Grist to the mill

“For my own good I will go to Al-Anon meetings with an open mind, ready to receive and accept new ideas. For my own good I will apply these ideas to my own life. If I go to meetings with a mind tightly closed, ready to criticize what I hear, it is as though I were to hold a teaspoon under Niagara Falls in an effort to get water for my thirst.” (ODAT, 6 April)

I can learn something from everyone in meetings.

I can learn what to do.

I can learn what not to do.

I can learn what works.

I can learn what does not work.

I listen out for people who are light, bubbly, fun, take life with a pinch of salt, take themselves with a pinch of salt, are entirely free of the past, are entirely confident about the future, are unaffected by others, and live fully in the day.

I listen out very carefully for what they say about what they believe, think, and do.

If anyone is unhappy, intense, affected by the past or others, concerned with themselves and their negative feelings, lost in abstract ‘poetry’ about themselves, I can extend compassion, in part because that is how I was, in spades, so I understand completely.

But that’s that.

Unhappiness has its own mesmerising logic, and I do well not to lean in too far.