A Week in the Life

Link: http://www.changeispossible.org/pyramid.pdf

John Wooden died yesterday at age 99.  He leaves with us many things.  Most importantly is the Pyramid of Success with is applicable to everything in life.  Enjoy and use it often for your own success.

Thank you John Wooden.

On a holiday weekend, New Jersey is the home of traffic jams, long lines,  and people with short tempers.  As the temperature increases, so do these traits.  If you were stuck in traffic, particularly accident traffic, you could be there for a while. It feels like you are in hell.

However there is a different form of hell known quite intimately by people with addictions.  It is the “highway to hell".

On the highway to hell, the addicted person is driving on a path of self destruction, they are going to continue to use, going to continue to have problems and consequences, and continue to do it again and again.  There is no escape, there are no exits, there is only pain, and more pain.  This highway is littered with the ultimate consequences of addiction “jails, institutions and death".

While driving on the highway to hell without exits, occasionally there is a sign which reads “turnaround ahead".  Depending on the speed that I am driving, I may or may not see it.  If I don’t see it through may addicted haze, I’ll continue to drive with the same reckless abandon that I have been driving with.  There may be many signs: “disaster ahead", “cops approaching” “brick wall .5 miles ahead” “lightpost beyond the turn", “wife leaving”–I may not be reading them, I may however be feeling them shortly.

These “signs” may lead to that “moment of clarity” an opportunity to examine my addiction.  This clarity may lead me to examine my addiction privately or even publically–at a 12 step meeting,  with a counselor,  at a treatment facility, or even in a jail or hospital.  Optimistically speaking, after my examination, I decide to make major lifestyle changes, and get off the highway to hell.  

However, many people don’t make an examination, and some people who do, are not ready to keep this change.  For reasons known to them, and for reasons not known to them, they get back on the highway to hell and drive even faster and more recklessly than before.  They know that they will crash(particularly the ones that did any type of self-examination) and they know it will not be pretty. Sometimes however, it is that pain which starts the process of recovery to occur.

The process of recovery is a  strange and beautiful thing. It occurs in my greatest pain, but changes my life so dramatically. It is in fact “amazing” that it happens  at all and we’ll discuss how it happens next time.

Imagine that you have a car that you have had forever.  It’s got many thousands of miles on it.  It’s reliable & dependable.  You have taken  it on many trips through all kinds of terrain, all kinds of weather, and with all kinds of people.  You often think if this car could talk, it could tell the world some of my deepest darkest secrets.  One day you begin to notice that your car is starting to develop rust on its body.  It gradually is in need of more and more repair, some more expensive than it justifies.  Your rationale is  ” I love that car, I want to keep it forever".  The car keeps running but the pattern of running and repair continues.  On a rainy and disgusting day, you have an important meeting to attend and are running a little late.  You hop into  your reliable and dependable car to take you to this meeting.  Unfortunately,  it dies.  You are stranded, the car doesn’t work and you need to be towed to the service station.  The new pattern with your beloved car is that it works, but it keeps breaking down.   One day you out of total frustration you say "I love this car, but not in love with it anymore”

  To make this point clearer, listen to this song by Pure Prairie League entitled “Amie".  You have to wait unit  3:47 into the song to hear it.  So since I’ve told you where to look, pay careful attention

Here are the lyrics for the last part:

I keep falling in and out of love with you
Falling in and out of love with you
Don’t know what I’m gonna do
I keep falling in and out of love with you, ooh

The last line “falling in and out of love with you” is the one we want because  the word IN  is the homerun– I love you, but am I “in” love with you?  That 2 letter word “in” is so potent in relationships.  Most people who have been in long term relationships can easily say I love him or her, but struggle to say that they are in love with that person.  

How does that change?  In many relationships the “in” is eroded by problems in the marriage.  These may be the “big ticket” items–addiction, abuse, mood disorders, anxiety disorders,etc. or may be the day to day— we stopped talking, our lives are too busy, the kids came, the job took over etc.  In either case,  in order to get the “in” back, we have lots of work to do.  Clearly the communication skills that we have been talking about(last 3 blog entries) will be of great assistance here since clearly we need to begin to discuss the problems in a healthier way.  If we have the  big ticket items version those issues have to be dealt with first.    It’s amazing to me how many people come for couple’s counseling in order to fix their partner’s issues. (look for a more in-depth discussion in the blog entitled “she’s got issues” coming to a blog near you)  Those major issues are the first part of any type of treatment with the relationship a distant third.  If the person with the major issues fixes their problem, and the partner fixes their issues, then the relationship has a chance for not only repair, but rebirth  as it finds that “in love” place.  Ironically, it’s the couples with the day to day erosion that have the harder time getting the “in” back.  The structure of the relationship, whether  caused by kids, work, or distance, has created the  problems. The structure of the relationship  has gotten stuck over time.  It  has to be changed to produce a new relationship with good communication, good intimacy, and a good partnership.  If that sounds as hard to you as it does to me, than you know we have a lot of work ahead of us.  To get this “in” back, we’re going to need some in-depth, in-siteful, and in-tense work in order to produce change.  Its very doable work, but work none the less.  When all is said and done, we want the song  lyric to be “I keep  falling in love with you”