The Lifelong Quest For Sobriety…The Ultimate Hero’s Journey—Part 18

Guest Blogger and long-time Council friend, Bob W. presents Part 18 of a series dealing with Alcoholism and Addiction from a Mystical, Mythological Perspective, reflecting Bob’s scholarly work as a Ph.D. in mythological studies.

On August 25, 2017 at approximately 10:00PM, Hurricane Harvey slammed ashore at Rockport, Texas, with sustaining winds of 130mph.  Over the next 4-5 days, it moved inland about 50 miles, then turned back out to the Gulf, meandered just offshore Houston and Bay City and finally came ashore again at Cameron, Louisiana.  Over the period of time that it lingered in or around Houston, it dropped approximately 9 trillion gallons of water in the Greater Houston area, Katy to Bay City, the Woodlands to Clear Lake.  To put this volume of water in perspective, if this volume was in a cylinder one mile square, about the size of the Inner Loop of Houston, the column of water such a cylinder would create would be 8 miles tall, a column reaching a higher point than the peak of Mt Everest.

This truly was a storm for the ages…and in its wake a treasure trove of heroic stories were spawned.  Consumption of alcoholic beverages and addictive substances spiked, and I am sure that there were instances of pretty bad behavior resulting there from. But the dominant behavior patterns seemed much more of the heroic, good-Samaritan type where people of all walks of life reached out to help everyone, thousands of people stranded in muddy, putrid water.

The storm affected everyone. The sight of the man of means struggling to salvage precious possessions wading out of his palatial house in waist-deep, flowing water to get to high ground, only to stop to help an elderly neighbor not able to get there, losing some of his possessions in the process. It was all repeated over and over.

The concept of the hero’s journey played out in everyone’s psyche. For the recovering alcoholic or addict, the ability to use the tools of recovery, the boon of the hero’s journey, allowed him/her to stay in the moment, serenely focused on the needs of those helpless souls who were otherwise stranded.  Service in the highest tradition of the 12th Step.  What a great gift it all was for all of us….

The Lifelong Quest For Sobriety…The Ultimate Hero’s Journey—Part 17

Guest Blogger and long-time Council friend, Bob W. presents Part 17 of a series dealing with Alcoholism and Addiction from a Mystical, Mythological Perspective, reflecting Bob’s scholarly work as a Ph.D. in mythological studies.

In my earlier life, I was a rather serious marathon runner, training for and running a series of marathons over 13 years.  Marathoning, like other extreme sports, can be seen as therapeutic, having the effect of significantly strengthening various bodily functions.  It can also be seen as addictive.  Scientists have discovered that, during two hour runs, runners’ pre-frontal and limbic regions spewed out endorphins which are natural body chemicals that act a lot like medically engineered drugs such as morphine. The greater the endorphin surge in these brain areas, the more euphoric is the feeling of such runners.  For me, my alcoholic, obsessive-compulsive psyche sought relief in the imbedded highs of long distance running much as I did with alcohol and other substances and behaviors later in life.Boston Marathon Pic1

Marathoning also has a wonderful mythic history, dating back to the Peloponnesian Wars between the Greeks and the Persians.  In 490 B.C.E., after the badly outnumbered Greeks somehow managed to drive back the Persians on the coastal plain of Marathon near Athens, an Athenian messenger named Pheidippides was dispatched from the battlefield to Athens to deliver the news of Greek victory. After running about 25 miles to the Acropolis, he burst into the chambers and gallantly hailed his countrymen with “We are victorious!” And then he promptly collapsed from exhaustion and died. This was the genesis of the original idea of this race in the Olympics, although luckily there have been no recurrences of the fate of Pheidippides.

For our purposes here, rather than look at the addictive elements of such extreme sports activities, it is worthwhile to recall the Greek history of the event and see the process in a recovery, celebratory light. Making the decision to run a marathon, committing to and doing the training, and actually running the race follow the pattern of recovery quite nicely.  A marathon, running continuously for 26 miles, is not something the body can do easily.  The decision to pursue it must be taken quite seriously.  The training must be pursued in great earnest, planned meticulously and executed over a minimum of three months.  Running every day, sunshine, rain or snow;  eating and resting according to a disciplined schedule; and developing the mind set to run the race with some element of control and precision requires a focus not unlike the road to recovery from addictions.  The process is very much like the march through the Steps of Recovery…the exhilaration of the final yards of the 26 mile race before a cheering crowd measured against the congratulatory applause of a fellowship group as we share our experiences in “carrying the message” of the 12th Step.

