Good Morning, you Beautiful People!
It is Saturday, and it is officially a Lazy Day for me. Instead of going to my Face-to-Face meeting today, I went to my AA Zoom meeting, because there was going to be a Group Conscience meeting after. If you aren't familiar with AA, that's basically an administrative meeting. One of the subjects on the table was whether or not the group wanted to encourage profile pictures that are actual photos of the members, and what, if anything, should be done to encourage people to keep their cameras on. I felt pretty strongly about this, so I thought it best to share my opinion. While I usually do the meetings with the camera on and I love to see the faces of my AA buddies, I'm very much against the idea that one should feel forced to keep the camera on. One of the reasons why that particular group works so well is because it has always been pretty chill about that. Also, while I don't use it here, my profile picture there is my Stick-Figure-Me icon, which I use ALL OVER the internet. My account here is different, because I accidentally got stuck with a random name I was given (it happened when I was logging in through Google, and somewhere along the way I accidentally accepted it as permament...just so you know, Real_Park would mean absolute zilch to me, if it weren't how you folks know me). I wasn't sure if I was going to stay around at first, so I picked Harry from Sesame Street because I think he just doesn't get enough love.
Back to my point -- with AA, people should get to be anonymous. And online anonymity is fragile. Let people who are reaching out feel safe. As they get comfortable, they can start sharing more, and then, maybe one day, they will just start sharing and never know when to shut up. [Some of my AA shares are similar to my SMART Recovery Check-ins...I just start freeform rambling in the middle of things, because I also see AA and SMART as places where I don't have to mask my ADHD.] I wouldn't feel secure enough to be me if I felt obligated to leave my camera on, just as I am accustomed to my icons, both Stick-Figure-Me...and now, Harry -- he's really grown on me.
I originally wanted to also go to my AA Face-to-Face meeting, because a friend is celebrating their 7-month anniversary, but I am out of social energy. So I'll send her a text later today.
I am feeling strong in my sobriety, comfortable in my eating habits, and working with those new spending habits. I also feel lazy and look forward to taking a nap in about an hour.
I hope you find some sort of beautiful surprise today (it can be as small as a buttercup, or as majestic as a hawk flying above you), and as always, thank you for being here.