Month: August 2022

 “The giving of love is an education itself.”
Eleanor Roosevelt

“Stuff is irrelevant. Sooner or later we have to throw overboard our possessions, vanities, and ambitions; only the good we have done matters.”
Isabel Allende

“Take time to look…….”
Georgia O’Keefe

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Hi 4C Women,

I am so glad that Statement 10 is about love and that the past is gone forever preceding it. I needed to heal from my past in order to learn to love myself and know that I am loved. I was looking for love, as the song says, in all the wrong places. I betrayed my own worth by giving myself away. The consequences were obvious to my heart yet my mind refused to listen, to connect to my heart. As I became sober, I found my self-esteem growing. Honestly, I never expected to like myself, let alone love myself!

Last Monday, I talked about creating a mantra when the past starts to shout and one of the women in the WFS meeting said, I’m back but better. I think this is a great mantra. Think of this when you start doubting your worth when you might feel you haven’t worked hard enough to deserve love. Remember, you are back on track but better. And why better? Because you have learned more about who you are, kept moving forward when you might have faltered, and are willing to do what it takes to give and receive love authentically, trusting your intuition. In fact, I believe this Statement has a lot to do with trust – trusting ourselves to be vulnerable and trusting others to be genuine with us. It doesn’t mean we won’t be hurt at times yet we hopefully have enough self-love to let go of the toxic people in our lives and focus on nurturing those relationships that are flourishing and loving.

If I were to judge my self-worth by those who hurt me in the past, I would be stuck and miss the joy of caring relationships. I silenced my intuition when I was drinking. I was afraid to speak my needs for fear of rejection or trusting the wrong person with those spoken words.  Lessons learned along the way. WFS taught me that mistakes were part of the process, not the end of the journey.

In learning trust, are you open to differentiating between your intuition guiding you or your traumas misleading you?
How do you respect your self-worth in relationships?
How do you value yourself in practicing self-care?
Have you given thought to what your needs are in relationships? Do you express these needs?
What experience do you have to honor? This is a deep question when it comes to loving and being loved. I honor my surviving toxic relationships, knowing what is unacceptable as well as acceptable, and valuing myself enough to know when it’s time to let go or nurture a relationship. This is for all relationships – friends, family, partners, co-workers, etc. In other words, I honor myself. Never thought I would think, feel, and especially say those words about myself.

Bonded in loving, being loved, and learning to trust ourselves and our intuition, Dee

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“Sometimes the hardest part isn’t letting go but rather learning to start over.”
Nicole Sobon

“Letting go doesn’t mean that you don’t care about someone anymore. It’s just realizing that the only person you really have control over is yourself.”
Deborah Reber

“Even on my weakest days I get a little bit stronger.”
Sara Evans

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Hi 4C Women,

This has always been my favorite Statement as I wanted so desperately to live in the present, to forgive myself for a past I could not change but wasn’t sure how I could do that. It took a while to understand exactly what not victimizing myself meant on a personal level. Every regret, every mistake, or wrong choice only fed my low self-esteem, validated my negative definition of who I was, and kept me stuck. Like Karen, I chose alcohol to escape the pain but I’ve learned that pain not healed just waits patiently to rise up and squash my soul even more. It finally became so clear that I was victimizing only myself and defeating any chance of personal growth and especially self-forgiveness.

My coping tool became my positive self-talk. The moment I felt drawn into the negative past, I literally spoke out loud that I could not change the past, I am a new woman and I refuse to hurt myself by a past that cannot be changed. The next step was to work on true forgiveness and acknowledge my role in some of the situations. But rather than beat myself up for those unhealthy choices, WFS taught me to learn and in the present, make self-affirming choices, find my voice, and speak it respectfully. And if I made a choice that wasn’t supporting my well-being, another lesson learned.

Are you able to forgive yourself?
What are you holding onto that isn’t serving your well-being? What action(s) can you take to let go of the hurt?
What situations have you endured that have made you stronger?
What do you say to yourself when the negative thoughts of the past start shouting? Do you have a positive mantra for those moments? If not, think about creating one.
What qualities, positive characteristics, and skills have you developed as you navigated the difficulties of your life?
What is a positive memory of the past?

When you think about all that you have dealt with in the past and survived, give yourself credit for the willingness to open those wounds, heal, grow, learn and keep moving forward. It’s important to praise every part of your journey even when it may be 1 step forward, 2 steps back. What matters is that you are building a strong foundation of personal growth, life lessons, healthy, positive, supportive relationships in the present, new moments to treasure, self-forgiveness, and self-love in the present!

