preparation

A Pile of Dry Shit

One day a famous government officer met a highly respected edlerly master. Being conceited, he wanted to prove that he was the superior person.As their conversation drew on, he asked the master, "Old monk, do you know what I think of you and the things you said?"

The master replied, "I don't care what you think of me. You are entitled to have your own opinion."The officer snorted, "Well, I will tell you what I think anyway. In my eyes, you are just like a pile of dry shit!"The master simply smiled and stayed quiet.

Seeing that his insult had fallen into deaf ears, he asked curiously, "And what do you think of me?"

The master said, "In my eyes, you are just like the Buddha."Hearing this remark, the officer left happily and bragged to his wife about the incident.His wife said to him, "You conceited fool! When a person has a heart like a pile of dry shit, he sees everyone in that light. The elderly master has a heart like that of the Buddha, and that is why in his eyes, everyone, including you, is like the Buddha!"

i find myself in the planning stage of change as the days once again begin the trek to get longer. i have been considering some options for the next project to dive into. part of me wonders whether i should just take a break, but i am not sure that is how i roll anymore. i can take a break when i'm dead. i would like to fuel and flame some passion in my life. and i would love the opportunity to continue to have conversations about recovery. not my recovery any more, but recovery in general- and why it is that the concept of recovery is not the first thing or even the 100th thing that people expect when the topic of addiction or illness comes up. it seems to me that our collective perspective on addiction and mental illness could be characterized as a pile of dry shit. but i hope to remind us that there is a something just like a buddha among us- recovery.

A New Recovery Advocacy Movement 

William L. White & Pat Taylor 

People in recovery from addiction, their families, friends and allies are on the 

move. Some are calling on mayors, governors and legislators to change policies to make 

it possible for people to get needed treatment and recovery support services. Others are 

joining National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month celebrations that draw 

tens of thousands of people and extensive media coverage. 

Local communities of recovery are organizing and sharing ideas, resources and 

experiences. A grass roots media campaign (see www.recoveryiseverywhere.org) is 

countering stigma and putting a positive face on recovery. A network of thousands of 

recovery homes is spreading rapidly to small towns and large cities. Recovery High 

Schools are flourishing, as are special programs for the growing number of recovering 

people entering or returning to college. Innovative peer-based recovery support services, 

ranging from Recovery Support Centers to growing networks of recovery coaches are 

testimony to new creative solutions to addiction. Something is happening in our 

communities -- a renewed spirit of service and activism that has been christened the New 

Recovery Advocacy Movement. 

Faces & Voices of Recovery, the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug 

Dependence, the Legal Action Center, the Johnson Institute, the Center for Substance 

Abuse Treatment’s Recovery Community Services Program grantees such as White 

Bison, Association of Persons Affected by Addiction (APAA) and Connecticut 

Community for Addiction Recovery (CCAR) and hundreds of new grassroots recovery 

community organizations are all part of this exciting movement. Recovering people are 

collaborating with visionary professionals to communicate to the world that addiction 

recovery is a reality for millions of people and their families. This movement is calling 

for a vanguard of recovering people.... www.facesandvoicesofrecovery.org

the ride

i remember going to the carnival in the small town where i lived when i was a little boy. the main square of town had been transformed into a gallimaufry of contraptions and structures which consisted of rides, games, and food purveyors, all of it was strange and exciting and new. adrenalin filled my veins like a mountain stream after a downpour of rain. i always eagerly anticipated attending and would make my way to try as much as possible as soon as possible. i would gorge on roasted corn on the cob, cotton candy, and pork tenderloin sandwiches- usually double up on the sugar- and swirl with a buzz. i treated the rides just like the candy- i was a glutton-almost pacman like.

