The greatest decision I ever made....

Making the decision to change your life. What really defines surrender? No one is exactly sure how to activate this state of radical change, but it is pretty easy to spot it once you have the ball rolling. Willingness is a key element. The addict becomes willing to do pretty much anything to get out of the misery of their addiction. But the decision to change is deeper than that. It has to come from a place of complete surrender, where you stop fighting and struggling to control things. At least in early recovery, the best thing you can do is to give up. To let go. To stop fighting for control. This is the correct mindset for radical change. A lot of addicts and alcoholics are at a place in their addiction where they wish things were different, but they are not yet willing to take massive action in order to make big changes. They realize that their addiction is dragging them down, and they may even realize that it is their main source of unhappiness, but they still do not see that the solution is to let go of their need for control and allow a new solution into their lives. People get confused about recovery and how it unfolds. They have bias that their path to surrender is the only possible path. They also have bias that their method of recovery is the only way to beat an addiction. In truth, the recovery is born out of surrender, and the actions taken do not have to be defined in great detail. There is no great mystery in recovery. There is no great secret that allows an addict or alcoholic to remain clean and sober. This is not rocket science. Even the 12 steps are merely suggestions, there is no magic in them, no mystery….simple abstinence and support is enough to maintain sobriety for anyone who has truly surrendered. Do not give power to the mystery of a solution, because in truth, the solution is in the surrender, it is in the willingness, not in the program. The decision to change your life has to come from within. It is not a surface level decision, like deciding whether to have ice cream or not. Nudging the addict or alcoholic closer to this decision can only be done indirectly, through changing your own behavior so that you do not enable them. Getting yourself closer to this decision can only be done through internal surrender, a process that does not seem to be voluntary. In other words, you cannot choose to surrender. It has to happen on its own….thus is the way of addiction. If you could choose to surrender, you probably would not be a real addict or alcoholic. In the end, we surrender and make the decision to change after we have had “enough.” Enough what? Enough pain.