Bonded in healing, moving forward, open to change, and willingness to always try, Dee

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Women for Sobriety is asking women who use the New Life Program to take our 2022 Member Survey! This survey is designed to help WFS understand your needs, experiences, and satisfaction with the New Life Program by asking these types of questions:

• About your substance use and its impact(s) on your life
• About your recovery and your use of the New Life Program

We want to assure you that your responses in this survey are completely anonymous, and cannot be traced back to the respondent. No personally identifiable information is captured. Additionally, your responses are combined with those of many others and summarized in a report to further protect your anonymity.

TAKE THE SURVEY

“You can’t wait until life isn’t hard anymore before you decide to be happy.”

Nightbirde

“If we don’t change, we don’t grow. If we don’t grow, we aren’t really living.”

Gail Sheehy

“Love yourself enough to create an environment in your life that is conducive to the nourishment of your personal growth. Allow yourself to let go of the people, thoughts and situations that poison your well-being. Cultivate a vibrant surrounding and commit yourself to making choices that will help you release the greatest expression of your unique beauty and purpose.”

Steve Mariboli

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Hi 4C Women,

Through my ups and downs, I must say how incredibly grateful I am for the WFS program that has changed my life in such positive ways, especially with emotional and spiritual growth. Years ago, going through the down times felt as though they would never end. I just knew my sad, angry, disappointing, rejected, negative feelings would last forever. At least that is how I felt. This past week I experienced one of those down times and part of what got me through was realizing that this was my authentic feeling and just acknowledging that helped me. I’m a big believer in acknowledging all of our feelings to accept them, learn from them and grow emotionally and spiritually as Statement #8 guides us.

I was also supported by other WFS women who assured me my feelings were valid. What a gift to have these “cheerleaders.” I needed to remember this down feeling is just a part of life and the lesson I learned from Statement #8 is that while real, it is temporary. What WFS has taught me is to explore where the feeling is coming from, which for me, is usually a feeling from the past that brings it to the present, i.e., feeling invisible, unheard. Rather than being stuck in that feeling, I consider addressing the person by speaking my voice in a calm, yet assertive voice. I saw a quote on Facebook that is a good reminder for me:

“Communication is one thing but your tone while communicating with someone is everything.”

This is one of the reasons, I no longer feel bad if I don’t address a situation immediately because if I respond in anger or frustration, I might not get my viewpoint across or be heard. This doesn’t mean that I never address a situation immediately. A lot depends on how I am feeling, the situation, and the person who is offending or demeaning me. All I’m saying is I no longer stay in the “why didn’t I say this then?” because I still have the power to do it when I choose.

Consider all the positive changes in recovery that the WFS Statements have given us from personal growth, learning new coping tools, peace, hope, spiritual journey, choices, and coping tools – the list is long and I know you can add your own personal changes. All of these changes help us put our priorities in order.

What are your priorities? Think of a priority as something that gives your life purpose, direction, and meaning.

How have your priorities changed as you’ve grown emotionally and spiritually?

How do you nurture yourself?

How do you define emotional growth in recovery?

Bonded in learning to let go of what hurts our well-being (Karen) and move forward in nurturing, respecting ourselves, speaking our voice, and knowing our priorities, Dee

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Women for Sobriety is asking women who use the New Life Program to take our 2022 Member Survey! This survey is designed to help WFS understand your needs, experiences, and satisfaction with the New Life Program by asking these types of questions:

• About your substance use and its impact(s) on your life
• About your recovery and your use of the New Life Program

We want to assure you that your responses in this survey are completely anonymous, and cannot be traced back to the respondent. No personally identifiable information is captured. Additionally, your responses are combined with those of many others and summarized in a report to further protect your anonymity.

TAKE THE SURVEY

“It takes courage and strength to be empathetic.”

Jacinda Arden

“Find ecstasy in life: the mere sense of living is joy enough.”

Emily Dickinson

“Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do.”

Brené Brown

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Hi 4C Women,

As I read Karen’s thoughts, it is so amazing how the WFS Statements all work together yet separately have such an empowering message in learning, growing, loving, and definitely hope.

The 4 points that Karen shared made me reflect on how the Statements fit together so beautifully.  These are my reflections.  Would love for you to think about which Statements you believe they represent.

1.        Reducing self-judgment is Statement #2.  So important in self-love and self-respect.

2.       Trusting ourselves is Statement #12 in knowing how competent we are, trusting we are 4C women with so much to offer.

3.       Forgiving myself was so difficult.  Yet, I realized that if I were to have a New Life in recovery, I needed to do just that.  Statement #9 always pulls me out of regret, shame, and wishes I had, to remember that I can’t change what happened but learn from it and make healthier, wiser choices.

4.       Being true to yourself for me is Statement #13 knowing we are responsible for our actions and setting boundaries to nurture and grow our self-worth.

