Without a Higher Power you might get sober, but it’s almost impossible to stay this way. So what do you do, if you don’t believe in God? Does this mean you can never get sober and shouldn’t even bother trying? Who is God? What is God?

I used to hate the word GOD. I still find it to be one of the biggest road blocks to those contemplating sobriety.

The first place I used to go when I heard the word ‘God’ was to a punishing, tyrannical God. One with many demands in which this sinning, unfit human, was never able to live up to.

Mind you, I really didn’t think he was living up to his end of the bargain either. With all the pain,corruption and horror that exists in today’s world, it was easy to dismiss him.

Then I was introduced to the twelve steps. In particular step three. ‘Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understand him.’

Now here’s the problem. The God of my understanding was a mean bully who belittled me. I never seemed to live up to his expectations. I never felt good enough and yet strangely, in some of my darkest hours, I begged him for help. You know the kind…. Please, please God, get me out of this one and I swear I’ll never do it again.

One day a very kind woman asked me a question which changed my life.

‘What would you like your God to look like?”

“Whaaa…” I stammered. The thought of me, defining what GOD should look like seemed well… sinful.

At first I thought I might get struck by lightening, or get run down crossing the road. I had the feeling something awful would happen to me, but it didn’t.

As a matter of fact the experience was the very opposite of what I’d come to expect.

I would lay in bed thinking about the kind of God I needed to feel safe and protected. He/she/something… would need to be open to my mistakes. I would need to be able to acknowledge mistakes without fear of punishment, without shame or with holding love. The God of my understanding would need a sense of humor. Mine isn’t very good, I’m kind of serious, so I really needed some help in the ‘lighten up’ department. My God would need to teach me how to love, because I’m not very good at it. I know how to love when you do what I want…. not so much when you don’t.

I came to realize the word God could mean Good Orderly Direction or Group of Drunks (recovering of course) or the Great Out Doors.

When you really start to think about it the possibilities were endless. I needed a God who could teach me to be a better parent. One who mirrored the truest form of love, the unconditional kind.

Aha! I found it. The answer to the question which had been plaguing me long before I began consciously contemplating it.

It occurred to me it wasn’t God who was doing all the horrifying things in my home and in our world. No it wasn’t God at all…. it was man.

Man created possibly in the image of God, who has been given one of the greatest blessings of all.

Free will.

And just like everything else in our lives, it has two sides. Free will is a blessing, but it’s also a curse.

For me, free will almost killed me. Let’s face it. If you’re addicted you’re not making the best choices and all alone in my head, was a miserable, scary, place to be. All I had to rely on were the experiences I’d already accumulated, the very experiences that had brought me to my knees.

Only now free will gave me another direction. One that cracked open the rigid door of my making, just enough to let in something else. 

Hope.

And then it built.

When I don’t think I have all the answers I’m teachable. When I teachable my world changes. When my world changes I can laugh and sleep peacefully. I want to be a kinder person. I care. 

I know the answer to my question. My God may or may not sit on a throne, wearing a circlet of thorns. I haven’t ruled it out, but I haven’t ruled it in either.

See my God is patient and allows me to come to my own understanding. When I’m ready, not on his time. (Which maybe is his time after-all)

The longer I’m in this relationship, the more I begin to understand.

All my God ever wanted for me was happiness. ‘To thine own self be true,’

It’s as simple and as complicated, as that.

I no longer hate the word God. I embrace it. It is a multifaceted word with many layers. The cloth changes, as do I, over the years.

But I’ll simplify it the best I can.

For me God is love. Unconditional love. And in my quest to love unconditionally, I think I’ve become the person God always intended me to be.

Ignorance is judging something is not for you, when you’ve never even tried it.  Some of us know everything and will stay stuck the for rest of our lives.

Others will embrace an open mind set and succeed.

Free will states it’s your choice.

Faith, comfort and hope, or ……. what?

It’s really up to you.

But if your God isn’t doing it for you – I’ll be glad to share mine.