a retreat is what I needed...

I've been struggling with stress alot lately. Work has been crazy busy, yet not nearly as productive as I'd like. I've actually come to a point where I almost dread going to work and my motivation has slowly been grinding to a halt. This stress has been keeping me tired and I have had to work hard not to let my poor work attitude spill over into my personal life at home. My home group has been quite poorly attended for weeks now, the same 3-4 guys who end up talking about local affairs more than sobriety. So, my external AA program has been lacking as well. This of course is a recipie for potential disaster for this alcoholic.

This past weekend was our "10th Annual Winter Retreat for men of AA." Due to our busy schedules leading up to the retreat, flyers came out late and there was a bit of a scramble to put a program together. In spite of all that, 20 guys showed up (which is a good turnout for us, out here in the "boonies") and we had a wonderful weekend as always. Due to some confusion on the program and who would be "retreat master"this weekend, back in December I offered to present whatever program we decided upon, and facilitate the entire weekend. Now mind you, I have never led a retreat before in my life, lol. But, I felt guilty over not being better organized and prepared and felt obligated to take the reins. A good friend of mine suggested that we run the "Back to Basics" program which takes a group through the 12 Steps in 4 one hour sessions. It's modelled after the way Dr Bob ran his sponsees through the Steps early on, and is set up in the format of the early beginner's meeting of AA.

Well, I was too busy and exhausted to be very nervous or stressed about the weekend. HP kicked in for me and it all went really well. I got a lot out of the weekend, the guys got alot out of the weekend. We had a recovering priest among us who led us in some guided meditation and said Mass so we had a wonderful spiritual addition to the Steps. HP kept me in touch, relaxed and helped me all weekend long to remember that it wasn't all about me. I didn't stress, fret, worry or try to micromanage the whole thing (which is a bit of a miracle in itself lol). I took care of my part, took time with a sponsee, made a few new friends, and kindled a friendship with a guy who was in Toledo when I got sober almost 13 yrs ago. I hadn't seen him in years. I was even asked at the end to come down to Dayton some time this winter/spring and run the workshop down there. I didn't see that coming.

Of course, we come back to reality after a weekend on retreat. I stayed up too late talking all weekend, lol so I was beat. But, I spent most of yesterday and Sunday hanging out with Ian (he was pretty unhappy that I was gone all weekend). I did manage to do a little work yesterday (I had planned on working from home all day and blew it off mostly). I feel at ease with myself (received the gift of Absolution over the weekend, always good!) to an extent, especially where my family is concerned. I am still not looking forward to work and even less so now. I prayed and shared on my career issues with a few people this weekend and have come to the conclusion that I am going to go teach. I believe I am not doing what I am supposed to be doing and so I am going to get out of this career as soon as I can and get back into teaching. I believe it's what I am meant to be doing. This explains my unhappiness with my current career and to some extent, my lack of success in sales/finance. Oh sure, I do ok, even experience flashes of brilliance now and then. But, I fail to get the satisfaction I seek and I just can't seem to string together any long period of solid growth and success financially. It's time to quit hiding from my misson and do mroe of what I have been put here to do. That's my biggest takeway from the weekend.