Presence on Day 235

Dear Readers,
Last Friday, I went with some women from my AA group to conduct a meeting in a treatment center. It was a small meeting, a total of about ten or so.

We read a story from the AA Big Book, and then shared our thoughts about the reading. 
When it came to my turn, I ended up telling a little bit of my story and how I ended up where I had.
At first I wondered if anyone would connect to my story, and then I thought, it's not about how we are different.
It's how we are alike in our human condition. When I listened to all the women, I heard our hopes, fears, happiness, and sadness. We all started out as vulnerable little children, many of us with hard childhoods. Some of us came from rich families, others were poor. Some of us had children, boyfriends, husbands, others not.

If I only look at other addicts as how they are different compared to me, I am setting up a judgement, a dividing line, that I am better or worse than they are for one reason or another.
All of us are human, and being humans we struggle.
Being humans, we make mistakes. 

Perhaps one thing I said helped someone.
I don't know.
I do know I was helped.
I was helped by seeing all I needed to do was be present, share and listen.
I didn't need to be anything more or less than human.