Let me begin by saying that the development of spirituality is not dependent upon one’s religious affiliation or background. You do not have to go to church or attend temple or keep the Sabbath, or maintain any other religious rituals to acquire spirituality. Doing these things are fine and good, especially if they assist you in your quest for spirituality or help you to feel good about yourself. Nevertheless, they are not a mandatory part of the development and maintenance of spirituality.
To begin with, spirituality has little to do with what religion you choose to affiliate with. Spirituality is a personal path that each individual chooses for themselves. It is not based on a set of tenets or rituals that have been established by a religious organization or a spiritual leader. It is based upon that inner, personal connection, that you have with your Higher Power, whatever you envision that Higher Power to be.
Spirituality is that special inner guidance you receive, from that Power greater than yourself, directing you toward the most loving, most positive life choices.
It may be difficult at first to see that you need to develop spirituality. “What do I need spirituality for?” You may ask yourself. “I have survived till now without it, so what good is it? All my life people have been preaching to me about God, and all I got out of it was just more abuse, so why would I want to believe in God anyway? What has He done for me?”
I don’t know that these questions fit you or not, but these were my questions and all I can do here is share my own experience with you. Before I really began to recover from my early childhood abuse and from the drugs and alcohol I turned to, to deal with the memories and the flashbacks, I had no use for God. To be quite honest I hated God and anything that had to do with God.
Nevertheless, I was in intense pain and considering suicide. I had no hope, and saw no end to my inner turmoil. The only power I felt I truly possessed was the power to take my own life, on my own terms, when I decided the time was right. As a result of this position, my life was an endless night of drugs and alcohol, and a desperate search for the “one” who could help me.
I went from therapist to therapist, from hospital ward to hospital ward, looking for, hoping for someone, somewhere who would see my pain and know just what to do to get me out of it.
I found lots of individuals who thought they knew what to do, but each time I would get involved with another therapist, another counselor, my life would go into a spin and the flashbacks would increase and the pain would get worse and my drinking and drugging increased. At that time I had no idea why that was happening, all I knew was that what I was doing wasn’t working.
After my husband suffered a severe stroke and I was left to care for him and my seven year old adopted daughter, alone, I just pulled into myself and did my drugs and alcohol full time. I cared for my husband, who was paralyzed and couldn’t speak, and for my daughter, in minimal ways, but mostly I just wrote about my feelings, and drank and took drugs. The more I wrote, the more I began to see that my life was empty, hollow and meaningless. I decided that I had to end it, but before that, I would have to find a place for my daughter and husband first.
After making arrangements for them, I sat alone drinking, crying and wondering why my life was so meaningless. I turned on the television to help me to settle down so that I could do what I had decided to do. On TV was the movie, “Oh GOD”, and it got me to laughing. It also got me thinking. It seems silly now, that a comedy about God would have made me think about trying one more time to get better, but it did.
I called the minister of a church my husband and I had gone to, not any specific denomination, just a group of people who had started a church to help people find God in their own way. I told him that I had been planning to kill myself but that I had decided to give life one more chance. I asked him if he knew of anyone who might be able to help me. He gave me a name and a number and I called it. It was late in the evening, but the man who answered talked with me for about an hour and I made an appointment to see him the next day. I won’t give this counselor’s whole name, but I will call him Craig.
The next day, when I saw him, Craig asked me if I drank a lot. I said yes, I did. I told him that it was the only way that I could handle the pain inside me, and hold back the flashbacks. He told me that if I was going to continue to see him he would ask only two things of me. To attend at least one AA meeting a week and to come to my sessions sober, if I could. I decided that I would try doing as he asked. He was not a pushy person, and he didn’t talk down to me, so I thought I would at least try.
When I got to AA I was terrified. I thought these people were a bunch of Bible thumping Jesus freaks and almost all of my abuse had come from such people, so I wasn’t sure that I would be able to go through with this. Still, I stayed and I listened and I discovered I was wrong. These people were just like me. Everyone who spoke told about being at the end of their rope, until they came to AA and found a new way of life. Some of them told stories that sounded a lot like my own. Even so, most of these people seemed happy, and free of the pain of their past. Suddenly, hope burst forth within me.
I continued to see Craig, go to meetings, as well as write. Craig said that writing was a good way to get in touch with those parts of me that were injured and needed to tell about their pain. In meetings I heard a lot of talk about “coming to believe in a Power greater then ourselves”, and I listened to what they said. They said that this Power could be anything you chose. It didn’t matter, as long as it was a Power greater then you. They talked about “firing the God of their youth” and “hiring a God they could do business with”. This made sense to me for some reason. I needed something in my life that was bigger, more powerful than my pain and once I decided that I would try to find that, my life began to change.
I continued to work with Craig, as well as another therapist, whom another part of me chose to work with. Craig didn’t mind and we all worked together on getting in touch with and getting to know the “family” within me. I soon discovered that this part of me, a male aspect whom I choose to call Adrian, was my inner guide. This was the one part of me that knew everything about everything. This part of me chose this other therapist because he was willing to follow his instructions on how to assist me, and because he was a hypnotherapist and also a recovering alcoholic who lived and worked the program. I’ll call him Bob.
Between Bob, Craig, AA and the directions of Adrian I found recovery, not only from alcoholism and drug addiction, but also from the ravages of MPD/DID. It wasn’t just stopping the drugs and alcohol that assisted me in finding a new life, a new me, for I had only been drinking and drugging for a short time. No, it was the discovery of spirituality that really set me free!
I couldn’t have discovered that spirituality until I really wanted it. Even when I wanted it, I had to be willing to build it for myself, and then live it, daily. The God I chose to assist me had to be one that I could do business with. Then, I had to be willing to turn my life and will over to that God of my understanding. Only then could I be truly free of the struggle within.
As I grew in this new found spirituality, I discovered unconditional love, true friendship and the joy that comes from service to others. The more I helped others find their way, the less I hurt. The more I acted like a friend to others, the more friends I found. The more I accepted others, unconditionally, the more I found acceptance.
Though following this simple spiritual path, I found the ability not only to face my pain and the abuses that I had endured, I also found something even more precious, more healing. I found the ability to forgive. First, I found the ability to forgive myself, and finally, the ability to even forgive my abusers. I came to realize, through assisting others, that my abusers had also been abused, and were coming from that abuse when they hurt me. I realized that most of the time they were doing only what they knew, and that they had been twisted by others who had been twisted by others before them. Who was I to blame for my abuse? Adam and Eve?
In the final analysis there is no one to blame but a society that is spiritually bankrupt. The only way to change that is to assist as many individuals as I can in discovering a spiritual path toward healing.
You can find that spiritual path within yourself or you can turn to a 12 step program as I did. You can find these same steps in CoDA (CoDependents Anonymous), in OEA (Over Eaters Anonymous), EA (Emotions Anonymous), CA (Cocaine Anonymous), NA (Narcotics Anonymous) and in many, many more organizations that use the 12 steps. The reason the 12 steps are so widely used is because they work. The reason they work is that they instill a sense of spirituality within the individual that is both healing and empowering. If you seek healing, from addiction, from past abuse, or from any emotional difficulty, find a 12 step organization that fits you and your needs and follow these simple steps. I guarantee that if you will do this honestly and thoroughly, you will find a new hope, a new freedom, and a new life.
