Summary: As a woman in recovery from addiction for 45 years I know about self-doubt, fear and hesitation. This session explores common feelings and struggles in long term sobriety that women can feel embarrassed to admit, but once they do and shift their perceptions – the results are amazing. They experience happiness, joy, independence and confidence, and renewed interest in their relationships.

Hi, everyone. Self-doubt, fear, and hesitation versus confidence, trust, and taking bold action. Do you find yourself almost crippled by self-doubt sometimes? I know I have. How does it show up for you? Do you have conversations with your partner, and you know they're lying, but you doubt yourself? Do you notice that your boss said they support you? Of course, they do - but didn't take action to protect you from that office bully you talk to them about - and then you doubt yourself.

Do you promise yourself you will exercise and diet and hesitate at that moment of implementation telling yourself, I don't know how - it's too hard? Do you often listen to the words you and others speak and when the actions don't match - you doubt yourself and stop short of acknowledging that what they are doing is the real story? Action does speak louder than words, but not to us. Our words of doubt are so loud. We can't hear the action.

Today's show is how women in recovery from alcoholism or drugs show up in relationships with others and themselves that stops their spiritual growth, so get your coffee, sit back and let's get started.

I'm talking to you if you've been in recovery for a number of years, you've worked the steps, you go to meetings, you do all the other things that maintains your sobriety. You've cleared that wreckage from your past, and you had that spiritual experience, knowing that you are free from the debilitating compulsion to use.

You've rebuilt your life, repaired relationships, you have a stable job or a lifestyle of choice that allows you to remain clean. And you know there's more. You don't know what. You feel restless sometimes, or you've had a setback in relationships or with your finances. You go through the steps again, you talk about it with your sponsor, again. You pray about it. You turn it over; you keep doing the things that you do.

You've fallen into overthinking, tolerating, and adjusting, but you don't have words to describe it till now.

I've been there. I've been in recovery for 45 years and I love what the program has done for me. I'm grateful for my growth. I've been in Al-Anon for just about as long, so I'm a double winner, and I believe that's true. I'd often be trying so hard and come to this empty place inside where I didn't know what to do. I kept doing what I was doing. It wasn't giving me the happiness and freedom I wanted, but it was better than going back to using.

Can you relate? If so, you suffer from what I now know is a powerful judge, a judge that interprets all your experiences through a faulty lens.

I've learned that I don't know what I don't know. I don't know the questions to ask. I don't know how to achieve the happiness I see in others I compare myself to, and that really showed up in relationships for me.

I was married once while using and divorced right before I got clean, actually. The second time I was clean just over a year. Then again, I married for the third time when I was clean 21 years. We're still together, 24 years later while it's been a bumpy ride sometimes and not perfect, I wouldn't trade a day of it.

In between that second and third marriage, I was a single parent with five kids for 11 years. During that time, I went through several cycles of meeting someone, starting a relationship, and having it all fall apart. The longest, I think was 3 years. I would go from hopeful to crushed, full of despair, beating myself up, hating myself, wondering what I did wrong, what was wrong with me?

This pain-filled cycle felt punishing and further fueled my self-doubt. Two things were in play for me, although I didn't know it at the time. Hindsight is 2020, especially when you clean up that lens and you're looking at things with a new perspective.

One, while in a relationship, I didn't know how to connect, ask for what I needed, or believe that someone wanted to love and support me. I didn't trust myself to act if this relationship wasn't for me. I didn't trust myself to take care of me because what I did, what we already talked about was - I accommodated, I adjusted, I questioned my judgment instead of trusting my gut.

I watched for signs the relationship was ending. I was insecure and worried; my focus was outside myself - on them. What were they doing? What did they want? How could I adjust so that they would be happy? Co-dependent? For sure.

Number two, I didn't know how to discover what was inside me that was causing this cycle to repeat over and over. I didn't have self-awareness. That's the real solution, finding what's inside that generates that experience that kept repeating and repeating and repeating, deepening my despair and deepening my self-doubt.

Albert Einstein said, "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them." We know that in the program. We know that. We've learned that when we got cleaned up, we thought we knew everything, and we found out we didn't have a clue.

Those steps that didn't apply to me, they sure applied to me. Those steps that wouldn't change my life, changed my life. As much as my sponsors and friends in the program supported me during these years, they didn't know the questions either.

They often got caught up in the story with me and did not ground me in the truth. I'm not saying they didn't try. I also probably couldn't hear it.

What to do? What do you want in your relationships - start there. It sounds simplistic and it's true. Most answers are simple. It's our complicated overthinking mind that wants to make it a bigger deal than it really is. Start there.

You may have been given advice in the past about writing out the qualities you want in a partner. I'm suggesting you write the qualities you want to experience in your life first, who do you want to be and work on that. It's called your vision for your life.

Do you want to feel loved, be autonomous and independent, supported, nurtured, cherished, confident, trust your partner, be on a journey together, and have that sense of partnership? Do you want to experience mutual respect and support each other's goals? Do you want to be courageous and take bold action in your life?

I thought I was capable of that kind of relationship, but how I was showing up was looking to protect myself from hurt, dependent on outside validation, clingy, fearful, and insecure. In other words, self-centered. Ouch! That's so hard to admit, but it was the first step. Being honest with what I was bringing to the party.

Learn to meditate. I did a lot of prayer, a lot of prayer, a lot of prayer. I didn't ever get real quiet and still and meditate even though the 11th step is quite clear, "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact with a power greater than myself." A power that may have the answers that are lacking, a source that may have some insight into who I am and how I'm showing up, and what I could do to shift that. Take the time to go deeper into your motives, gain clarity on who you are because you can't shift from that space until you've defined it. Until you have the words to define your experience. You notice I didn't use the word change.

to me change means I'm not enough, something I'm doing or experiencing isn't right. It's not enough. It's wrong. That's coming from a place of lack. If I start from that place that I am enough already, just as I am, it gives me space to become aware through meditation. Remember. Become aware, see a new possibility, and take an action that aligns with what I want to experience, back to that life vision. Do I want to experience love, joy, and happiness?

Get support, seek women who have asked the questions and found the answers, women who have what you want. We said that in the beginning about our recovery. Stick with people that have what you want. That's still true. Find fellow seekers who are on that deeper journey. They'll lift you up and in turn, you'll lift up others.

Let me check in with you. What do you think is possible in your life? Pause, ask yourself, what is possible if I truly felt confident trusting and took that bold action? Would you experience joy? Would you start that new business, get that degree, change that job? Would you connect with your family and not talk at them but have a connection and really hear what they're trying to say and be able to express back your deepest vulnerabilities to those you love. Really have a bridge and not just talking heads, talking at each other, and not getting anywhere. That's at stake and that's what's available to you.

What can you take away from today's show? Can you do one small shift, open your mind to the idea that you may have it wrong, that there may be answers you need in places that you've rejected them? How about starting with listing what you want in life and be with that? Just be with that and let it breathe.

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