My name is Shirley and I am a grateful, recovering member of Gamblers Anonymous. We started a meeting called Sisters in Recovery. We meet on the second Sunday of each month.

We have women coming from North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee—plus a few from the Waynesville area in North Carolina, where we have the meeting. It is a meeting of l2-Step women, which gives us all serenity, unity and a deep feeling for one another. Good weather or bad, we all feel we would not miss it. I drive 2 hours and the others drive 3 hours. It is really worth it; recovering women being together is very strengthening. One more good thing for me in recovery.

Although I am going to celebrate 20 years in GA this year, I still feel I need all the good things and feelings I get from the other women in recovery. And what a blessing for me! Another day—24 hours without gambling—provides a wonderful serenity. Hugs to all ... a grateful friend,..................................Shirley S., Tennessee

Recently successive conversations with my 2 sponsors led me to understand an important reality. I want to share what I learned because it’s possible that I have quite a bit of company; others may share this "bedrock" problem I’ve identified—with invaluable help—in myself.

A face-to-face with Wanda one Saturday night included more moaning and groaning by me about my appalling procrastination problem. As always, she encouraged me and made me feel better about myself. And she shared a "tool" for fighting procrastination—greatly appreciated as the anti-procrastination compartment of my toolbox is woefully understocked!

The day after my talk with Wanda I called Marilyn, and I got on the same topic—the ‘p’ word. During the course of this talk with my other sponsor, my thinking progressed, and shortly after we hung up, I asked myself the question.

Am I still my own worst enemy? Early in my recovery from compulsive gambling—after "the fog" in my brain had substantially cleared—I came to understand that nobody had treated me as badly as I had treated myself. Nobody had repeatedly sabotaged me and created intolerable situations for me; nobody but myself, that is. When I was in denial about my gambling, rationalizing every idiotic decision and finding someone else to blame for all my problems, I didn’t have a clue. After awhile I came to understand that I had been my own worst enemy.

Now, years later, I found myself asking the question. And that’s good; it needed asking. Procrastination is the character defect that led me to examine the state of my recovery. I’ve come to understand that I’ve been allowing a character defect to foster unmanageable situations and ongoing negative conditions in my life. I know now that I am still the main source of negativity in my life. I’m "messing with" my own serenity!

Here’s a quick—and ridiculous—example. Last winter I accumulated a laundry room full of empty soda cans. I had cans in flats, cardboard 12-pack boxes and plastic grocery bags stacked on every surface. I had to move soda cans to extract my dryer’s lint trap to clean it! It got so I knocked cans over just opening the door to put more cans in.

The tiny town I live in enjoys relatively mild winters; numerous days came and went when I could have gone out back to the pole where The Crusher is mounted, wearing nothing warmer than a light sweatshirt. Still the cans accumulated.

To what purpose? Because I could beat myself up every 2 or 3 days when I transferred another filled container to the laundry room! I got months worth of debilitating self-condemnation out of a situation that probably took 2 to 3 hours to vanquish when I finally got around to crushing and bagging those cans! If I do it weekly, it takes 10 minutes tops.

Apply the "can" example to my work. I’m self-employed. The quality of my financial state depends directly on how much work I shake out of the trees or dream up. Can you imagine the first-rate abuse I can heap on myself about procrastinating in my professional pursuits? It’s spectacular!

Because of this defect I’ve continued to feel lousy about myself on a regular basis—just as I felt lousy about myself when I was gambling. Do you have a character defect that’s knocking you around as procrastination has me? Does defensiveness turn every conversation into a confrontation for you? Is jealousy tearing away at the fabric of your most important relationship? Does misdirected anger create fear in the people you care most about? Do you need to ask yourself the question?

Oh, yes ... in case you’re afflicted with the same defect I’m working to overcome, I’ll pass on the tool Wanda gave me! "Decide WHAT the night before, then every day do something you don’t want to do; and do it FIRST!" Guess what ... it works.............................................................Betty C., AZ

A parable is told of an old mule owned by a farmer. The mule fell into the farmer's well. The farmer heard the mule braying—or whatever mules do when they fall into wells. After carefully assessing the situation, the farmer sympathized with the mule, but decided that neither the mule nor the well was worth the trouble of saving. Instead, he called his neighbors together and told them what had happened ... and enlisted them to help haul dirt to bury the old mule in the well, and put him out of his misery.

Initially, the old mule was hysterical! But as the farmer and his neighbors continued shoveling and the dirt hit his back, a thought struck him. It suddenly dawned on him that every time a shovel-load of dirt landed on his back HE SHOULD SHAKE IT OFF AND STEP UP! This he did, blow after blow. "Shake it off and step up ... shake it off and step up ... shake it off and step up!" he repeated to encourage himself. No matter how painful the blows, or how distressing the situation seemed, the old mule fought panic and just kept right on SHAKING IT OFF AND STEPPING UP!

 

You're right! It wasn't long before the old mule, battered and exhausted, stepped triumphantly over the wall of that well! What seemed like it would bury him, actually blessed him ... all because of the manner in which he handled his adversity.