Learn What Spiritual Malady Is And The Role It Plays In Your Recovery

Wouldn’t that meant the 12 Steps would not work for them? If they are entirely normal then surely that would mean they have no resentments, they are not self centered etc.

I had a connection with the world I could not generate myself, when sober. One can see how this concept of sin disease or in other words spiritual malady could be and was applied https://ecosoberhouse.com/ to early AA and incorporated into the Big Book of AA. Sins I believe are the poisoned fruit of fear, often helped along in alcoholics by false pride, shame and guilt.

The Mind is also Abnormal

He “had to” react with arrogance, dismissiveness, impatience and intolerance, because his shame, which is a fear based emotion, made him fearful of his own recovery and fear makes one strangely dishonest , This is my experience. The newcomer gave me an example of a resentment he was experiencing after this guy at a meeting said “get off your pink cloud” a phrase that refers to the sometimes mildly ecstatic feelings of early recovery. For me we engage futilely and distressingly in resentment because we have an inability to process and control our emotions, they overwhelm us and we often react by people pleasing or react via various defense mechanisms .

I need booze to medicate my inner turmoil, tortured mind and my broken heart. What we used once to regulate negative emotions and a sense of self has eventually come to regulate our emotions to such an extent that any distress leads to the compulsive response of drinking. Alcoholics had become a compulsive disorder to relief distress not to induce pleasure. For me this section is saying our emotion dysregulation leads to feelings of being “restless, irritable and discontented” which prompt a return to drinking. My inventory of steps 4/5 showed me that my long lists of resentments were mainly the product of emotional immaturity and responding in an immature manner to not getting my way.

Clancy I. – AA Speaker – “Alcoholism: A Disease of Perception”

I have not been taught as a child or since to simply say I am upset. We have to show love and tolerance for each other as we suffer the same illness/malady. Dismissing others like us for having what we have and acting as we do is like a form of self loathing. We have to forgive ourselves and each other for being ill.

• Rather than providing a feeling of relief, we find ourselves in a perpetual “dark night of the soul,” cut off from any sense of spiritual comfort.
• Almost disappointingly I found some of my sins were quite tame when compared to other people I have spoken to in recovery.
• We seem to compulsively seek to relieve an inherent distress of not having what we set out to get.
• My inventory of steps 4/5 showed me that my long lists of resentments were mainly the product of emotional immaturity and responding in an immature manner to not getting my way.
• Similarly, those who struggle with alcohol addiction are more susceptible to developing a mental health issue.

I share my feelings of shame with those who know what that feels like. I related and all my negative emotions retreated to source like a evening tide on a beach. I respond to feelings of humiliation by humiliating you, I react to my chronic shame by attempting to created shame in you. These are my main negative emotional reactions to the world that often scare me and make me feel ashamed.

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It is the always wanting one more that makes my affective disorder that of addiction and not another disorder. I also think the issues are complicate because alcoholism have some many similarities to GAD, MDD, OCD, and so on. It was 80 years ago, so our knowledge base has moved on greatly from when the Big Book was written. Hence I believe we should appreciate that this definition of our condition has been updated by research into emotions especially in the last 20 years.

• His Grace takes the distress out of thee negative emotions.
• The doctors opinion emphasizes more on the physical craving part and talks about the spiritual malady part as the state of being restless irritable and discontented.
• We were prepared to look for it from an entirely different angle.
• The psychology and neuropsychology of alcoholism, addictive behaviour and recovery.

It is emotionally healthy to accept our past experiences, however painful, as past events and move on to a richer, more fulfilling future. So we have issues with emotions and spiritual malady somatic/body feeling states. That is not to say that normal people cannot be full of sin – a cursory look around the work and it’s events will soon confirm this is the case.

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It chains us to the past and endangers recovery because we drank on shame and guilt. The spirituality of AA is exemplified in helping others, it creates a feeling of wholeness and connectedness with others. High sponsor involvement over time has been found to predict longer recovery .

What I am saying is that they do not have the emotion dysregulation or fear based responding that I seem to have which often prompts “sin”. We have found that these problems no longer exist for us when we begin living by spiritual principles and improving our conscious contact with our higher power. There are many men and women who felt the same way and have been able to overcome the malady by maintaining spiritual fitness and practicing the principles of AA in all of their affairs.

Bob D. – AA Speaker – “A Shining Example of Recovery from Alcoholism”

It doesn’t mean their behaviour is acceptable & I should stand there & take their abuse but I can now look at it from an entirely different angle & those resentments / anger subside once I pray to my higher power. The Big Book of AA uses the word “powerless” once, and the word “power” over 65 times. The 12 Steps are about freedom and empowerment. I tried to being a more honest person, I tried to getting in better shape and eating right, I tried to live by religious priniples, but all of my attempts to change on my own power eventually failed utterly….. It would sometimes work superficially for a period of time, but then it would just fall by the wayside like so many other of my failed attempts to change my life on my own self will. It is very difficult for me to come to terms with my spiritual illness because of my great pride, disguised by my material successes and my intellectual power.