Willing

I am very thankful for the willingness God has placed in my heart to follow this program of recovery. I am very grateful for the willingness He has placed in my heart to follow Him and do His will. Not only am I willing to follow and serve Him, but I yearn to follow and serve Him. That is a gift from God.

I am willing. What a wonderful positive character trait this is for my list. I am willing to follow and serve God. I am willing to do my step work, go to meetings, be of service in CoDA at the local and regional levels. I am willing to journal, worship, work out, pound and yell, read my bible, connect with my inner child, read my step work to my sponsor, and work with my therapist. I am willing to experience all of the good that comes from working this program.

I am willing to face the challenges that this program offers, because I know at those tough times that recovery is just around the corner. If there weren’t challenges, we would have nothing to face. I am willing to face them. I may not even see the results right away on something I am working on in the program. That is when I need to practice humility, knowing that I am on God’s timing, not my own, and He knows best. Then I need to accept His timing as being the best timing that could happen to me now. Then I have to practice patience until such a time that I see recovery start to happen. And it will happen. The fact that it has already happened in so many areas reassures me, plus I have my strong trust in God.

In being willing to face the challenges, I admit that I am willing to fall down and skin my knees once in a while. I may have fallen down with Connie in “Keeping My Eyes on Christ,” Veronica in “Fear of Abandonment and Fear of Rejection,” and Louis in “Don’t React in the Classroom.”  The good news is that I was willing to get back up and try again. Try again I did. The scars on my knees have healed and I have come away with new game plans, such as my wonderful Process Four:

• Don’t take it personally.
• Don’t react.
• Stick to business and just teach music.
• Think before you speak.
• This too shall pass.
• Let it go.

I had to be willing to listen to God to receive this process, which I did. Then I had to be willing to practice it, which I also did. I am forever grateful. This process has been very, very helpful to me, especially in my teaching life.

Thanks to this process, the story with my student Veronica has a happy ending. Veronica remained in orchestra for the rest of the year and we continued our lessons together. (Her class schedule was complicated and thus I found a time to teach her privately.) I practiced my Process Four faithfully during our lessons and it really paid off. Our lessons were focused and productive. She did a great job on the orchestra music and did a fantastic duet with me. I was very proud of her. At the end of the concert, her mom came up to me, gave me a big hug and smile, and took my picture with Veronica. I echoed their enthusiasm and told Veronica’s mom how proud I was of her daughter’s performance. It was a great ending to my evening. I was humbled and grateful. None of this would have happened if I had not been willing to follow my process and change my behavior.

I am willing to change, grow, accept, surrender control, work hard, and admit when I’m wrong. Whenever I’m not willing, I pray for the willingness to be willing. I also make use of my mantras, positive affirmations, and additional practices as outlined in the “Willingness” section in “The Principles.” The more I do this work, the more willing I become. This is recovery.