One of my favorite coping skills I learned during my stay at in-patient treatment was called the 8/80 rule. When faced with adversity, the ‘rule’ says to look at the problem from two perspectives: what would you tell your 8-year-old self if you could give them advice on how to deal with your current situation? What would your 80-year-old self tell your current self if they could give you advice on your current situation? In thinking about these perspectives, I wrote a letter from my 80-year-old self to my current, newcomer self.
Dear newcomer-self, You have embarked on the most challenging and most rewarding journey of your life. In the past few months, I know it must feel like everything has changed - and not all of those changes feel positive right now. I am here to tell you that you are worth all the work you are putting in for yourself right now. As your mind clears from the hazy years of addiction, you have begun to realize that all those times you used substances to numb only paused those bad feelings for the time being. Now, as you have been sober and the negative emotions flood in, take time to remind yourself that as you numbed those bad feelings, you numbed a lot of good ones too - and those will come with time. The past several years, your self-esteem has plummeted. As your addiction progressed and you felt yourself losing power over your actions, you forgot all of the qualities that make you who you are. I know that in these early months of recovery, you have felt more lost than you did while you were using. Your use gave you the illusion of an identity. Stripped of that illusion, I know you feel naked and vulnerable and deeply unsure of who you are. But let me tell you, you are beginning to find yourself in the rooms of AA. You have found a voice and the courage to use that voice. You have begun to be someone who lives the program and practices openness, willingness and rigorous honesty on a daily basis. Above all, you have found hope in these rooms. A feeling you have never felt before. Hope was your nemesis for many years - an elusive and intangible feeling that felt impossible to attain. I am here to assure you that as you continue on this path of recovery, hope will become a familiar friend. Although the future is a massive stressor for you right now, let me reassure you that things do get better. In early recovery you are rebuilding all aspects of your life and many aspects of who you are. Let me validate your experience: early recovery is terrifying in many ways. As your sponsor so often tells you, ‘everyone would do it if it were easy.’ But it is not easy and that is what makes sobriety such a gift. Sobriety is something you chose each and every day, sometimes every hour or every minute and that is why it is so crucial you continue to remind yourself that the hard work pays off. Not in the ways you may imagine, though. You will not wake up one day and think, ‘I made it!’ Life does not work that way and neither does sobriety. Rather, as you continue to put in the work, you will see, little by little, the promises ring true in your life. As you go through life, remind yourself of those promises, of the glimmering, magical quality they hold for you in these early days. The way you cannot help but smile every time you read them. The promises spark in you that feeling of hope that you have longed for these past several years. Just remind yourself of the way the promises begin: ‘If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are halfway through.’ The early months of recovery are ‘a phase in my development.’ These months must be painstaking. They must be completed with great care and thoroughness because these months are delicate and fragile. As you grow in your recovery and gain more sober days under your belt, never forget the great effort these early days require. Because, as you have learned in the meetings, relapse is always lurking, always there to sneak back in when you least expect it. Before you know it, you could be thrown right back into this early phase in development. That is why your sponsor always tells you, ‘every single word in the big book is chosen for a reason.’ Applying that to the promises means that they will appear ‘if we are painstaking.’ That is what you will continue to work toward: an early phase filled with thoroughness and dedication. Only then will the promises begin to ring true before you are halfway through, As you grow out of this phase in your development, remember to remind yourself each day what it was like. Humble yourself with the reminder of the rock bottom you grew from. Keep going to meetings because that is the only place where you can shine light into these dark corners of your disease. Without meetings, it will be all too easy and seemingly natural to forget about this painstaking phase. As soon as those memories slip away, the promises will gradually be replaced by substances. That is how addiction creeps back in. It is when you least expect it that you will find a drink back in your hand. In these first few months of recovery you have learned the self-compassion and dedication it takes to put one foot in front of the other and keep walking even through the seemingly impossible. You have not mastered that skill, but practice makes progress, not perfection. You are a newcomer, and that means you have the power to remind every person who hears you speak, where they came from and what they have to be proud of. Everyone in this program, whether it was today or 30 years ago, celebrated their first 24 hours and those hours are time we must always cherish and never forget. Bring humility to yourself and others by being brave enough to continue to tell the narrative of this tumultuous early phase. Remember these words I am telling you now: you are giving yourself the gift of life, and beyond that, a life full of painstaking yet rewarding growth, humility, honesty and self-love. I thank you each day for granting me the gift of the AA promises. They may not be true for you yet, but take it from me, your 80-year-old self, they will come true. It will be worth it. Thank you, newcomer-self. I love you. Love, Your 80-year-old self