In 1978, I had the opportunity to run with a high competitive group in the Boston Marathon.  To this day, I remember virtually every step of that race, from the start in the tiny town of Hopkington, Mass, along Route 16 to Commonwealth Avenue, past Wellesley College with the lead women around me, up over the “heartbreak hills” of Newton and past Boston College at the zenith. The road down Beacon Street in the waning, exhausting miles, lead finally to the vision of the Prudential Center and the cheering crowds at the Finish Line in Copley Square.  It was a highlight of my life at the time…and one I can remember with great delight from a much different perspective today in Sobriety.

 

Rob Lowe Wows Record Crowd at The Council’s Fall Luncheon, Raises Over $600K

Rob Lowe Speaks at The Council on Recovery's Fall Luncheon

Iconic Hollywood star, Rob Lowe, helped The Council on Recovery’s Fall Luncheon exceed all expectations in terms of size, money raised, and rave reviews from attendees. Nearly 1,270 enthusiastic Council supporters filled the Hilton Americas grand ballroom on October 20th to hear the celebrated actor, author, and producer tell his personal story of recovery from alcoholism and addiction. In the process, he helped The Council raise more than $600,000 to fund its critical programs and services. Continue reading “Rob Lowe Wows Record Crowd at The Council’s Fall Luncheon, Raises Over $600K” →

Fighting the Opioid Epidemic Using New Technology

Facing a rapidly worsening opioid epidemic, federal health organizations are turning to new technology to fight the growing problem. Leading the way, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has created a mobile application called the CDC Opioid Guideline Mobile App. 

CDC Opioid Prescribing Guideline Mobile App
An app created by the CDC in order for health professionals to monitor their patients’ pain and opioid medications. Photo credit: CDC.

The app features a Morphine Milligram Equivalent (MME) calculator that helps give prescription recommendations, and lets health providers practice effective communication skills. It is free and available to download on any smartphone. The CDC is optimistic that the app will help manage the legal distribution of opioid drugs more efficiently.

Cities across the U.S. have also found ways to tackle the opioid epidemic using new technology in their local communities. The Overdose Detection Mapping Application Program (ODMAP) helps first responders and public health officials locate areas where overdoses are happening. It also helps predict potential opioid drug trafficking areas.

Continue reading “Fighting the Opioid Epidemic Using New Technology” →

The Lifelong Quest For Sobriety…The Ultimate Hero’s Journey—Part 16

Guest Blogger and long-time Council friend, Bob W. presents Part 16 of a series dealing with Alcoholism and Addiction from a Mystical, Mythological Perspective, reflecting Bob’s scholarly work as a Ph.D. in mythological studies.

Dante and Virgil, having finally escaped Hell, the Inferno, find themselves traveling through the Earth into the light of day, on the other side of the world. Now they must traverse upward, through the circles of Purgatorio. In the Church of the time, Purgatory was a place where souls, otherwise in God’s grace, needed further purification, further temporal punishment to become holy enough to enter Heaven. In Dante’s poem, Purgatory is effectively the reverse of Hell, structured as a mountain with rising terraces, each dedicated to one of the Seven Deadly Sins, in reverse order from The Inferno. Each terrace is where souls with one of the sins encounter a process of purification dictated by the representative sin.

The punishments are much less severe, temporal in length, and designed to “correct” and “purify” the soul.  We could see this as a representative parallel to our efforts in our early stages of Sobriety.  This seems a reasonably good parallel to the practice of working the Steps of Four through Nine.  We must record our history in the disease and then reveal it to another.  From this we identify our “defects of character,” ask God for their removal, and then work to correct the effects they had on our life by seeking forgiveness from all those we had harmed.

Having achieved such a purification in Purgatorio, the souls reach a pinnacle, a sort of paradise on earth.  The top of the Purgatorio mountain is just such a paradise, it is the Garden of Eden before the Fall of Man. For us, this could be seen as a place of Steps 11 and 12, where we develop the conscious contact with God and begin to practice the principles and pass on the revelations.

From here, Dante proceeds on to Heaven, Paradiso. Virgil has had to leave him in Purgatory, since, in the beliefs of the Church of the time, his not being a Christian has obviated his worthiness to enter Heaven. In his place, Dante has connected with Beatrice, the love of his early life and the symbol of purity and perfection, and she becomes his companion in Heaven. They ascend above the Earth, traveling to the Moon and the Planets, each housing a realm more beautiful and bright than the one before, until finally reaching the company of all the angelic beings and the Trinity.  The brightness and serenity of this final place is a perfect representation for those of us in the glow of fully committed Sobriety, perhaps the most perfect rendition of the “Sunlight of the Spirit.”