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Unpacking the subconscious

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The dream is a little hidden door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the soul

Carl Jung

A night of heavy dreaming left me more tired than before. Yesterday was a busy and emotionally taxing day. Life, in general, is, to be fair, challenging, but such things are beyond our control. All that is within our control is to find peace amidst it.

Owning one’s truth can be difficult to live with, and sometimes that means living with the knowledge that others are aware of your most shameful times. I am living in a perpetual state of Step nine (striving to make amends) and will continue to do so for the remainder of my time.

Now that we have some context of where my head is at, I want to unpack my dreams. Some people believe that dreams have spiritual significance, harking back to ancient times. Dreams are like our subconscious minds showing us things, and if we are willing to explore them, they can help settle certain emotional states.

I dreamt I was with a mix of a couple of ex-girlfriends. I say “girlfriend,” but I now realize that many of my former partners were fellow broken souls searching for something no human could offer. We found in each other respite from our own indiscernible pain.

This beautiful chimera was a blend of everything that excited me about the chaos. The sex I thought was fantastic, but it was devoid of real intimacy because it lacked something truly human. In the dream, I was right back there, feeling desired and enough, but as I often failed to see with such partners, completely disposable.

My dream then shifted to show me something painful—a loved one in a hospital bed. I’ve come to love this person as we walked shoulder to shoulder, and I feel I have, in a tangible earthly way, someone whom God uses to show up for me and let me know I am not alone.

In real life, this is a wonderful friend and journeyman, but in my dream, this person represented my fear of loss. When you open yourself up in a truly human way, you have to embrace the risk of loss, hurt, and all the pain that might come with it. It’s how we truly get to live—by embracing the full spectrum of life and not being selective.

I experienced this feeling and fear when I fell in love with my puppy. She won’t be around forever, and one day will come great pain and loss. But in between, all the colorful joys that come with it, there’s limitless love and acceptance.

Back to the dream, I let the girl walk away, and true to my experiences, she moved on relatively quickly. But this time, I didn’t dwell or jump to the next with a ball of emotions thinking, “next, next.”

I then took a call from a friend. A friend who said, “I know what’s going on, mate, and you’re not alone. I know you’re more than what you’ve done, and I’ve seen day in and day out for years now what you’ve done to make amends. You spread more life now than you ever peeked at death.”

This friend represented hope, hope that I will be seen not through the prism of my worst actions but rather through my authentic life in colour.

As I lay here thinking, I have a day to get on with, and I conclude from this busy night of dreams, I see the important lesson. Acting out or using others to medicate feeds one another’s pain for a moment, yielding nothing because it risks nothing emotional, sure, you can take risks that wreak havoc in life but we addicts throw that dice every time. This stuff is deeper than addiction.

When we love, we have to be willing to experience it all—the good, the bad, all weathers, and even loss.

When I traveled out of my mess, I was like the prodigal son Jesus spoke of. I was truly spent, broken, and my choice was mud, death, or redemption. I may or may not be forgiven in men’s eyes, but if I make myself a servant, it will be better than the mess I made. True to the story, while it is not without cost, I am restored, I have worth, and I am accepted.

There are no “real” relationships without this risk, and the only fee is to be open. The world offers counterfeit love, so I have to wonder why I spent so long with my microwave meal when I now get to experience the Father’s banquet.

Higher Power is Purpose

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Where there is no vision, the people perish

Proverbs 29:18

My whole life I have abused my ability to see, if the eyes are the window to the soul, I have defiled them with my vision since I was a child, all the while living my life without a true vision. I would name this post double vision but that would be focussing on the problem.

This week I shared at a neighbouring fellowship and as I spoke something clicked, the words power and purpose are interchangeable in recovery. The one thing that kept me alive beyond the initial feelings of wanting to end my life was that if I could survive this and help others, that might just be enough reason to keep going.

That purpose of serving others, taking all this mess and hurt and somehow working it into some form of good has been the driving force behind this whole journey thus far, for all the talk of higher power and wrestling that some experience because of whether one believes in God or not I would simply say “struggle with the God stuff, that’s fine but find your purpose! you will find your power.”

I lived my life chasing the next promotion, the better paycheck or seeking the admiration of others. I used to message girls just to get some compliments and only then tell them I was in a relationship, if I was a droid I had a bad motivator. (pardon the star wars speak) I was destined to perish for my lack of vision.

