HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL

No one dreams of becoming a heroin addict when they are a child. I certainly didn’t. I wanted to be a Ghostbuster or Indiana Jones. I didn’t grow up in a home that would likely produce a heroin addict. My parents have been married for 40 years, I wasn’t abused, I always had a roof over my head, and I was and still am loved by my family. Certainly, we weren’t a perfect family. Like most, upon reflection and close examination, this fact is abundantly clear.

Was I genetically predisposed? Was I to pay a price for the sins of my father? Was it fate, karma, or something else? I thought about these questions for many years. Now, 39 days from 8 years of sobriety I rarely do, and this is one of the many impacts addiction had on my life.

I’m lucky to be alive. When you do heroin for long enough, the fear of death becomes a dull noise in the background of chaos. Now, from the outside looking in, I see how truly nefarious addiction is. Slowly or rapidly, the monkey on your back whispers in your ear as you march yourself to execution. What other affliction does this? It is from this perspective I can now see how precious life is.

What level of pain causes someone to become their own gleeful executioner? Be the trauma real or imagined, the results of escape via substance abuse are absolutely real. Further, the self-inflicted harm, like interest, compounds over time. “Jail, institutions, and death.” I know the pain that causes this. I’ve seen the rain bounce off the same square of concrete I was sleeping on. I’ve watched my family despair over their son’s whereabouts, well-being, and sanity. They watched me slowly attempt killing myself before their very eyes. To this day, eight years later, I still feel the pain of regret from my behavior. The pain is no longer crippling self-loathing. No, today it is a gentle angst that humbles me and reminds me of what exactly I have been saved from.

Perspective is a powerful tool. Like all tools, it can be used for good, or it can be used for abominable evil. The second greatest gift my addiction gave me is perspective. When you’ve been trapped in the darkest dungeons of evil, hopelessness, and despair, your perspective changes. Especially, when your situation is your own fault. This makes being a victim the parallel addiction. An excuse. If nothing is your fault, your genetics are bad, and the world is against you, you will never have to change. It is here where bitterness infects the blood and sickens its host. It corrupts, rots, and steals life. Over time perspective is warped so badly that the world is no longer recognizable, and neither are you.

When this perspective is flipped. Lives are changed and they are saved. This is where redemption is found. This is where we find forgiveness, love, kindness, and humility. It is from a renewed perspective that we can discover the antidote to victimhood, bitterness, and suffering. The antidote is gratitude.

When I first went to treatment for the last time, I often wondered where I would marshal the resources to change. How could I possibly be healed? After all, I truly believed I was born this way and had resigned to my imminent destiny.

This is where addiction truly touched my life in a way I still can’t really describe. This is the reason I found God. I really wanted nothing to do with God. Afterall, my superior intellect and spry mastery of the world had gotten my jailed, homeless, and addicted to heroin. There’s a nice quote, I don’t know who said it: “From the human heart hope springs eternal,” that’s the gist anyway. It’s a lovely sentiment, but it’s false. My human heart utterly lacked the resources, will, motivation, and perspective for hope. It was only when I surrendered my life to God that hope emerged and resides with me fully to this day. It is from this transcendent resource that a miracle happened in my life.

I have been sober nearly eight years and I give all credit and glory to God. That statement alone is the greatest gift I have ever been given. It is from the well of the eternal Himself that hope sprung and it is from that very well I drink from daily.