Living a Life of Evidence

Our actions will always produce a trail of evidence that reflect our inward status.
Always.

In school we learned that successful addiction treatment outcomes (and by successful I mean treatment plans that are put in place and any kind of forward moving progress is being made) are always marked by identifiable variations of measurable, outward change.

Of course it matters how you feel and what your deepest desires are, and what your motives and intentions might be.  But clinical progress is measured by evidence and evidence is tangible stuff you can taste, smell, see, or touch and keep track of on paper.

Regardless of who you are or where you have been or how slow you go, the inward changes that we are consciously making as regularly as we can will undoubtedly manifest and become something solid and huge and powerful in our lives. There will be no way you can miss them.

I try my best to carry this same method and message with other facets of my personal life. Not just in relation to drugs & alcohol, but in how I interact and treat other human beings. A lot of this recovery stuff, actually translates seamlessly into what is actually just regular everyday life stuff.

If I say that I want to be supportive of people who are struggling with a substance use disorder, or if I want to be a part of breaking through stigma associated with mental health issues, or that I want to love like Jesus and show the love and compassion that He showed people who society deemed and discarded as the ‘less thans’ or ‘damaged goods’ during His time here…

How do I get there?

If the cure to darkness is light, how can I help reflect The light to those around me?
If the key to despair is hope, how can I share hope?
If supporting people who are feeling burdened by shame means accepting them, how can I show them love?

If these are my desires and are a reflection of my values,feelings, priorities and goals, what does that actually mean?

What do these things look like within the context of MY life?

I am most definitely a fan of the all or nothing, the black and white and the doing and not just saying. Mostly because of my being a COA and possessing certain characteristics, evidenced by my perfectionist personality traits and a pressing need to have consistency and trust. I like to consider myself to be a do-er and not a talker. It’s safer.

So to me the only major difference between talking of wanting something or having a desire to be more of myself in certain ways, lies right in the depths of the doing..

Yet, even the perfectionist that lives in my bones knows that I won’t ever get all of these things ‘right’. Life in general is messy because of all of the humany qualities that are major stumbling blocks on anyone’s pathway to peace, or quest for illusive balance. There are always roadblocks when rolling out even the most thoughtful, well-intentioned life plans.

Hell, I know for sure and have accepted that these ducks of mine will never end up in a pretty row and will probably always show up late. My ducks are the neony, fluorescent type and will always be representative of the kind that toddler has tossed out of a bathtub across a bathroom somewhere.

But that is not going to stop me from trying every single day, to live out the answers that I have within my heart to these various questions.

Our everyday lives are basically just one huge reflection of our most coveted values, priorities and goals. And we do not have to lead perfect lives to live lives packed full of wall-to-wall evidence, and we don’t have to get all of the somethings right every time. There is no such thing as not qualifying for this kind of stuff.

So, here’s to living a life full of evidence.