George Caywood

String of Pearls 26

The following ideas have helped me.

• I learned how to deal with unhealthy people effectively, early in my program. Then I learned that I was better off when the difficult people had been taken completely out of my life.
• When I am in a crisis, I am tempted to think the crisis is going to last forever.
• When I simply cannot hear something God is trying to tell me, God arranges that I tell the thing I will not face in answer to someone’s question. Then God turns on my hearing aid and I have to listen to myself say the very thing I have not heard. When that happens I just know there is a big grin on God’s face.
• There is a light at the end of the tunnel, and it is not a train.
• If I get on the green line train going the opposite direction from my destination, no amount of adjustment or manipulation will correct the problem. I have to get off the train I am on and board the train that is going where I want to go.
• One time, I was bitching about how judgemental my boss was. My friend said, “That makes you the judge of the judgemental.”
• When I need self care the most, it is the hardest for me to give it to myself.
• My program gives me independence. I am able to be serene no matter how unhappy my immediate circumstances are.
• The permanent solution to people pushing my buttons is to ask God to remove my buttons one by one.
• I use to be a full 88 note piano keyboard on which troubled people could play unhappy concertos. My program has dramatically reduced the number of keys available to be played.

String of Pearls 27

The following are ideas that have helped me.

-It is possible for us to love our children to death.

-One day at a time means dealing with things only as they actually come up.

-I want to be a detective examining my life for a chance to affirm myself.

-The twelve year son of a friend of mine wrote,”Good decisions make life easier.

-God does not have a sore throat. She can make herself heard.

-I never have to pray God in from Chicago. She was involved in all my situations way before I was.

-At its roots, all my anger is at God, because I know God could solve all my problems if she wanted.

-Something a friend said to me when I had been feeling down for a couple of weeks: “Here are two nouns and two adjectives; Heaven and Hell, happy and sad. You hook them up.”

-When people say to me, “If God is so loving, how come there are so many hungry people on Earth”, I reply, “Have you thanked him for your lunch?” It seems to me, that if God is going to be blamed for the hungry people in the world,  She should get credit for all the people that eat.

-The only way out is through.

String of Pearls 28

The following are ideas that have helped me.

-A million dollars in the bank does me no good if I do not know it is there. Every bit of everyone’s sins are already completely forgiven . However, it is hard to enjoy that grace if you do not know it has been given.

-One way for me to think about a decision I need to make, is to ask myself “What advice would I give one of my daughters if she were in a similar situation?”

-When my program gave me ears to hear, I realized that God had whispered in my ear a version of “I love you” a billion times, beginning in my Mother’s womb.

-Whenever I have one, an “Aha” moment always seems familiar to me. I think that is because the new thought in my conscious mind is the duplicate of something my Higher Power has already said to my subconscious mind many times.

-When I let my anger process itself, I never like the time and manner in which it does so.

-Jesus told Thomas, ” Put your hands in my wounds, then you will know who I am.” I think it is also as I touch your wounds and you touch my wounds that we come to know who each other really is.

-The only way I can truly feel safe, is to open myself up and be vulnerable with trustworthy people.

-When you are very young, being responsible is a very different thing from being mature.

-To run from my problems is to run into the destructive embrace of total emptiness.

-If you think escape and numbing yourself is an appropriate way to live, visit the nearest rescue mission and look into the vacuous eyes of the men and women that spend the day sitting in the chapel.

String of Pearls 29

The following ideas have helped me.

-”Praying only for a knowledge of God’s will and the power to carry it out.” In other words, there is no “Plan B” when it comes to God’s will.

-God does not need my permission to do Her will.

-If I am fasting because I don’t want to do the thing I know God is asking me to do, it is not fasting, it is a hunger strike.

-For me, there is often a substantial period of time between getting “A knowledge of God’s will” and getting “The power to carry it out”.

-To me, there is a when of God’s will as well as a what of God’s will. I am much better off if I do God’s will in God’s time.

-Very often, God’s will is expressed to me simply as doing the next indicated thing.

-Doing my duty is one way to figure out God’s will for the next moment.