i don't remember those carnival days as the happiest in my youth by any means, but i remember them vividly.. they seem pagan and pre-radical faerie at best. what i also remember succinctly is the kind of vertigo that would follow this ritual and roll in like a fog after the convergence of sucrose and kinetics. i would get somewhat numbed, disoriented, a bit detached, just as i do at the end of the manic phase. the energy of those outdoor festivals felt just like mania to me. and for this bi-polar mania may just be like a broadway show overture, comprised of a whirlwind of curious and enticing soundbites strung together in an upbeat tapestry. this vertigo, or motion sickness, that i would feel has always felt intrinsically connected to me, just like the mania that preceded it.

i bring this up because i am in the circuit that is described above in my daily life. there is so much newness going on that i have spied my reflection spinning in circles to keep up with all the changes. interwoven with this activity is that ancient sense of disambiguation which ebbs in and out like a marine layer and fills my soul with intoxicating feelings of engagement and disconnection that can be dizzying. the strangeness of it all is the topside and the underside is the familiarity of the dance.

moving through and living with a chemical imbalance is both the carnival i remember and at the same time it is like the funhouse there. it is an revolving and everhshifting maze that recites "the more things change, the more they remain the same" each time the labyrinth is walked. my life has traditionally felt tumultuous. it was before i began using substances, it continued in the 33 years of consistent self-medicating, and it remains in tact after 9 years of sobriety. it has become less of a star player in my drama and phased into the greek chorus. medication reels in the circumference, but the ride motion remains.

no matter how unflattering, now matter how inconvenient, how unsettling- this is part of the  truth of who i am. i often spout to those that i work with that emotional sobriety really involves looking at, understanding, and accepting how we really are in the world. omg- that is so much easier said than done. and it is definitely a ride.

the tide is high

image credit... dmitri theocharis

i had a long day at work catching up on paperwork and trying to regain my emotional balance somehow. i just feel wonky. change has moved into our department like the santa ana winds, and i am stirred deeply by the gales.

i volunteered for the foundation at a fundraiser for the adolescent psychiatric program. a young black woman named madeline spoke about her experiences with mental health issues in her own neighborhood. the simplicity of her stories of her neighbors and friends, gutted by mental health issues, just like hooks thrown by invisible fishing lines had me teary. i remembered my own adolescence usurped by imbalance which set a course of living on the edge which lasted decades more than appropriate. mental illness is very real and very closeted. i need to work more to illuminate this.

today i spoke with my friend. he spent his final day at work and was cagey and passive aggressive as he talked around it. he talked about hooking up with home health care with hospice to follow. it was matter of fact and chilled both of us as it was discussed. months pass very quickly while time can move slowly in the same life. i wonder if that will be the case here.

i couldn't sleep this morning. longtime companion was running on cable, so i watched it again. the film still moves\ me deeply, but the effects are not as acute at all. i have moved past the pain and fear of that time, but find i continue to deal with loss and the inability to change life and death. luckily, i have become adept at learning not to run.

this seems to be rambling. it is very late and i should sleep.

chaos

image credit... HIV+ Babylon Chaos

Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos.

Stephen Sondheim

sometimes it just all seems to go to shit. all the planning, all the meditation, all the affirmations, all the steps i take to stay grounded just fade instantly into black. i am left with darkness, unknowing, and chaos. it doesn't last long, but it is certainly a black hole. today was a feast of this chaos for me. it was huge, without flavor, yet hard to forget.

insanity and sanity may just be the same feeling- one perhaps being the negative of the other. or maybe a 2 sided kandinsky is what this resembles. or maybe i have seen a replication of the big bang theory. how did i live before faith?

Our universe began with a hot big bang 13.7 billion years ago and has expanded and cooled ever since. It has evolved from a formless soup of elementary particles into the richly structured cosmos of today.

The first microsecond was the formative period when matter came to dominate over 

antimatter, the seeds for galaxies and other structures were planted, and dark matter (the unidentified material that holds those structures together) was created.

The future of the universe lies in the hands of dark energy, an unknown form of energy that caused cosmic expansion to begin accelerating a few billion years ago....reprinted from scientific american

camera obscura... through a glass darkly

It doesn't hurt me. 

