Bloggerlife.blog

12/07/2025

Today’s blog

Lynn Murphy Mark

Led to action

We are starting week number 50 of the year 2025. This is astonishing to me. In many ways, this has not been an easy year. My friends and I have shared in the madness that is happening in our government, often feeling beyond outraged and helpless at the same time. It has also been a year in which I had to examine my behaviors where my compulsions are concerned. I have had to admit that I can be obsessive in my thoughts and actions. This has not been easy, and I still struggle with some behaviors that do not contribute to my wellbeing. 

I have written before about my addiction to overeating, and all the acts that go with my disease. I do have a disease when it comes to my relationship with food. My 12 Step literature tells me that I am “in the clutches of a dangerous illness, and that willpower, emotional health and self-confidence, which some of us had once possessed were no defense against it.” It is not easy to admit to this particular addiction but all the evidence points me in a direction that requires fundamental change in the way I behave when confronted with my substance of abuse.

Experience of over two years in the 12 Step group that addresses this addiction finally brought me to my knees. While I have learned some protective tactics I have also realized just how much denial I am still in. What alcoholics call “sobriety”, we overeaters call “abstinence”. The principle is the same in both groups. Indulging in our substance of choice leads down a treacherous path, and relapse looms. In my addict’s brain I have been very clever about playing around with foods that are to me what alcohol is to an alcoholic.

As we are in the midst of the holiday season, food and drink abound. Wherever I turn there are opportunities to indulge. I have to face the fact that a lot of holiday offerings are sure paths to a relapse if I partake. At the same time, I have learned so much about how to manage my life so that it makes sense and leads down healthy pathways. I am learning to be grateful for this knowledge, and to pray for the willingness to follow it. 

I struggle with my demons sometimes. But I am also surrounded by people and words that help me cope. For example, this morning’s meditation from Richard Rohr, helped me define the bleakness that comes on me sometimes:

“My good friend Gerald May shed fresh light on the meaning of John of the Cross’ phrase “the dark night of the soul.” He said that God has to work in the soul in secret and  in darkness, because if we fully knew what was happening, and what Mystery/God/grace will eventually ask of us, we would either try to take charge or to stop the whole process. May writes:

The dark night is a profoundly good thing. It is an ongoing spiritual process in which we are liberated from attachments and compulsions and empowered to live and love more freely. Sometimes this letting go of old ways is painful, occasionally even devastating. But this is not why the night is called “dark.” The darkness of the night implies nothing sinister, only that the liberation takes place in hidden ways, beneath our knowledge and understanding. It happens mysteriously, in secret, and beyond our conscious control. [2]”

I recognize this phenomenon of mysterious exposures to helpful things. My main job is to be open to these opportunities to reflect on and work out a plan of action for the present moment. If there is a veil between me and the Universal wisdom, these are times when the veil opens – if I am paying attention. I think this is the meaning of “Presence” – the ability to live into the present moment. In my addiction, I can regret the past, and ponder the future. Nothing good usually comes of lingering in either one of these states. The Serenity Prayer helps. “God, grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change what I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” Thanks, and Amen.