Humbling Can Be Stumbling On The Road To Humility

On my road to recovery, I've had to face many fears, emotions and personal beliefs that have been brought to my attention as preventing me from being "Humble." If you have read my other blog "Let Go, Let Me!!!" you know that I have a wife who is an Alcoholic in recovery, and along side her I am in my own recovery program from this disease. Recently I was in a week long conference for Families affected by Alcoholism. One morning before the rest of the family members joined the session, The Counselor asked me how I was doing. I replied that I was doing well, and felt that I was learning a lot; as our topics were really helping me to understand the disease. She seemed somewhat condescending when I told her that, so being that no one else had came in to the room yet I said "Why do you ask." At this, she stopped what she was doing, came and sat next to me and in so many words stated that she did not think I was humble, and she was worried how that would effect me if my wife were to relapse back into alcoholism.


This topic baffled me as I thought that for sure the disease had already humbled me to the fact that my own desires to stop my Wife’s drinking were not going to work. Alcoholism defined my limitations for me in the battle against the disease, and I was sure humbled when I reached that sobering conclusion (No pun intended.) This disease started tearing me down emotionally, mentally and physically long before I ever stepped into a counselor’s office in search of help.


So this lead me to my search for exactly what "Humble" in the counselors definition meant, as I most certainly wanted to be humble if it was going to help me on my own recovery journey!! As always I find myself googling for everything, and this search for Humility would be no different. Armed with several search terms, I fired up my browser and into cyberspace I went. Of the many sites I found, the following articles seemed to have relevance to my particular needs to quantify "Humility."
 

1. >Humility vs. Humiliation I found the following passage to be eye opening and informative!
   
   In the philosophical context, humility is synonymous with teach-ability. The old adage, “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” is commonly used among Doctors, Psychiatrists and Psychologists. So much so, that it is a rule of thumb in some circles. The exception to this rule is humility. It is easy to see why the Greeks saw meekness as having a cleansing effect on the human soul. It, in effect, turned meekness into a “Tabula Rosa” (clean slate) allowing new knowledge to be written on the blackboard of the soul.
   
   Another big advantage for those in recovery is that humility serves as an instrument for seeing through the ego’s attempt to deny the severity of the sufferer’s addiction. No matter how much one suffers as the result of addictive behavior, pride will always grow back, not unlike a weed, and attempt to cover up the damage with denial. Humility serves as the perfect gardening tool for this relentless emotional weed by pruning pride and allowing the truth to show through about this disease.
   
   Einstein defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results. Humility is seeing the truth about ourselves and the truth about our potential to change (the truth shall set you free). Paradoxically, there is an ancient proverb that is the functional equivalent to the Greeks “Tabula Rosa”. It goes something like this; “you must suffer to get well, you have to surrender to win and you must give it away to keep it”.
    
2.  HUMILITY  The following passage was quoted from the Alcoholics Anonymous book "Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions" Page 59
   
   Obtaining Humility - "Only by discussing ourselves, holding back nothing, only by being willing to take advice and accept direction could we set foot on the road to straight thinking, solid honesty, and genuine humility."

I feel as if I relate well to the those passages especially "Obtaining Humity." During the week I spent in the Families with Alcoholism Conference, I was open, I shared my soul, deepest feelings and cried often. I once stated " I came here to bare everything thing I have. I plan on leaving all my sadness, emotions and fears of Alcoholism here on the floor. I plan on taking back with me only those tools that will help me on my journey through recovery!" Humble?? I would have thought so!!
 

So for me this journey to find out whether I am Humble will become an on going soul searching, life experience with it's own motto for my soul "Tabula Rosa."