Do you want to feel how it feels? 

Do you want to know, know that it doesn't hurt me? 

Do you want to hear about the deal that I'm making? 

You, It's you and me. 

And if I only could, 

I'd make a deal with God, 

And I'd get him to swap our places, 

Be running up that road, 

Be running up that hill, 

Be running up that building. 

Say, If I only could, oh... 

You don't want to hurt me, 

But see how deep the bullet lies. 

Unaware, I'm tearing you asunder. 

Ooh, There is thunder in our hearts.... kate bush

the darkness that seems to have settled upon my life at the beginning of this year seems a bit less stifling today. although continuing to be out of sorts, i sense some hope- with regard to specifically what i am not so sure. there is a recurrence of old feelings that i haven't yet pinpointed.

perhaps there is an innate sense of self-destruction that permeates my foundation. i know that i can't sense directly what is not right, but with time, i can rewind until i forage the rough steps and the missteps until perhaps motivation emerged.

i now realize (after only 1 week this time) that some ancient feelings got triggered somehow. i reacted as i have trained myself to. i then paused, looked around, and remembered that my emotional responses are not my desired ones. the recoiling of  the released ball of emotional yarn needs to happen. it is happening. staying in the moment is the last instinct.

meanwhile- the image i captured, although based in reality, is not at all a true image nor is the response a real response, but more i have just experienced a reflection of an old reaction.

it's a lotta friggin work to heal sometimes..

"Please forgive me. This post strains two metaphors and doesn’t do it very artfully. One, the camera obscura, represents, literally, the “dark room” in which many developers find themselves when working with a non-standards-based SOA development platform. The second, “through a glass darkly” represents the transition, indeed, the revolution, that developers need to accept in order to get SOA applications widely deployed".... an idea lifted from another blogger

piece of my heart

image credit- will northerner

Perhaps the only true dignity of a man is his capacity to despise himself. - George Santayana

Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it. - Michel de Montaigne

Let us not burden our remembrances with a heaviness that is gone. - William Shakespeare

Emotion has taught mankind to reason. - Marquis de Vauvenargues

In a fight between you and the world, back the world. - Franz Kafka

I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul. - William E. Henley

Happiness is the interval between periods of unhappiness. - Don Marquis

Happiness is not being pained in body or troubled in mind. - Thomas Jefferson

We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe. - Goethe

Stress is nothing more than a socially acceptable form of mental illness. - Richard Carlson

Mental illness is nothing to be ashamed of, but stigma and bias shame us all. - Bill Clinton

i decided to start this post with quotes about mental illness. i inherited a form of bi-polar disorder from my mother who inherited it from her father and so on... definitely a gift that keeps on giving, i have wrestled with mania and depression for longer than i allow myself to remember.

early in my journey i was so enmeshed in her process that i didn't realize i was learning how to deal with mine. i guess it's called learning by rote. or maybe it's a journeyman process like the 12 steps. it doesn't matter really, either way. it is my experience and i can't erase that.

our particular brand of challenge seems to be characterized by a meltdown somewhere in the 40's. there has been a consistent crash that is characterized by the letting go of everything in life and a calling to proverbially circle the drain. this seems to be the point when a medical professional usually comes into the picture and introduces medicine and our lives change - at least for awhile.
that last sentence sounds simple, but it is anything but that. included in this is releasing the romance and relationship with mania. crazy can be much more intoxicating than its reputation. it is perhaps the ultimate natural high. mania is addictive. it's pretty common knowledge that most folks with bi-polar disorder will follow doctors orders until their lives have leveled out and then tell themselves they are ok and leave the meds behind much like an alcoholic or a crack addict. this must be because the chemical releases in the brain are so powerful that the brain devises ways to get more.

