Another one of the very helpful tools I received from working with my sponsor is an attitude of gratitude. Gratitude is a great tool for me. It helps me beat the blues and keep going. I spoke of my gratitude list in my first book, and I list it throughout this book as a tool as well. In the following journal entry, I describe how I used gratitude to get myself through a challenging day.

God help me to always be grateful. God, when I’m rageful, resentful, or blue, please help me to remember to be grateful to you for all I have. Help me to remember to read my gratitude list. I have so many great things on that list. I have a great life. I have my wonderful, merciful, forgiving, patient God, my health, a beautiful home, a great job, fabulous family, and friends. I have my music, my book, my instruments, art, and creativity. The sun is out and there are flowers in my yard. I get vacations. Life is truly wonderful.

The other day I was running late for the dentist and when I did finally get there, it didn’t go well. I don’t brush right and the hygienist sure let me know. I got specific instructions. Okay, fine. I’m not perfect. And I pay the price. Ouch.The dentist, hygienist, and secretary were very nice. I did get a lecture about how badly I’m brushing my teeth but… I guess you can’t have everything.

The issue with being late for the dentist led to me being late for my private students. I have the best parents in the world because they were both so flexible and understanding. The dentist, hygienist, and secretary did everything they could to accommodate me and help me get out the door to my lessons. I appreciate all of these people and I am lucky to know them. Plus I raised my lesson prices and none of the parents that are employing me have blinked an eye about it. I am grateful.

The other day, a friend of mine was sharing with me about how her in-laws are already asking for money from her recently deceased husband’s estate. They are also asking her to forfeit her share of some of the money as they are having financial issues. I was horrified at their inappropriate behavior.

This, however, is a lesson for me. It’s a reminder for me to always be grateful for what I have and give freely to others, whether it’s time, money, or labor. It means taking 12 Step calls when they happen and giving people the time and ear they need. Thank you God for helping me to be empathetic, patient, and compassionate. Thank you God for taking away my greed and selfishness.

I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those

who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary

to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them.

~ Romans 16:17 (NIV)

One can never have enough gratitude to God. He gives us everything and is everything.

This post has special meaning to me today. I just came home from a Quaker Memorial Meeting for a member that was well loved by all. He had more God in him than anyone I had ever met. I will miss him very much. Earlier this week a friend shared with me that she has one year to live and has to write her kids a letter. Live in this moment Juliet, and quit complaining. You have an incredible, wonderful, God-given life. All we have is this moment.

TAKE THIS MOMENT

One of the most beneficial lessons I have learned through working my program is that all I have is this moment and I need to cherish that. In the following journal entry, I explore this idea.

It’s Not All or Nothing 

I used to be an “all or nothing” black and white thinker. Either it was all bad or all good. I need all of Sunday off or I need this or that or I won’t be happy. Now every moment that I get that is softer and easier is a blessing from God. If I can just take it moment-by-moment and not have it be “all or nothing,” I’ll be doing okay. I’ll be making progress.

Take today for example. I had a great Quaker Meeting for worship and stayed awake through the whole thing. As a result, I had a really good day. Then I had a great session with my sponsor. Good recovery is taking place. Alice called after 8 pm and I still answered the phone. I was kind and sweet and wanted to talk to her. I stared at my Tanglewood picture the whole time and took myself there in my mind. I heard the soft breeze sifting through the trees and felt it on my face, grateful for its cooling effects after a hot day. As if at Tanglewood, I smelled the bug spray that I had applied amply to my body to protect me from vicious bugs. I could hear the Emerson String Quartet playing Mozart’s String Quartet #15 in DMinor.Good stuff. I did good.

What I am learning is that this life is not “all or nothing.” It’s about moments.Every moment that I get that is pain-free, obsession-free, and worry-free, in which I am accepting and going with whatever is happening, is a good one. Every instant that is not catastrophic, heart-pounding, or stuffed with that gut-aching despair and sadness is a gift. Every time I follow up a negative thought with a positive thought is a victory.