-It is never God’s will for me to be a victim.

-The presupposition of “Turning your will and your life to the care of God” is that God cares.

-The word recovery means getting something back that used to be mine. Since I never had serenity, I can not have it returned. In my case recovery means, I get back the gift of being the person I really am, the person God created in Her image.

String of Pearls 30

The following ideas have helped me.

-A local public safety department has as it’s operating motto,”Civility and Respect”. That says it all.

-The Old Testament word for intercourse is “Know” as in Abraham knew Sarah. Knowledge then implies deep, tender intimacy. I have come to “Know” many folks in my program.

-When I am hurting, I do not need a solution. I need someone to listen carefully to me and to tell me that my pain is legitimate.

-When people thank me for my influence on their life, they seldom tell me of some service I performed for them. They nearly always say, “You were there for me.” It is presence that matters, not service. Service seems like the the means I have that opens the door for me, so I can provide presence.

-Care not cure changes me.

-I am no longer emotionally blocked by shame. However, I still have the old habit of acting blocked. Therefore, the slightest movement toward action usually gets me going.

-Freedom is doing what I should do because I so thoroughly enjoy doing it.

-Sometimes my idea of happiness is God’s will+ money=serenity. However, whatever I put in my happiness formula after the+ sign, is the thing that my disease uses to torture me.

-What is it that I think I need in addition to God to be happy?

-For me to attempt to live my life without meditation is reckless foolishness.

String of Pearls 31

The following are ideas that have helped me.

-I need to believe in a Higher Power that is capable of anger. I want Him to be angry about the fact that I was molested as a boy.

-Anger is a part of my makeup. It is not some foreign interloper.

-Sharing with trustworthy friends and family is the appropriate action in regard to my anger. Repression is never helpful.

-Suppressing my anger just plants it in the soft, moist, rich soil of my heart. Suppressed anger, once it is thus planted, is bound to grow and multiply.

-Inward anger results in depression. Outward anger brings hostility. If my anger frightens me, it results in passive aggressive behavior.

-I can not accurately say, “You make me angry.” I can only accurately say, “You revealed my buried anger.”

-My anger is always rational. If I release 100 pounds of rage in response to a 10 pound provocation, it feels irrational. However, if I take time to ask God to help me see reality, I realize my anger is not in response to my immediate situation but to an unhealed, buried anger I was unable to talk about when I was a boy. Then I can see that my 100 pound rage was actually in response to a 100 pound provocation that happened decades ago.

–If I choose, I can use my anger as a trailhead to a trail that leads back to an old hurt that my Higher power would love to heal.

-The healing of my anger is a slow process because my Higher Power never pushes me beyond my ability to safely cope.

-It is my secrets that kill me.

String of Pearls 32

The following ideas have helped me.

• In a relationship, I need to let “love cover a multitude” of my partner’s sins. It is helpful to just let most things go. However, if I cannot let it go, I need to talk to my partner about my feelings. If we can not lovingly resolve our differences, we need to seek out a competent third party to help us.
• Early in my recovery, I told my therapist she was missing a sure bet. She should put me in a room with 500 women. I would then point out the women to whom I was attracted. My therapist could approach the women who were attractive to me and give them her business card and say, “You may not know it yet, but you need me.”
• Given to me by a lovely program friend: “Don’t let my reactions justify their behavior.”
• The second fastest thing in the universe is the speed of light. The first fastest is the speed at which I can turn from serenity to anxiety.
• Sometimes it is necessary for me to detach now and worry about the “With love” part later.
• I must look like a banjo to some people, judging from the way they try to pick on me.
• A pre-program presupposition of mine: “I nag, therefore I am.”
• I am a writer because the single requirement to be a writer is to write.
• I write for living, not for a living.
• If someone consistently writes for a few minutes everyday, the time he spends writing tends to grow regularly. That is because writing has become part of our human survival genetics.

String of Pearls 33

The following ideas have helped me.

