The Seduction of Self Will

The Seduction of Self-Will

Understanding How Comfort Competes with Truth

Personal reflections from a fellow traveler.  Not AA approved literature.  Shared in the spirit of Experience, Strength, and Hope.

My self-will is often rooted in self-deception – the most insidious and destructive form of lying that exists.  To deceive oneself is to destroy oneself. 

I still chase outcomes, still seek to anesthetize my feelings through control instead of complete and total surrender.  The desire to change the way I feel sits at the core of my inability to allow discomfort to do its work in refining my heart.  As soon as those impurities begin to burn off, that’s when I start thinking of giving up.  I will bargain with myself, rewrite the truth, contemplate my thoughts, second guess, and set aside what I know to be true in order to regain some comfort and control.  This is the behavior of sick people, and this is where I must see myself for what I truly am; broken and weak.  I’m not saying this in a self-deprecating manner, but rather to illustrate my need for growth.

I will attempt to surrender, try to release, then I find that there is something within me that is grasping at the wheel.

I’ve heard it said that “pain is inevitable, suffering is optional”.  I’ve played with this in my mind for hours.  The mental gymnastics I’ve conducted are worthy of an Olympic Gold Medal.  As I try to understand this on a deeper level, I’ve come to realize what this might mean to me: The pain and discomfort of life, the disappointments, the loss, the trials that are meant to strengthen me and refine me are only capable of doing their work if I allow them.  Suffering, agony, and protracted pain are allowed to take root when I negotiate with what I know to be true.  When I alter the fabric of reality, when I reframe it, when I minimize it to suit my selfish desires, and plow forward with my projected outcome in mind, I allow suffering to bloom.

It’s here - RIGHT HERE – before I move forward in self, where acceptance of the situation or circumstance must begin its work. 

I think of it simply like this: Acceptance, Pain, Surrender, Healing.

Often this won’t happen quickly enough for me.  I become frustrated with the perceived delay and sometimes decide I’ve had enough.  This is the bitter fruit of impatience attempting to sabotage the process.

Acceptance begins its work when I stop rewriting the reality I’ve observed.  Pain ignites its furnace when I cease returning to what doesn’t work.  Surrender occurs when I’ve had enough wallowing in a place I don’t truly belong.  Healing forms when these things have completed their course within me.  All of them uncomfortable, all of them painful, all of them reminding me that I am not the center of the universe.  The sickness of self still resides within me, perhaps this can best be described as human nature.  I can fight its foul decay only when I completely rely upon a power greater than myself.

I find peace when I step into “The Truth” (objective reality) versus manufacturing “My Truth” (subjective reality).  “My Truth” is a rewritten narrative I create that softens the sting, the pain, the offense of something I refuse to accept within myself.

Peace does not always arrive quickly, often it is achieved slower than I’d like.

This is the work.  This is the struggle.  This is the process of refinement.  It will hurt.

Where in my life am I being seduced by self-will, and where is comfort competing with Truth?