Recently, at our annual Quaker Sessions, we were asked to let there be “no more weeping and wailing.” Let’s just truly experience and accept where we are at today. Let us be joyful even with the tensions that exist in our lives because ultimately God listens and we listen.

I need to cherish this moment. It’s all I have. Some moments are joyful, some are very, very sad. Some make my heart race. Some are peaceful. When I’m sitting out on the porch of my Vermont cabin listening to the brook babble below, that is a peaceful moment. That is my own piece of heaven. I will focus on that.

If what it took was my dear brother-in-law getting sick with brain cancer to get me to learn to live in the moment that is pretty sad. But at least I’m getting to the point where I’m not always thinking, “This is what’s going to happen tomorrow and that is happening next week.” That is progress. This moment is good. This moment is fine. I can deal with it.

The future is a loosely knit sweater that could be pulled out at any time. Let’s just live for today. Make loose plans for the future. Just for today I’m going to do this. Just for this moment, I will have God write my book for me. Just for today, I will work on my book first before practicing. Live in the moment. That is the answer.

It’s time to abandon the idea that I have any clue about what the future holds. Holding tightly to any fixed point in space that’s in the future is futile.

I will strive to live in this instant and to bring joy there. I don’t know what the next 5 minutes are going to bring. But I know in this moment I can take in everything that’s happening and find a way to be joyful and thankful to God for it. It’s not “all or nothing” forever; it is this moment and that’s all.

Thank you, God.

Harmonic Reasons 

There are harmonic reasons that music is calming for me. I define harmony for my students as two or more notes played at the same time, or more than one note at once.

Even if the whole world is going crazy, I know that when I put on Bach, Haydn, or Handel, the five chord will resolve to the one chord or the six chord.

If I’m listening to jazz musicians, I know that the one six two five progressions (in music language, it would be written as I-vi-ii-V) are common and the blues will always be around. The five chord (V) almost always follows two minor seven half-diminished chords. (If this looks like Greek to you, in music, each note of the scale is given a roman numeral, on which a chord is built. These chords appear in certain progressions, or orders, in different types of music. These chord progressions are often predictable and reliable.)

I can be certain that Bach will always have counterpoint and fugue in his music, and Mozart will never go 12-tone on me. I will never put on Handel’s Messiah and hear a whole tone scale. (12-tone music basically consists of 12 tones picked by the author that always appear in the same order and are manipulated in a variety of ways. The whole tone scale was a six-tone scale heard in late romantic, 20^thcentury, and jazz music.)

Below is a journal entry from summer 2014 when I was attending a concert at Tanglewood’s Ozawa Hall:

I just listened to the Emerson String Quartet play Shostakovich’s String Quartets 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 all in one concert. It was a long concert with two intermissions. What it taught me is that I have to write music about Zeb’s death and my experience in dealing with it. I have to write about my sadness and get it out of me. Shostakovich poured out his life in his music, pouring the sadness of his experiences into his music through sound. That is what I have to keep doing. I did that with Fearless Moral Inventoryand I need to keep doing it. I will pour out my life in my book and my music and it will heal me.

I loved the Brahms right away. I heard his String Sextet in Bb major, opus 18 at Tanglewood recently. Why wasn’t everyone on their feet at the end of that performance? Maybe I’m just out of step with the rest of the planet, but I thought that the Brahms sextet was the best thing I’ve heard at Tanglewood this season. I will add his string ensemble music to my CD collection.

I urge you to beef up your listening library with pieces that refresh you spiritually.

I strongly suggest that you learn to play an instrument. Is there an instrument that you always wanted to play but never got the opportunity? Go buy or rent one and start taking lessons. It is a wonderful creative outlet.

Music is a vital part of my life. I can’t imagine living without it. How thankful I am to have ears to hear it, a heart to appreciate it, and a soul that depends on it for nourishment.

I pray that the music I sing and play will glorify God now and forever.

Surrender 

It’s not our show

It’s his to run,

We can only come home

Like the prodigal son

Do our best to give up control

Bide our time, walk in faith

~ Something to Believe Infrom Fearless Moral Inventory

by Juliet A. Wright, copyright 2010, all rights reserved

I have to be able to surrenderin order to live life in this world. It’s just absolutely necessary. Otherwise I’ll drive myself completely crazy.

