I Learned to Question
By Holly K., Kentucky
Al-Anon: The Forum: August, 2002
We often share in meetings that the program has helped us see life is not black and white, but shades of gray. As we grow, life can even be in color. The program helped me not only see in color, but now I can see a different view altogether.
In a meeting, a friend asked me to read the page on maturity from "Blueprint for Progress, Al-Anon's Fourth Step Inventory (P-5). With that little surge of self-esteem that comes from being asked, I agreed. As we opened the meeting, it dawned on me that I didn't know if he had asked me to read about maturity because I had it, or because I needed to hear it. A whole new worldview became available to me.
Maybe people honked at my car because I had a program bumper sticker, not because I was driving badly. Maybe people did things my way, not because it was the best way, but because it was the path of least resistance. In one very small moment, I learned to question assumptions and interpretations of the world around me.
I know a lot less than I did when I came to these rooms for the first time. I am a good deal less certain of other people's feelings and motivations. What I know for certainhas been reduced to a few cherished realities. I know who I am, I know I have a Higher Power, and I know the Al-Anon program works. All else can change at a moment's notice, and I am enriched by that reduction of knowledge.
I never asked my friend why he asked me to read the section on maturity. As he has since passed away, I will never know, and I am content with that. My world can now contain uncertainty, mystery, and even contentment. Not only is life in color, it is a whole new picture.
Reprinted with permission of The Forum, Al-Anon
Family Group Headquarters, Inc., Virginia Beach, VA.
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