At a recent meeting several people bemoaned the fact that they acted out against their own self-interest. They did not want to act out but felt compelled to do so.

It seems we almost want to wallow in our inability to change our behavior. Why don’t we do the good we would do and why do we do the evil we do not want to do?

I think in recovery that I have found something of an answer. What is pleasurable is attractive. The pleasure we once experienced is implanted in the imagination as a way of getting high. How does one conduct oneself before this pull of the imagination on the will? I know that in a certain situation I am helpless and will act out, just as the alcoholic who finds himself in a bar will drink. He has no freedom once he is in the bar. He will drink and get drunk. Everyone will admit he has no freedom in such a situation.

But I can avoid the steps that lead up to acting out. The alcoholic has some freedom in the steps that lead up to going into the bar. “I will not go down that street where the bar is. I will avoid the fellow drinkers who seduce me into drinking. Therefore I must focus on where I am still free and act at that level. I must choose to not go down the street where the bar is.”

So I, too, must focus on where I am still free and not on where I am not free. By focusing on where I am not free I wallow in helplessness. In fact, I am abdicating responsibility for assuming the modicum of freedom I have.

Freedom of choice, for me personally, consists in:

• Not taking alcohol;
• Not drinking in images or people who are triggers for me;
• Being fully alert and sensitive to what is dangerous and to act responsibly and immediately in a positive way when these triggers appear in my consciousness or field of vision;
• Turning to God immediately with the cry of a drowning man: “God, please help me, I’m powerless.”

God will judge me by what I do with the freedom I have and not by the freedom I do not have. His grace is sufficient for me in the moment of choice. After a while good habits develop and carry me along and save me from a crisis-choice in every new situation.