Then there is Statement #7 in loving all of me, past included, in order to move forward.  Believing I was lovable seemed an impossibility.  I saw myself as broken, fake, needy, undesirable, and definitely unworthy of love.  But there is that word again that Karen shared – hope!  As I practiced the Statements, I began to understand how important loving myself would allow love in my life.  I could genuinely love myself and others.  It was as though I was learning to walk again, to reach out my arms for support, and then to give it back.  This was my New Life.

How we speak to ourselves is critical.  I had to unlearn my negative self-talk.  Loving myself also allowed me to be vulnerable, especially to my great fear of rejection.  That was huge.  Honestly, it was painful at times yet slowly I began to recognize that I was in charge of my life and my reactions.  I never would have thought that being authentic and loving myself would heal the need to be liked/loved by everyone.  While I love helping others more than anything, I also learned that I cannot be a doormat, and walked on with no consequence.  The consequence is that I move on, giving my caring and compassion from my heart and not just the need to please or be liked.  My love for others is so real and it gives me great joy.

As you go through this week, think about how:

you speak to yourself;

how you heal and move through the past, the lessons you have learned/learning;

how love is changing your world in concrete ways, moving from people pleasing to self-caring with compassion;

how brave you are to let love in and give love away authentically.

Bonded in knowing, expressing authentic love, and practicing self-care, Dee

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“When was the last time you spent a quiet moment just doing nothing—just sitting and looking at the sea, or watching the wind blowing the tree limbs, or waves rippling a pond, a flickering candle or children playing in the park?”

Ralph Marston

“It may look like I’m doing nothing, but in my head I’m quite busy.”

Anonymous

“Don’t underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.”

A.A. Milne

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Hi 4C Women,

I absolutely, positively love Karen’s message about being still, simply be or do nothing without feeling guilty. WOW! That is a different perspective on living the greatness of the ordinary and so much truth in it. I have to say that I thought I had to be overly busy to create greatness and if I wasn’t, the guilt would come and I would try harder. I now realize that sobriety is meant to be joyful and fulfilling, and being busy to fill up the time is not exactly creating a balance that provides those feelings. However, I understand in the beginning that being busy is very helpful. At least it was for me. After all, I was happy to have my junk drawers and closets cleaned out as I have heard from many women over the years feeling the exact same way. It felt like cleansing and release of the energy built up from resisting the desire to drink or use other substances. It helped quiet the loud thoughts in my head by having something physical to do that didn’t require a huge thought process.

Unfortunately for me, it wasn’t lasting fulfillment or contentment of being sober. It was more of a stepping stone to uncovering and discovering what greatness meant to me on an ordinary day in my ordinary life. I was actually grateful for the ordinary rather than the chaos of my drinking days. My initial thoughts were so negative as I tried to understand how to create this ordinary life into one of greatness.  I finally realized that ordinary wasn’t so bad. I began to enjoy the moments of peace but never connected it to this Statement in the way that Karen has expressed herein that life can be both ordinary and great together. Rather than separating them, I am going to combine them to know what is important to me in creating an ordinary life of greatness and how to achieve it. In other words, create a balance, freeing me from useless guilt. I encourage those who are working on gaining sobriety by being busy, to just keep doing what works for you now! This is why Karen’s thoughts resonated with me when she spoke about guilt in doing nothing as I was experiencing guilt in doing too much. I needed and was surprised by the awareness that sometimes there is also guilt in doing too much. Again, it’s all about balance and feeling alright with where ever we are at this moment. I slowly understood that I was blocking the awareness needed to create a balance. I still love organizing yet if it becomes a defense to having balance and appreciating both stillness and hard work, I need to acknowledge that. Always remember that recovery is a process that we need to embrace as we learn and grow.

This week try to be conscious of how you practice Statement #6. What are you discovering about yourself? What awareness do you have of how ordinary fits into the greatness of your life? If you discover what you need to add or remove from your day, think about how you can do that. Create a plan that works for you. You deserve greatness in this ordinary life; however, you define it!

Bonded in uncovering and discovering what greatness in the ordinary means specifically to each of you, Dee

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Women for Sobriety is asking women who use the New Life Program to take our 2022 Member Survey! This survey is designed to help WFS understand your needs, experiences, and satisfaction with the New Life Program by asking these types of questions:

• About your substance use and its impact(s) on your life
• About your recovery and your use of the New Life Program

We want to assure you that your responses in this survey are completely anonymous, and cannot be traced back to the respondent. No personally identifiable information is captured. Additionally, your responses are combined with those of many others and summarized in a report to further protect your anonymity.

TAKE THE SURVEY