Fear Solutions

Fear might drive someone to go to a recovery meeting, or a bunch of them, such as AA.  The person is feeling shame and guilt, thinking of suicide, and feeling worthless.  They may stop drinking, from attendance at meetings, maybe saying something here and there, and you think, OK, problem solved.  No.  Drinking had been the solution to feelings of fear and anxiety.  The  person, now not drinking,  feels worse without a drink!  So the person goes back to their previous solution, alcohol or drugs, and stops going to meetings.  Now they feel like a failure.  Suicide thoughts, and more self-loathing, and still the fear haunts the person.  This is not all bad.  A Power might be at work.  Desperation might be a gift!  The person comes back to a meeting, and sits in the back, and maybe cries a bit, trying to weep as silently as one can.  They may even share and say they are a mess.  All pretense is surrendered.  Now the  miracle.  Someone walks up to the person and says, "I will be your guide through this spiritual path.  You don't have to be so miserable anymore."  Would that religion had this encounter when one comes and sits forlornly in the last row in church, bewildered and lost.  This guide person then brings the weeping one through the steps of the recovery program.  The feelings are written down and "confessed" in honesty, to the guide.  The guide is HOPE with a human face.  The guide leads one to the light, and willingness is the engine that carries the weeping one along.  Those killer feelings?  They may never go away, but their power to kill, and make for a miserable and futile life, are gone.  The recovering process means that a feeling's destructive energy no longer has the power to dominate and control our actions.  Something of Light overcomes the negativity, and the energy of the Light wins out.  This is a Promise.  Try it.