Surrender is one of the most basic and vital spiritual principles in the recovery program. It has become an essential spiritual practice for me. I surrender many things to God daily. I begin my day by getting on my knees and giving my day to God.

To me, surrender means that I give up control of something. In this case, I am giving up control of my life to God.

The principle of surrender is the river bed in which the water of Co-Dependents Anonymous Step 3flows:

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.^[1]

I have faith, confidence, and trust in Christ and in God’s divine plan for me. Why then do I not have confidence in my ability to follow him? Because I don’t surrender enough. It is insufficient for me to just get on my knees once in the morning and think, “Okay, now I’m set.” I am much too human and flawed for that. I have to practice surrendering every moment of every day.

Sometimes I am a poor example of a child of God. For example, I rage, I lose my temper. My commute is annoying. My inability to get my carcass out of the gym on time to have a relaxed drive to work, if that is possible, is hopeless and totally rage-producing. So I will pray for the willingness to be willing to have confidence in myself and to give up control, get up every morning, and try again. Give up control. Surrender.

The phone brings out the dark side of me also. I get mad when it rings. Ridiculous, I know. I feel responsible for whomever is on the other end of the line. I have to fix them, take care of them. After all, they are probably calling me for help — right?

At the same time, I can’t control when the phone rings. I probably can’t control whatever the person is calling about or asking me to do either. I need to surrender the phone to God. This is a circumstance beyond my control. I will address the phone in more detail later.

When I surrender, I give up control of my life to God. I mean I never really had control of it anyway, but I come to terms with this in my mind. God’s in charge. I can’t control whatever it is.

I surrender to God my over-responsibility and caretaking. I don’t have to fix or control it. I can let go. I can give it to God. I can’t fix it and I don’t have to fix it. I let go and let God.

Surrender takes the pressure off me. Let go, Juliet.

I had to surrender a lot during my brother-in-law’s illness (and eventual death). Many days, I was sad about his illness to the point that I could barely function. I was desperately worried about my sister in all of this. I felt responsible for her and wanted to fix everything for her. I didn’t want either of them to hurt. I wanted them to get their “happily ever after.” This was codependency because it was bordering on my not being able to take care of myself. I was just about at a standstill with despair. I couldn’t fix it, nor was it my responsibility. Where were my boundaries? I needed to surrender all of this to God and I did, repeatedly. It was difficult. It hurt. I hurt for them. Still, I kept surrendering.

Yes, I have had to surrender my over-responsibility and caretaking to God. He is the only one who can take it away from my tortured soul.

I have to surrender my job to God too. I do this on a daily basis. Lately I have been too worried about what other people think of me. I have to give up my control of who takes my class, who has decided to quit, who likes me, who doesn’t, whose parents are happy with me, and whose parents are dissatisfied.

The good news is that I can lay down my arms to God. I don’t have to figure it out. Any of it. Even cancer.Juliet did not have to and could not cure cancer by the end of whatever day or days she was in a state of hopelessness. I don’t have to plan my life all out perfectly. All I have to do is my best, do what is in front of me, and trust that this was God’s will for me for that day. God can figure it out for me. He can pave the way for me and show me what he wants me to do. Whatever I did not get done today, he didn’t want me to get done. Whatever I got done, it is enough.

^[1]Co-Dependents Anonymous. Co-Dependents Anonymous.Dallas, TX: CoDA Resource Publishing, 2009, p. iv.

Art and music are both very big parts of my recovery program. I paint pictures as a way of expressing myself and working through my challenges. I write songs in the same way, pouring my heart onto the page and into the tape recording. Both of these art forms are avenues of self-expression for me, and they have helped me to discern what’s going on inside of me so I can get it out of me and into my latest inventory.

In the pages that follow, I will detail some of this work. Perhaps you will be inspired by my example, and consider using art forms in your recovery program.

Since the art is difficult for me to reproduce in these pages, I have provided links to my website, where the art is displayed.

