Author: Darkstar
Posted: Sun Jun 26, 2011 8:16 pm
It amazes me how often people post their personal opinion, view, or interpretations and state them as a fact. Whenever we do this we risk appearing ignorant and reducing the strength of our position. People proclaim to know the "real" definition of what recovery "really" is. Recovery is a word used to describe a concept that clearly means different things to different people. Clearly we can agree that it means different things to different people right? We all define it for ourselves or choose to accept a definition that is commonly accepted by those that most closely share our views. I don’t understand why so many people insist that others share there same view or else they are wrong. My opinion (not fact) is that recovery, or "being clean" and what those concepts mean is a decision made by each individual. I fail to see what is productive about arguing what these concepts mean except to further divide people. My opinion is that as long as we are comfortable with our own definitions and that we are working toward "recovery" and "being clean" (whatever that may mean for us) in a way that is useful to us and we can feel good about out, then I think we are doing a good thing. It sounds like everyone who posted here is trying to be a better person than they were in the throes of addiction and that is great. Can we please just accept that we have our own values and opinions and that we should focus on what’s best for ourselves rather than assuming that it must also be best for everyone else. Too much arrogance in the world as it is, but it seems to be all too prevalent in the recovery community which is contradictory to the "humility" that many agree is an important ingredient. I dunno, I didn’t’ even voice my ‘opinion’ on the marijuana topic because I became so distracted by the way some people were responding to it. It reminded me of the kind of judgment and all knowing attitudes that have led to my keeping the recovery community at arms length which is sad. Thanks for listening 
