peace is to accept the detachment needed to be not of this world.

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So who is the "us” that Yahweh refers to in The Fall? A priest will call it the "royal we", but I will not accept that answer. I believe the “us” is either 1) Yahweh plus other gods, or 2) Yahweh plus the angels (since Yahweh is talking to Satan. who is a [fallen] angel). I am beginning to suspect, however, that "god" and "angel" can be synonymous. Satan, an angel, is called a god in Paul's second letter to the Corinthians, "The god of this world (Satan) blinded the minds of the non-believers" (4.4).

Historically, “god” was plural - "elohim".  Psalm 82.1 says that Yahweh takes his stand in the divine council amidst the gods. (See different translations here). I suspect that the divine council is where Yahweh conducts the rules of the war with his colleagues of equal stature (other gods), just as our state leaders behind closed doors also do. 

Yes, we are at war, but it is crucial to take heed to Saint Paul’s words: that we do not battle with each other, but with powers from above (Ephesians 6.12). However, the many who are called do still takes sides that affect the flesh, because those who deny the material are defaulted to the darkness, for even if unknowingly, they choose the world (1 John 2.15), and this is why few become chosen (my interpretation: to fight the battle. See Matthew 22.14). I suspect this is why Jesus said, "Forgive them Father, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23.24). Most of us are unaware of the true enemy, which is not each other.

“You do not belong to the world, for I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.” – John 15.19