i have come to understand a deeper reason it is referred to as a chemical imbalance. there has been very little balance in my brain since i was 12 or so. it has been a storm of sorts. "tumultuous"," uneven", and "wtf" are just a few phrases that can relay the reality of a bi-polar brain. i am now learning that living with bipolar disorder just may be one of the huge lessons that my life has to offer me. there are others certainly. the gift of recovery has been monumental in my life. but years into sobriety, it is being revealed that recovery for me encompasses much deeper issues that substance use.

these last few years of clean time have afforded me the luxury of being in the middle of a storm in my brain on more than one occasion and learning that i can withstand that without disappearing. it has taken 50 years to just get a glimpse of the grace of that revelation.

i'm pretty sure i have spent most of my life judging my mother and her circumstance, her decisions, and her occasional knack to get in over her head. i have hated some of those times. luckily, time has a way of softening the lens. now i know that i am not very different.

so tomorrow, as i spend time with my mom on  mother's day, i will have renewed gratitude on a hugely deeper level. i cannot ever think i would have figured out how to come in from the storm without her wisdom and experience. and especially her mistakes.

light

crazy is as crazy does. sounds simple, but it gets so much more complicated than a catch phrase. and i was once again reminded of this yet again as i watched and listened to the darkly fantastic "next to normal" playing at the elle caulkins theatre in denver last night. a musical about mental illness? the ironies only begin with that question.

not a perfect play by any means, i found it compelling and thought-provoking at worst and engaging and validating on the better part of the scale. mental health anomalies (ergo mental health issues) don't get cured. they are endured and remain. or not. this nugget of truth makes up the dark part of this story of a family doing their very best to limp through their own wounded situation. all are heroes, all falter, and all of them make sacrifices as well as compromises in order to keep going. and keeping going is the light at the end of the lightless tunnel they take us through. this family keeps going, as individuals, and as a unit, just not the unit we were introduced to at the start of the show.

the daughter's character held special interest to me. she has not bonded with her mother (who has the disorder) and yet she is so like her mother it's uncanny. she handles life and mishandles life in the very same ways she learned from her mother, yet seems so eager to get angry at her mother with every action. it reminded me that indeed most of us learn by example, not by direction and this truth may be hard to get around.

i remembered last night during the walk back to the car that how i deal with life was mostly learned by example. my chemical imbalance is hereditary and is active in most members of one side of my family, although it does manifest itself differently in many. but i did learn about self-medication, avoidance, and denial from my older family members. and later in life- my twenties, i started seeing what the repercussions of their techniques were, although i was already entrenched in my own blend of coping and a course was set.

i liked the magic show approach to psychiatry that was presented in the play. it stings with truth as well as exaggeration. there is not a formula or an exact prescription that fits all. it is an approach at best. and even with the best approach, the symptoms of an anomaly continue. they may be quelled to a point, however, an imbalance still exists. and always will.

learning to live with one's own mental health is a lifetime voyage. both for the bearer and for the people in their lives who love them. i love the lyric "this is the price we pay to feel".  this difficulty is illustrated in a most tender and beautiful fashion in "next to normal". and i believe that next to normal is probably the best anyone will ever get. "and still we pay... we love anyway"...

And you find some way to survive
And you find out you don't have to be happy at all,
To be happier alive.


Natalie:
Day after day,
Give me clouds, and rain and gray.
Give me pain, if that's what's real.


Henry and Natalie:
It's the price we pay to feel.


Dan and Diana:
The price of love is loss,

Dan:
But still we pay.
Dan and Henry:
We love anyway.


Gabe:
And when the night has finally gone.
And when we see the new day dawn.
We'll wonder how we wandered for so long, so blind.
The wasted world we thought we knew,
The light will make it look brand new.... lyrics from "light" next to normal

how to save a life

Step one you say we need to talk
He walks you say sit down it's just a talk
He smiles politely back at you
You stare politely right on through
Some sort of window to your right
As he goes left and you stay right
Between the lines of fear and blame
And you begin to wonder why you came

