Episode 1:
I've gotten a lot of feedback from a previous newsletter that the idea of creative recovery is striking a chord, so I decided to share my journey here in a more public way.
Recovery means some specific things to a lot of people and they aren't always the same. Addiction recovery is probably among the most common. Recovery of one's health and vitality from an extended illness is another. Recovery from devastating loss such as a financial meltdown, death or divorce. Recovery of one's self respect after extended exposure to a soul sucking, extractive, dehumanizing corporate job. Then we get into some of the more nuanced possibilities, recovery of one's identity, sense of self, self respect, dreams, possibilities, talents, joy, happiness, even recovery of one's basic humanity.
What do I personally mean? Probably all of these actually. The one that isn't so directly true for me is recovery from the corporate abuse that is so common in the western world, especially the US. And even that one is present for me indirectly both through working with big corporate clients as a consultant, helping many private clients remake themselves, and in my lineage as the effects were felt through my father's life and his own wounding in that role. The cultural and familial devastation of corporate extraction was the backdrop for my experience growing up and strongly influenced my choices then and since. When I was a teen, I remember thinking of my father as a primary example of what not to be. His pain motivated me to vow that I would never do for work what I didn't love enough to do for free.
While painfully naïve, it has guided my life choices and been largely successful since.
Writing is a primary sensemaking practice for me and has been for many years. As I write now, I realize that bold and idealistic move probably served in discontinuing some strong and unhealthy family patterns at the time, but became very limiting later. Defining oneself in opposition to something only feeds it and perpetuates it. What we resist, persists; goes the saying in energy medicine.
Back to Creative Recovery. I realize this is an ongoing inquiry to live, but so far to me, this means recovering my own humanity through my creative impulse and recovering my creative authority through my humanity. Nothing has catalyzed growth and challenged my smallness like my own damn wild-ass, unendurably creative impulses.
In addition to that, somewhere about this week 5 years ago I stopped drinking alcohol. There are a lot of reasons for that large and small, some of them I'll unpack here since they inform this conversation.
One is curiosity and a natural impulse to self actualize. I was curious after 15+ years of meditation how even small amounts of alcohol might be detrimental to my lived experience and the quality or depth of my consciousness. I experimented to find how much alcohol I could have without negatively impacting my embodied presence, ability to show up, and happiness. The answer was clear. Zero. For me at that time, even a single glass of wine at dinner was a net negative.
When we are on the path, the universe responds. Participates. Often this shows up in the form of synchronicities.
I was approached by someone I respected and asked to be their teacher. This woman was very powerful and feeling the early signs what what I call the medicine journey. She recognized in me someone that could help her on the journey to go through the dark night, find and embody her particular medicine, and learn to live it with ferocious grace. She was not wrong in this. However, as soon as I considered the possibility I immediately knew it was a profound and ancient commitment and would require an equally significant sacrifice. I also knew in that same moment what would be required. Alcohol. Likely forever. A younger me leaned much more heavily on alcohol for various reasons. It felt like an island in stormy seas, and the idea of this disappearing out of choice was deeply intimidating.
I also knew that I would say yes. To all of it. The universe was offering me a choice, truth and purpose through the fires of transformation, or... not. Two paths diverging. What do I choose? There was no question, only a matter of gathering myself sufficiently to say yes.
I did, and the journey began.
I had moved from living in opposition of the negative to pursuing the dream of the possible.
To be continued...
