Overheard in Recovery - Writing Your Story

A writer friend and I were talking about the process of writing stories. Some writers, he reminded me, like to start knowing the end of the story before they start. Others know where the story starts and let the story take them where they need to go in the end. And some, we were reminded from the book Ron Carlson Writes a Story end up discovering that the end of the story that they wrote first ends up being but the beginning of the story.

I realized that recovery is like the last example. We start thinking we know the end of the story:

I will stay clean and sober. That's what it's all about.

But a few years down the road, if one manages to stay on the path, you realize that the end was but the beginning. You end up writing your own story starting at the end- clean and sober- and then going on from there.

I think that moment is the ultimate willingness to admit powerlessness and move into true acceptance.

And to discover what it means to live in hope.