Strength Over Speed Colorado

our team has been piecing together some ideas for a newer direction for the hiv positive patients who are (or are struggling with) dealing with substance abuse issues and healthcare adherence lapses. there are several factors which are closely related to many of these individuals challenges.  trauma, stigma, depression, aging, sexual dysfunction, isolation, self-esteem, mental health are the first of many to come to mind.

most of the patients i see live below the poverty level. some by design, but most reside in this strata because this is all they know. insurance is not an issue as it is not a choice. luckily in colorado, there is a state program which is designed to give access to healthcare to every coloradan. so much of the basic and intricate healthcare issues and hiv care issues can be met. but honestly, many of these individuals don't care about healthcare or hiv care. the avoidance of these as well as avoiding as many of their feelings beyond numb creates a perfect environment for drug and alcohol use to morph into abuse almost invisibly- at least to them. it's quite a different story to the world around them as out of balance seems quite evident.

one thing that seems to be a reality in our city is that  a sense of community and camaraderie in the world of alcohol and drugs exists and beckons. the bars- especially gay bars are community oriented and geared towards fun while you use. music, emcees, shows, drag shows, comedy, dancing, are all at our fingertips as we begin to cement our relationship with drugs and alcohol. the concept of fun is interlaced with use and as we all know it does feel good to get high. it's moderation which becomes the issue, or maybe the lack of it.

so when people are conceptualizing themselves changing their use, or stopping their use, the idea of fun and festivity becomes a major factor. "life will be dull without the party" accompanies a belief that there will never be joy in their lives again if they stop using. seems pretty reasonable to me. felt that way myself actually. and if you think about it, the image of sobriety pales with regard to fun-loving. as a matter of fact, even though i believe that being sober has brought an unbelievable sense of calm and peace to my life, i don't even think my using friends think of me as being very much fun. conversely, i would imagine they see me as a buzz kill.

anyway, we are trying to put together a visual and approachable set of peers who have gone through the changes involved in giving up drug use and drinking and have become conduits of joy. i know that i am much happier than i was before 9/29/04, and if you sit an chat with me for a while, i think you'll believe it and feel it, and i know it is true of many, many others too! this is the subliminal message we want to disseminate. i am currently looking to seattle's strength over speed  for some inspiration. that grassroots effort has been in development for a few years and i believe they have affected lives. they mix together men who have stopped using meth with men who are actively using- some of those reformed are involved with 12-step and some are not. this encounter, no doubt, allows people weighing their options to see that life can easily continue successfully without the armor of substance protecting us.

the next offering is a workbook-driven curriculum for meth users that is evidence-based and hails from the Matrix Institute of CA. i worked with a version of it previously when i helped develop a program called  the "mile high meth project" for another agency. the matrix has its strengths and weaknesses, but the structure works well and it is designed to engage user's right brain in order to address the left. coming down off meth creates so much emotionality, that any process that can grab their attention is worth its weight in gold. this is not specifically for gay men. this is much more universal. this is also not poz-only. it's not as if people discriminate when they are actively using, and i am trusting that same acceptance tendency can bring educational opportunities as well as personal growth and self-acceptance.

this layer will hopefully work as we extend our efforts here beyond gay men. in colorado, poz persons who are not gay men struggle with isolation and stigma even more intensely. there is a small sense if community among these subsets, but it is not cohesive. at least not at our workplace. thus far, we have started a drop in group for the gay poz patients and it seems to be making an imprint. this week heralds its 1-year anniversary, and i believe we have had almost 100 persons through our doors. and our substance treatment numbers for that population have quadrupled with the onset of this effort. and the work continues.

of course, what we are working towards includes helping people find their way to healthcare adherence and retention. the science has been available for some time to keep this virus manageable and undetectable. the costly and debilitating problems that unaddressed hiv infection brings can be greatly minimized by adherence. honestly, i have seen about 15 persons pass this year and most of them would be categorized in the aforementioned. i know that what i am working towards is how to save a life.

keep your fingers crossed... oh... and, can you see my heart smile?

