Day 22 Afternoon - "You Are A Natural Born Teacher With A Voice That Needs To Be In This World."

On Friday night, I spoke at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting in Los Angeles, illustrating in depth how I am using my tools and practicing the principles as I go through the process of Hepatitis C treatment. Although I have yet to start the actual treatment, I have been in and out of hospitals and making progress in terms of finding the best available options and marshaling my resources. When I speak about working the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, I describe them as tools in a tool belt that help me deal with the challenges and the roller-coaster ride of everyday life. After all, in truth, alcohol and drugs were not my problem. They were my solution, and they stopped working as an escape from reality and into the refuge of my disease of perception. Ultimately, I was and am my own problem, and the 12 Steps give me the tools and the tool belt to live a life based on the spiritual truth of principles and not the emotional swings of personalities.

Do You Actually Use Your Spiritual Tool Belt When You Need It?

When I was a kid and I first used tools, I wasn't any good at using any of them. Unless you are Thor, when you first use a hammer, you are bound to bang your thumb and pound the nails bent and flat. When you first use a screwdriver, you can't tell the difference between a Phillip's head and a regular old screwdriver. Whenever you begin anything, there is a process of developing your skills. The exact same is true with spiritual and emotional skills like taking inventory, developing boundaries, letting go of the bullshit, walking in faith and not fear, working on your character defects, making amends when you do something wrong, meditating and praying, and so forth and so on.

Every one of these skills works in practice, but it takes practice to apply them properly and to know how to use them. Contrary action and proper measure (avoiding the extremes of emotion and perception) are difficult skills to actually employ and to trust that they will work. In fact, I had to go through a long period of being aware of my shit before I actually was able to clean it up. And such an awareness can be excruciating.

Okay, this basically is what I talked about at the meeting and how these ideas applied to my own experience of dealing with Hepatitis C and the challenge of starting treatment. I have found that it almost always works better to talk about ideas as they relate my experience as opposed to how they may and could relate to anyone else. People listen when you apply lessons to yourself as opposed to projecting them outward. After speaking, the meeting was open to sharing, and I called on anyone who raised their hand. At this very moment, something unexpected and wonderful happened.

A Powerful Message in the Ernest Sweater of A Grandfather

To the side of the room, a heavy-set African American man in his mid-sixties raised his hand. Wearing one of those reddish patterned sweaters and thick brown glasses, he looked just like a Grandfather from a movie or a sitcom. At least, that is the stereotype that popped into my head when I saw him. When I pointed at him, he stood up slowly, bearing his weight, and said something like this: "Young man, you have to do those treatments and listen to your doctors because you are a natural born teacher with a voice that needs to be in this world. Not very many people were ever able to teach me anything, but you taught me something tonight. You used images to show me what you meant and you made me think about a lot of things. Your voice is a gift from your God and you need to get well and let that voice be heard."

Wow! To say I was blown away and complimented by what he said would be an understatement. It touched me deeply and gave me a certain perspective on my own sense of value. If this crucible of Hepatitis C treatment is about anything for me beyond getting well, it is the motivation to free my voice from the chains of fear and the false shadow of mediocrity looming. You never know when and where you will hear a message that will hit you in the place you need to be rocked, awakening a latent awareness of your own purpose and meaning. This is the essence of this journey. If I am fearful of starting treatment, it is because I am scared that I will be unable to walk the walk when in the eye of the storm. Can I continue to sing when the crucible becomes a reality?

Enough of such melodrama for now. I know the questions and thoughts are legitimate, but language can be dangerous if it is abused. If I couch the challenge in ultimatums, then I sink into the quicksand of a logical fallacy. This is not an absolute or a totality, but a process that will be handled one-day-at-a-time in the nuts&bolts reality of the present. And the story of the older African American man whose name turned out to be Ernest is far from over. After the meeting, the Secretary told me that Ernest had spoken the week before and needed a ride back to his neighborhood. Would I drive him a few miles to where he needed to go to catch a bus? My answer came without hesitation: It would be a pleasure to give Ernest a ride to wherever he needed to go.

As we drove to his bus stop where he insisted I drop him off as opposed to taking him home, Ernest revealed several things to me that widened my understanding and and opened the doors of my perception (forgive the casual reference to the Aldous Huxley classic). Although he is indeed a Grandfather, he recently had been released from prison where he had spent years because of an intensely violent criminal past. In prison, he had discovered his faith, although he still felt uncomfortable on the outside. When a cop car blazed by us with sirens blaring, he startled for a second, then laughed with the comment: "I always am surprised when they don't pull me over because I still think they are coming for me. Back in the day, it seemed like they were all gunning for me." My connection with Ernest was a pleasure, and I was sorry to drop him off and lose the company. In retrospect, I wish I had invited him out for  a cup of coffee of a bite to eat. Without question, it was an enlightened moment of rare spiritual intimacy with a true stranger. As we drove, Ernest kept expressing his gratitude and reminding me of his message. I hope that I never allow myself to forget what he said and I never lose track of my voice.

And I'll leave this post with a little graffiti that reveals the way with the jagged grace of anonymity that needs no caption from this grateful boy.