• When I turn the same thing over to God over and over again, I think I am giving it to God and then taking it back. That is not necessarily true. Most of the time I find that while I have taken back almost all of the pain from God, I have indeed left a small percentage of the problem with God. If I do that often enough, a huge chunk of the problem ends up in God’s hands. Then I can surrender the rest fairly easily.
• One definition of addiction is the state in which I use the object of my addiction to solve the problems created by my addiction.
• Admitting I am wrong is the first step in the removing a character defect.
• Honesty cannot be the result of recovery because getting honest has always been the first step in my recovery.
• My disease is located between my ears and just in back of my eyes.
• The “Road Less Traveled” is less traveled because people are afraid of being faced with their inner reality.
• Much of my suffering with depression stems from my anger about not getting my way.
• I can never do my best because I can always improve. Therefore, doing my best is an unreasonable expectation.
• Things never get better when an alcoholic drinks. In the same way, things are never improved when I heap shame upon myself.
• My fellow program members are delightful garbage men. They lovingly haul away my garbage every time I am willing to put it on the curb.

String of Pearls 34

The following ideas have helped me.

-The little word no is hard for me to handle. I need to be able to say no to people whose ideas are not suitable for me. I need to say no to the dream breakers in my life when they come at me with their negativity in regard to my creative energies and desires. However, I need to say Yes! Yes! to my own dreams. In that way I can learn to be a dream maker for myself and others.

– I am much better at predicting potential disaster than I am at predicting how things are going to work out, as they do always seem to.

-When I began my latest spiritual journey, a family member jokingly said, “You are a little old to be figuring out what you want to be when you grow up. I replied, “One of the hardest adjustments in life, is learning that you have no way to keep the crazy ones like me out of your family”.

-Another family member said, “If you get in trouble financially, don’t expect me to bail you out.” To which I replied, “You are afraid of being 85 and poor. I am afraid of being 85 and crazy.”

-The other two “F” words: I call believing in the love and provision of my Higher Power “Faith”. I call believing the lies that my disease tries to tell me “Fear”

-Sometimes I think it is high time to make my disease make up some new lies. I have believed the same old fibs for too many decades.

-When I was a child, the constantly changing rules and expectations I faced, confused the fun right out of my life.

-My laughter in a meeting is partly based on recognition of my story as you tell your story and partly based in the sheer joy of no longer being alone.

-The honesty I needed to learn when I began my recovery, goes beyond not lying and stealing. It is the honesty of giving up my fantasies and facing the real world

-When my eyes finally opened up to the real world’s troubles, my eyes also opened up to the love of my Higher Power. Then I was able to see her ever present love everywhere.

String of Pearls 35

The following expressions have helped me.

-You have to face fear and walk through it to discover you can survive.

-The love and acceptance in your eyes gradually chases the shame out of my heart.

-Confusing homes lead to fantasy thinking in the children of that home.

-Being in program means I no longer have to be defined by my past.

-If I have as my goal to be as much like God as possible, I may feel one of two ways. I can be overwhelmed because that goal seems excessively large. However, I can also choose to feel that the goal of being like God means that my growth possibilities are infinite. That is an exhilarating thought.

-Once I dropped the reins, things began to happen.

-I can set a boundary without explaining why I am doing it.

-I can do life.

-A fish is the last one to discover water.

-My life had been upside down so long, I felt upside down when God turned me right side up.

-This too shall pass.

String of Pearls 36

The following ideas have helped me.

-I use to feel like there was no one at home inside my skin. My solution to that problem was to fill my insides up with adrenaline.

-I used to constantly feel panic like the fear I feel when I am unexpectedly charged by a big dog while riding my bike.

-To find the adult, I needed to embrace the child.

-Contrary action is doing the very opposite of what my diseased impulses are trying to get me to do. Sometimes, contrary action is the clearest indication of my Higher Power’s will for my life.

-It seems to me, that the religion of my youth was designed to to empower me to take contrary action to everything Christ said and did. It is like if Jesus said go right at this junction, I was shamed into going left.

-Jesus was never anyone’s victim. He laid down His life for us all.

-Jesus never wants me to be a victim. Never.

-God does not lead me to the cross, but through the cross to the resurrection. I am learning to live my resurrection life. It is thrilling to live alive.

