Being Imperfect

 
I didn't go to the meeting last night because I had to let my husband go by himself since we didn't have a babysitter again, and I went alone last time.  I miss it.

Support group meetings are like a breath of fresh air once a week.  Church attendance is important too, yes, but there is something extra special about attending a meeting where everyone takes off their masks and lets everyone else see the imperfections and pains and struggles, and still feel loved.  Church should be more like this.  Someday I hope the program merges into the church's regular programed system and helps people to open up and realize everybody is struggling.

There's a woman who attends my group who expressed feeling completely and utterly alone when she attends church because as she looks around it feels like she is the only one that isn't put together.  This is the terrible lie I feel everyone at church sometimes thinks they must live up to.  Especially the women (in my opinion) although the men have their masks too.  Women seem to have more to hide.  I mean, we are of course the ones expected to cover up with makeup and panty hose and modern-day corsets to hide our physical nonconformities...and then emotionally and spiritually it's even worse, because of this.  Men have the freedom to allow physical imperfection and seem to have more lee-way in their social psyche when it comes to any kind of expectation.  (Of course, they go completely the opposite direction and are expected to have the emotional capacities of snails, but that rant is for another post).

Women expect perfection in ways that are completely and utterly impossible.  But what is important to note is that most women expect this of themselves more then others, and because they expect it of themselves they feel like everyone else is  expecting it.  When, in truth, everyone else is just as worried for themselves.   No one really pays attention to judge how perfect other people are, if only to compare someone's greatest talent to one's own weaknesses, degrading oneself all over again.  I rarely could even imagine seeing someone say "Oh look, she's not a good mom because her daughter didn't get her hair in a neat ponytail for church today."

All that?  At the Addiction Recovery Support Group Meetings? Gone.

Instead, we are sitting there with the combined understanding that we all are imperfect, we all make mistakes, we all need our Savior, and that this is ok!

On top of this, we discuss our struggles and our faith, and a beautiful spirit is always there in each meeting that testifies the truth of that sentence above.

So if you are struggling with anything, be it an addiction, or just a weakness, or pain from someone else's wrongs.  Come to a meeting.  You are welcome here.

Go to the Meeting Finder to find a meeting near your area.