So I was talking to one of my friends who is a recovering drug addict. We were discussing some of the people in his AA/NA programs and he was amazed at the fact that a lot of them don’t have any real goals in life. I was amazed by the fact that he was amazed by this.
Addicts aren’t really known for being goal oriented (unless you count the goal of getting a fix. He was talking about this one particular friend who has decided to start a club of sorts for his addict friends. In theory it sounds like a good idea, not the way he’s implementing it, but the concept in general. It’s basically getting a group of addicts together and agreeing to be there for one another. If anyone needs a ride to a meeting or someone to talk to, that type of thing. Then he was talking about expanding it to an outreach program. Talking to troubled kids and the like…. again, sounds like a fabulous idea…
Here’s the catch. The friend who is looking to start the program isn’t really sober. I mean, he’s sometimes sober… he can go for periods of time being sober, but as soon as anything happens in his life he jumps head first of the wagon. On top of that he has severe issues with relationships. He just got out of jail for stalking and harassing an ex… this does not really feel like the type of person that should be teaching others about sobriety and living well sober.
When I mentioned this to my friend, he started with the excuses, “well, it’s not really his fault, he has severe abandonment issues… his childhood was…. ” blah blah blah. I stopped listening at that point. Your childhood is not a reasonable answer for your choices. It is a pathetic excuse to blame others. Now I am in no way perfect. I admit that. I picked up a lot of bad eating habits from my father growing up as I have discussed previously, but once I became an adult… maybe not the moment I turned 18… but 25, 30… so on… my parents mistakes were not my problem.. my own were.
This guy with the abandonment issues (because he was put into foster care as a child) has gone on to put one child up for adoption and has another that sees him bouncing in and out of jail and rehabs. Those are his choices. There are plenty of people who have had screwed up childhoods who turn out just fine. I, personally, am so sick of an entire society who blames everyone else for their choices and actions.
My childhood was not perfect. My mother was schizophrenic. There were horrible custody battles, at one point my parents had a literal tug of war battle over me in the middle of the street. When I did live with my mother she took us to religious communes where, since we didn’t live with out father, anyone was allowed to punish us as they wished. For a while we even lived in a car. It didn’t stop once my dad finally got custody. My mother kidnapped us, police were called to the house and my school.. all kinds of things happened, but none of that made me a victim. All of that made me stronger and more aware of my own actions.
As an adult I have taken in other people’s children when the mom wasn’t able to care for them, and now I am a full-time mom to my son, while still running my own business. People make their own choices. If they hate the way they were treated by someone else or society or however they feel wronged, it is not their job to cry about why they deserve more, it’s their responsibility to make sure they don’t repeat the actions, and their right to have a better life.
If you blame others for your problems then you are giving them control over your life. The only person who can fix your life is you!