-When I reached my bottom, my choice was between surrender or death. Being the bright sort of guy I am, I chose surrender. If I could have thought of one more alternative to surrender, I would have taken it.

-I am not sure I can promise anyone unconditional love. I can unconditionally promise to do my part to heal our relationship, if the other person also wants healing.

String of Pearls 37

The following ideas have helped me.

-I grew up badly overloaded with pain and shame. In self defense, I forgot most of what happened as soon as it passed.

-When I discovered I had forgotten much of my youthful life, most of my larger family would not help me remember. They badly wanted me not to remember to avoid having to remember themselves.

-Years ago, my only connection to my forgotten past was a paralyzing nausea in my belly.

-Today, I no longer have to live vicariously through my kids.

-Without self trust, intimacy and trust with my siblings was nearly impossible.

-In my family growing up, nothing was simple. All the subtle dishonesty’s made normal relationships within the family impossible.

-Either I work with my sponsor, or the committee in my head becomes my acting sponsor.

-In the old days, my idea of meditation was to sit and think about what I was going to do about everything bad that might possibly happen.

-The beginning of faith for me is believing a solution is possible.

-I catch myself being an angry parent with myself.

String of Pearls 38

The following ideas have helped me.

-A test to see whether or not my idea is actually a solution: “Is it likely that my idea will lead to serenity?”

-Get off the cross, we need the wood.

-God is not primarily concerned with how often I make mistakes. However, She is deeply concerned that I know how to learn from my mistakes.

-With some people, asking the question, “How are you doing” can be an invitation to cross my boundaries.

-The idea of setting boundaries can also be expressed as teaching other people how I want to be treated.

-Boundaries are about me, not about the other person.

-I need boundaries for my myself in the areas of food consumption and self critical thinking.

-When I try to live without boundaries, I shrivel up on the inside.

-Another boundary for me is when I am tired I take a nap.

-In a family without effective boundaries, the family members tend to end arguments by a period of everyone going for the jugular.

String of Pearls 39

The following ideas have helped me.

-When I find I am trying to please everyone, I know I am probably pleasing no one.

-Am I willing to stay present to my short term pain for sake of long term gain?

-Anytime I have to say something that arouses one of my strong emotional feelings, it is good for me to to say it in ten words or less.

-When I am asked “How are you doing?”, I sometimes answer, “I am happy at the moment but I am subject to mood swings.”

-I never had a hope for myself when I walked into these rooms. All my hopes were for my qualifier.

-Forget St Francis. I”m tired of loving. I want to be loved.

-My name is George. If I accept the responsibility pointed at in the adage, “Let George Do It” I am also saying to myself “It is George’s fault”, if anything goes wrong.

-I am now one of the On Call people at the retirement center where I live. From the perspective of working this job, I can see that I have been the On Call person for everyone I know, most of my life. I want to keep my On Call job at the apartments where I live. However, I hereby resign, without notice, from the job of being on call to my world.

-When I came to this program I felt trapped. I felt I had to do stuff in order to get a better self image. However, in my case, I had to get a better self image in before I could get stuff done.

-In the Bible, the Old Testament system was “If I obey, I will have peace”. The New Testament system is, “Since I have been given peace with God as a free gift, I now have the power to obey”.

String of Pearls 40

The following are ideas that have helped me.

-My friend sees himself as a survivor of Pancreatic Cancer, not a victim of cancer. Perhaps I can learn to see myself as a child abuse survivor, not a victim of child abuse.

-Pain is inevitable, but misery is optional.

-In the same way as an alcoholic’s situation never improves if he drinks, my situation never improves if I blame.

-When I tried to free others from the fundamentalist religion that had so seriously wounded me, they were not grateful.

-I am beginning to consider that the religion I grew up in, was in some powerful ways, the village that raised me.

-I feel much kinder toward my parents when I am grateful for all the help that is available to me, that simply was not available to them.

-Victims victimize.

-When I could not “Get It” in my program, I realized just how very hard I needed to listen.

-Sometimes when I am not on an emotional and spiritual roll, I need to be militantly positive.

-First accept reality and then move on to the next indicated thing.