Music for Recovery (The Healing Power of Music)

Music is a big part of my recovery program. Music heals my anxiety and restores my soul. Whether I’m playing it or listening to it, music is a vital part of my daily life. What follows is a presentation of the different types of music I use and how I use them.

Music for Listening 

Listening to music is a healing experience for me. I listen to it to heal myself from whatever anxiety or uncomfortable feeling I’m experiencing at that moment. I choose the music I listen to based on the healing I wish to take place.

There are certain pieces of music that heal me spiritually. There are other pieces that help me to release rage, as I have discussed previously in this book. When my soul needs repair, I put these pieces on and they cure me of whatever difficult feelings I am struggling with.

Here is a list of music I listen to and how it serves me. Some of the music listed is an entire CD and some of it is just single pieces. Much of this music, especially the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic pieces, is available on recordings from many different artists. There is a complete discography at the end of the book.

Music for Spiritual Healing

Bach:  Sonatas and Partitas for Violin

Beethoven:  The Late String Quartets

Brahms:  Complete String Quartets, Quintets and Sextets

Sarah Groves: Conversations

Handel:  The Messiah (There is a part of me that could live in Handel’s Messiahforever and never come out. That’s the truth.)

Haydn:  The Creation

Josquin des Prez: Ave Maria… Virgo Serena, Missa Pange Lingua, Mille Regretz

Mozart:  Requiem Mass in D Minor

New Camaldoli Hermitage:  O Day of Resurrection! Liturgy of the Hours for Sunday

Palestrina: Pope Marcellus Mass

Radiohead:  Kid A, OK Computer, In Rainbows, The Bends

Sibelius:  Violin Concerto in D Minor, Opus 47

Victoria:  O Magnum Mysterium

Wilson, Steven: The Raven That Refused to Sing

The music for spiritual healing is music that does just that. It revives my spiritual self. Bach, Haydn, Handel, and New Camaldoli Hermitage are music used as a form of worship.

Music for the Release of Rage

Linkin Park:Meteora (album),Hybrid Theory (album)

Marilyn Manson, This Is the New Shit (The Matrix Reloaded soundtrack),Rock Is Dead (Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture, The Matrix)

Ministry:  Bad Blood (Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture, The Matrix)

Rage Against the Machine:  Calm Like a Bomb (The Matrix Reloaded soundtrack)

Rob Zombie: Dragula (Hot Rod Herman Remix) (Music from and Inspired by the Motion Picture, The Matrix)

Un Loco:  Bruises (The Matrix Reloaded soundtrack)

With the music that I use to release rage, I either listen to it in my car, or put them on my iPod when I’m pounding and yelling on my punching bag.

Music for Playing

Playing music is a huge part of my life and is part of my recovery process. As I have noted throughout this book, playing etudes and partitas on my stringed instruments (violin, viola, and cello) is an activity that gets me relaxed and centered. Playing classical pieces on my classical guitar is also useful for this purpose.

I play and sing my own music, on either my electric or acoustic guitar, when I want to express myself and release tension, anxiety, or despair. It restores my soul every time.

Here is a list of music that I play on my stringed instruments to release tension, anxiety, or despair

Bach, Johann Sebastian. Six Sonatas and Partitas, S. 1001 – 1006, For violin solo, edited by Joseph Joachim and Andreas Moser, New York, NY: International Music Company, No. 516. (Partita in D Minor for Violinis one of my absolute favorites.)

Bach, Johann Sebastian. Six Suites for Violoncello Solo, Milwaukee, WI: G. Schirmer, Inc., 1939.   

Schroeder, Alwin. 170 Foundation Studies for Violoncello, New York, NY: Carl Fisher, 1916. (Warning: Not all of these studies are relaxing. Some of them are downright scary!)

Jerry Willard. Fifty Easy Classical Guitar Pieces, New York, NY: Amsco Publications, 2004.

Wolfahrt, Franz. Foundational Studies for Violin, books 1 and 2. New York, NY: Carl Fischer LLC, 2011.