of course the fray are from colorado turf. their stunning debut album seemed to almost usher in the latest indie music boon that we are now in the midst. i heard an interview with lead singer isaac as he talked about visiting a mountainside drug and alcohol recovery camp for youth and was inspired to write these lyrics. appropriate.... local...... lovely..

it's kind of a funny story

last night i went to a co-worker's open house in federal heights for a minute, then met jim and went to dinner at new saigon where we had soft shell crab with garlic sauce, curry and coconut mussels and beef with black pepper. i can't say enough about how much i love spending time with him. somehow, i don't feel as if i have to explain myself to him, nor do i feel apologetic for being as avid an advocate for developing programs or ideas as i have become. he has known me for 18 years or so and understands me and gives me perspective that i am unable to quite see.

after dinner, we went to see "it's a kinda funny story" for the late show at the mayan. it was sweet, tender, and a bit balsamic. the performances are timely and relaxed, the script flowed easily like melted butter on popcorn, ad the idea that doing what we think we should be doing can be crazy making and that letting go of that particular mantra and spending time following our dreams, we may find some sense of sanity and serenity on the way. and with the exception of a couple of completely useless vomiting scenes, the film seemed easy and a good fit.

strangely, the cast of characters residing in the psych ward of the hospital did not seem very distant from the people i know in my life. i think they seem far more "normal" than the cast of "w" to me. music always lifts me and much of the music used for the background is from the sensational canadian ensemble "broken social scene". however, the most memorable musical moment came during the music workshop at the hospital with all the patients gathered round to play instruments. our hero's anxiety about singing takes us along on a fantasy about his fronting a glam band and performing queen and bowie's "under pressure".  a big debate between jim and i ensued, because i was sure this a late 70's song, but he insisted it was 80's. i also was sure it was bowie, but he disagreed. both of us were right and both of us were wrong. perfect..

good music. good film. worth seeing. maybe homescreen.

get your group on

"Group means simply a number of people that you are sharing with on a regular basis. So if in fact you are living with or working with people who are negative, that you have help with that. There are also times in our lives when we are with positive people who are trying to walk a positive road. There is support. There is sharing of wisdom. More than anything else people who are walking the same road, who are fighting the same battles. It helps define you. That you are not powerless. That you can make all kinds of decisions. The quality of our life so much depends on what we choose it to be. Choose something wonderful and great for yourself and then get out and make it happen."... Earnie Larsen

i remember when i was attending a group with regularity. i went to 3 groups a week for 3 years because i needed the support. and i fell off the group attendance because i had a life changing situation and i started isolating. isolating is what i do when i am emotional because it is easier and hurts less than being around people and having to explain my feelings.

perhaps this is a cop out. i think this is what many acquaintances think. and maybe i think this too. there are two lines of thought for me on this. firstly, i think that i should talk about how i feel and include people in my life in what is going on inside my head and heart. and more so, i fall first to believing that my feelings (and myself) are inappropriate and in the wrong. the next process is for me to remember that i am allowed to have my feelings whatever they are. for so many years i have pushed past my feelings, ignored them, medicated them, not honored them, and therefore it is imperative for me to honor my feelings by having them and sitting with them.

i have written about this before and most likely will do so again. this is the centerpiece of my serenity at this time of my life. i co-exist with a chemical imbalance and i have to learn to do so in a way that is considerate of my being. i need to acquaint myself with my moods and the strategies to remain sane. and i have a steamer trunk full of emotional baggage filled with homespun and imported trauma and a lifetime of secrets, lying, hiding, and binging.

needless to say this requires fortitude and in reviewing my program, i realize i need to expand my support network.  i have about 5 good friends that are the ultimate supporters, but i think i may need to expand my inner work to include a more focused agenda and expand my recreational life to be around more people with more activities.

i sat in the group i facilitate yesterday and again noticed the energy that can be created by a selection of souls and a need to explore. i found myself smiling in admiration of this whole exchange.

 i think i need to get my group on.

and for fun, here is missy  gettin her group on and speaking an enticing language maybe only they really understand..