shades of grey

Well it has been an interesting week in the inner workings of the newman mind, or lack there of. I think I might be coming to some hard conclusions about the troubles associated with thinking in "shades of grey"

Last Sunday while I was in Edmonton I had the chance to visit with Kelly. This was an extremely eye opening visit. Kelly has come so far in the past few months on her own road of recovery. She is looking healthier and happier than I have ever seen her. This change in and of itself made my week, made my year, made my decade.

Our conversation really left me thinking about how simple recovery is, when you make some hard decisions in life. When you say "thou shall not" in your mind. All to often in my life I have tended to look at the grey areas. I have rationalized things in my mind that I should never have tried to defend in the first place. Those grey actions almost always have bad endings. They end with people going to jail. They end with fractured lives and minds.

I think that in my own recovery I need to make some things "black and white", "right and wrong". I dont believe that "right" should simply mean what makes me happy, or what feels good. "right" should also mean something that is not destructive to myself and my longterm happiness. It should also not be something that might cause another to head down the wrong road either. And in the "wrong" column I think, that because I dont have the infinite wisdom of my youth, I might choose to look to the thoughts, and the experiences of society, and the law. Maybe there is a reason for all those laws afterall. Maybe they are not just there to punish. Maybe they are there to provide a compass to direct our course through life.

So with that said, I think I am going to make a pledge to myself to try to get rid of all those grey areas in my life. To put myself in a world that is more black and white. Replacing things like "I will try not to", or "maybe once and a while" to the simple words "thou shalt not" A world a little easier to manage, and navigate. A world with a few more "thou shalt not's", because after seeing how a few simple rules have affected Kelly's life, I know they can also make me a better person.

Keep up the good work Kelly. Lotsa Love from Calgary