Wolfahrt, Franz. Foundational Studies for Viola, books 1 and 2. New York, NY: Carl Fischer LLC, 2013.

Wright, Juliet. Beloved Album, all songs (For a list of song titles, their lyrics, or to pick up the CD, go to www.hiddenangel.net.) (These songs work great on acoustic or electric guitar. Sheet music not currently available.)

Wright, Juliet. Fearless Moral Inventory Album, all songs (For a list of song titles, their lyrics, or to pick up the CD, go to www.hiddenangel.net.) (These songs work great on acoustic or electric guitar. Sheet music not currently available.)

Playing my instruments always gets me relaxed, calm, centered, and breathing. Practicing improves my self-esteem and makes my inner children happy. Playing my instruments reminds me that there is still purity and truth in the world, and it puts me back in the flow of the Goodness of the Universe. Regardless of what’s going on in my life, playing my instruments and singing my songs always makes me feel better. I will always keep music in my life for my own self. I always feel better after singing my songs. That is God’s gift to me and I am grateful to God for His gift of music.

I am a charitable person. I give freely to others. I give to those in need without expecting anything in return. This is one of my positive character traits.

I give to others in many ways. One way is giving through organizations. I give financially to many charities that I care deeply about. I give food to my local food bank once a month. I give my time to my Quaker Meeting through service at many levels. I give my time to CoDA through my home group and higher service levels.

I also give to individuals in many ways. I give through listening, smiling at people in the hallway, holding the door for them, and making eye contact. Some of these people are people I know, but many are people that I don’t know. I give to the clerk behind the counter at the coffee place by making eye contact, smiling, saying hello, and asking them how they are. If a colleague forgets their lunch, I offer them some of mine. If a friend is cold, I offer them my sweater. If a friend needs a lift and I’m available, I give them a ride. I give to the road crew by smiling when I drive by instead of grumping at them. (Yes, despite my previous complaints about traffic, I am often able to do this!) I hope it helps them and I know it makes me feel better.

I have also been known to help out my students and their families, even during my off-hours or during summer. For example, there is a family in Pittsfield that has had one child or another in my orchestras for several years now. During this span of years and even after the children were out of my classroom, I would go out of my way to help the family when they needed it. For example, there were a couple of times that one of the children, we’ll call him Greg (not his real name), needed to have the chin rest on his violin replaced and then adjusted. I met with the mother a couple of times, once at my place of work and once at their home. I gave my time to them, without expecting anything in return. (I actually did receive coffee and cookies, which were wonderful!) The profit I received from this experience came in the form of gratitude, warmth, and friendship. It was well worth it.

These things may seem small, but they’re important. They are all examples of me being of service to others in a small way, giving for the sake of giving. Being charitable is vital to me because it helps me grow spiritually. It is the God in me reaching out to the God in others. I am aware that all of the charity that comes out of me is God’s doing. All good in me comes from God. How cool of God to allow good to come through me to others. I am grateful and humbled by His mercy and grace.

As my books and music attest, I am a very spiritual person. My spirituality is a huge part of my life. God is everything to me.

Being a spiritual person keeps me focused on what is real, right, and true for me. It keeps me from getting caught up in this materialistic world. It keeps me pointed towards God and away from Satan.

Living in a constant state of prayer makes it easier to let God live through me and live my life for me. Then comes holy obedience. This means doing what God wants, not what I want. What He wants is the best thing for me. It is what needs to happen.

In “The Principles,” the section on “Making Contact (Spirituality)” describes in very nice detail my spiritual practice, how it works, and how much it means to me.

I owe my spirituality to God. He is the one who put it there. How grateful I am that He is sovereign over my life and that He has a plan for me. All I have to do is listen, trust, obey, and let go. My relationship with Him has made me happier than I ever thought I could be.

I am so grateful for my spirituality. I can’t imagine living any other way.

Having addressed my persistence quite thoroughly in the “Perseverance” section of “The Principles,” it is clear to see that I am a persistent, diligent, hard-working person.

My workaholism has also been well-defined throughout this book as one of my defects of character. I have defined my workaholism as a defect of character and it is. But diligence, when taken in the proper dosage, can be seen as a positive character trait.

