Saturday, April 4, 2009

Day Thirty Nine - Thoughts and Reflections on the Eve of the Fortieth Day

It is the eve of the Fortieth day of Lent. Tomorrow is Palm Sunday marking the beginning of Holy Week, the third act of Lent. I have lived (almost) through forty days of sobriety and have seven more to go. Looking back on the first and second acts I know that I have moved into a more honest space. Is it a happier space? In some ways yes because it is liberating. In some ways no, because it is easier to be happy when insulated from torment. It is an ignorant bliss, however. I have worked on TT, although not to the extent I had hoped. Still, I came to realize that these goals I set for myself can become tormentors, and that certainly was not the point of the goals in the first place. I am surprised that being sober was not at all difficult. I think my drinking was fear based and now that I have not had alcohol to insulate myself from my fear I can see that my fears were to a large extent unfounded or perhaps exaggerated is a better description. There are problems yes, but they are only problems and not whatever I feared they would be. So, what can be learned from Act One and Act Two? I have left the ordinary world of drinking and crossed the threshold into the special world of sobriety. But Lent is more than just sobriety. It is a state of mind. It is a striping down, a simplification, an approach to the bare essence. Sobriety has its role to play there because it forces me to see things (to a certain extent) as they are. To the extent that sobriety accomplishes that task, that is its importance. I cannot say that I have approached the inmost cave and faced my ordeal. There is a week to go, but perhaps that will happen after Lent. For the story of Lent is a microcosm of the macrocosm. In its third act, Christ enters Jerusalem on Palm Sunday (the approach to the inmost cave), he overturns the money changer's tables and is arrested and convicted (the ordeal). He is then crucified (the road home), he dies and rises from the dead (resurrection), and then returns to tell his loved ones to be not afraid of death (return with the elixir). So even if I do not face my ordeal before the end of Lent, I perhaps will construct a mental or spiritual road map.

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