The subjects of betrayal and trauma are ones I can empathise with greatly, we addicts can hurt those we love the most and we really do have to own that.

At times I conflate a loved one’s hurt feelings with my own character defects, and that is an error in judgement on my part, you see for me to be well, I have to guard against self-pity and gloom speak.

It’s crucial that when it comes to anyone else’s feelings or thoughts, it is not my place to dwell or take defence. Instead, I focus on amends and living as my authentic self with a sense of purpose I had previously lacked.

If a connection is the opposite of addiction then having a purpose focused on serving one’s fellow man is a noble endeavour and for all you give away you receive more, it’s almost a spiritual transaction which is why the literature pulls no punches in its religious undertones, the concepts we tap into are the opposite of our self-serving addict personas, the programme really becomes a sufficient substitute.

My partner said that she often feels overwhelmed and while she fully supports me in my recovery it can at times be a little much, my response was that the time to worry is when I am not obsessed with my recovery, I give it the same diligence and priority that my acting out held for so much of my life, but I agreed that we would need to find some boundaries as my being present for the moment isn’t just to keep me on the straight and narrow but also to facilitate my showing up for those in my life.

The Roots of this Tree

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I returned home from an Easter adventure, going away these days is really special to me and coming back even more so.

I spent some time with a close friend and made a new friend in the process, there is something about being with others in the outdoors that transcends our background, standing, class, wealth and just about anything else you can think of that normally makes people different.

As we walked up the mountain taking small steps we seemed to take turns with who was leading the way.

I live in a flat area and my local national park offers some modest hills and one or two that just about qualify as mountains in name only. These proper mountains however are always a reminder that I don’t have the legs I think I have and I have some way to go before my coastal marathon.

The escape from modernity is always a small but regular required dose of medicine for me, it’s how I manage stress in a much healthier way than I did with my sexual compulsivity.

Along with this temporary environment hack is the shared experience in the presence of others. I have a great time on my own when camping and hiking but its much more memorable and rewarding when experienced with others.

On the way back to a small and beautiful village I spied this tree, it’s image caused me to linger and a thought process was sparked.

Seeing the exposed root system of a tree and the scar of the earth when a tree is uprooted is quite a sight, much like my life over the last couple of years. The initial storm uprooted me and I had to accept those roots could never take to the ground again.

My sexuality got hijacked at the age of twelve, I came into contact with far too much graphic material and with the best part of a quarter of a century later it is of little surprise that I had picked up a lot of unhealthy coping mechanisms, behaviours, obsessions and distorted thinking. The roots had grown deep over the years.

The upset and fallout from coming to terms with my reality has meant there is a hole of time, headspace and priorities that I get to fill with better choices, behaviours and experiences.

Outer circle living is one of the most important parts of my life, in AA we have the script that says “I know I am to get along without acting out, but how am I to do so, do I have a sufficient substitute? Yes and it’s vastly more than that.

If you ask a room full of sex addicts what Penal Substitution means you may get an inappropriate answer but in short its the biblical concept that Jesus provided the atonement for us where we could never measure up under our own endeavours.

While the program is non religious I mention this as the program allows us to admit defeat and face the facts that we will never conquer this problem in one sitting or alone. The concept of a higher power is the foundational tool of recovery.

The program can seem a little cult like from a set of new eyes or those of an outsider. I often refer back to the concept that regardless of religious belief or any hangups about the G word that sex and pornography was my God, I was faithful and devoted in my worship to this false deity, I served earnestly and I diligently sought out the iconography associated with my life of secret rituals and sacrifice of dignity and self worth.

I guess that’s the point, addictions are spiritual illnesses or maladies, they are misplaced worship of powers greater than ourselves, we simply find in our quest for our higher power in recovery a substitution for our worn-out false gods.

In the place of the uprooted tree, I hope that I may continue in this journey of healthy spirituality, no churches, no pulpits and no pretence. Just a desire to connect and to serve my fellow man in the endeavour of a life free of our addictions.

I used to listen to this song called rootless tree, it feels like it’s taken on new meaning to me in recent times, it seems to capture the voice that was always crying out to be free.

Recovery is breaking up from the toxic relationship with myself, the abusive and destructive voice constantly saying I was never good enough, and the gravity of the secrecy that enslaved and incarcerated me for years no longer has the same power it once had.