I’ve always been a hard worker. I come from a family of hard workers. We were always a very productive bunch of folks.

I also come from a family of list makers. We were always big on making lists. I still make lists to this day. I make a “to do” list every week. It is usually three pages long and includes everything I have to do for the week from journaling, worshipping, working out, to CoDA meetings, Quaker meetings, and lists of things for my job. I never get everything checked off on the list, but I sure try hard. The end result is that I’m very productive and I feel good about that. I like that about myself. Juliet gets things done. Good for her.

I work hard at learning the violin, viola, cello, and guitar, writing books, writing music, and teaching. I find great fulfillment in all of these activities.

I am a very hard working teacher. I labor over every detail of my lesson plans until they are just right. I try to make the lessons fun, informative, and engaging, while striving to provide a comfortable, friendly learning environment. I try to greet them with a friendly hello and a smile when they come in the door. I try to encourage them to work hard, do their best, enjoy the music they are making and the process of learning. As stories in other parts of this book have revealed, I am not perfect at this. Teaching is a difficult profession. I try very hard and do the best I can.

This hard work in the classroom has paid off for me. I have a cello student that we’ll call Curt (not his real name). Curt has been one of my students for three years. He’s one of the most enthusiastic students I’ve ever had. He is in my music room practicing and learning every chance he gets. He is very appreciative of all of the instruction he has received from me. I have received many kind notes of gratitude and gifts from him and his family. Curt is off to middle school now and I’ll miss him. How grateful I am to have had the privilege of teaching him. This student’s success in music is the result of his passion and hard work, combined with well-delivered instruction, a comfortable learning environment, and lots of encouragement. If the instruction lacked planning and inspiration and the setting was consistently uncomfortable, I doubt that the outcome would have been the same. This diligence has been worth it.

I work hard for my Quaker Meeting and my CoDA Fellowships (in this setting, I am using fellowships to encompass all of the different CoDA groups I am involved with). This work is worth it as it feeds my soul. I am growing spiritually as a result of this work and thus I feel better about myself.

I work hard building and maintaining a close relationship with God. This is worth more to me than words can express. It is everything to me.

My diligence has produced good things in my life. I am very happy about this.

I like the part of me that is a hard worker. I just have to stop tying my self-worth up in what I accomplish. Binding my self-worth to my work only feeds my workaholism.

Taking the self-worth piece out of the equation will defuse the part of me that turns my diligence into workaholism. I have humbly given God this defect of character. He will take it away when He is ready to do that. In the meantime, I keep working my program. I give that to God too. It works if I work it.

I am a much more forgiving person than I used to be, thanks to program. I can actually put this character trait in the positive list. What a pleasure it is to be able to do that. It has taken a lot of hard work to be able to get to this place of forgiveness.

Thanks to program, I am now able to release the anger, resentment, and blame that I feel towards someone or myself for a wrong that has been done against me. I can now let it all go and move forward.

Now I need to qualify this. I can release the anger, resentment, and blame provided I work my program and the steps on the issue first. I do this along with the work I outlined in the “Forgiveness” section of “The Principles.” This enables me to come face-to-face either with what I’ve done to a person or what I think the person has done to me. Then I can make amends and make a commitment to change my behavior as is appropriate to the situation at hand.

I forgive Doris for not accepting my amends. I forgive her for thinking and speaking negatively about me. I forgive her for everything I think she has done to me.

I forgive myself for not being perfect in this friendship. I forgive myself for judging myself for not being available to her 24 hours a day. I forgive myself for calling myself selfish for not being available 24/7 when I was really just taking care of myself. I know I did the best I could with this friendship. That is all I can expect from anyone, including myself.

Thus I am learning forgive myself. I am trying to learn not to be so hard on myself. Being hard on myself does not serve me. I am learning to forgive others because I’m learning to forgive myself. It all starts with me.

Working my program has allowed me to put that bag of bricks of resentment down and feel the freedom that comes with true forgiveness. It feels great and is God-given. I am grateful.