3 and a half years

My sober date is February 1, 2007. And I have no idea where to start here or even what I am trying to say. Its a little like sharing. Sometimes I raise my hand and just let it come out. When I am really on the beam I pray to God to talk through me and to let me be a channel. I have only done this maybe twice with complete sincerity. Most times I sit in meetings trying to figure out what I will say so that my shares will be the best shares ever and everyone will think I am brilliant and wonderful and they will learn from me and adore me. And then of course I don't hear a word anyone else says because I am so busy in my own head that I can't hear anyone else. What a loss! But somehow I have gone to enough meetings now and worked with my sponsor on the steps and shared and cried that slowly I am hearing things in meetings. There are even whole meetings where I just listen. And come away feeling better. For a long time the only way that I could come out of a meeting feeling better was when I shared. When I confessed to my sponsor what I was doing about sitting in meetings trying to create the perfect share she gave me a great tip. She told me to share first thing. Get it out of the way and then sit back and listen. So that's pretty much where I am today. I try to share first thing. And its not that I have anything that great to say or am any different than anyone else, I am just so grateful to be sober, alive and in AA working a great program (much of the time) that I thought I would write about what I do and keep track of what works and what doesnt for me and maybe someone else could chip in and give me other ways of thinking about things and who knows. But here it is. My handbook for recovering. One day at a time. And this is day one of the handbook. Lets see what happens.