I was doing my step study lesson for today which is all about being ready to give your inventory to 3 people.  The first two of the three are the same for everyone:  God and yourself.  The third person is the focus and that is the individual each person chooses to share their story with.  A question that accompanies this lesson is:  what fear/s do you face about sharing your inventory?  I’ve given my inventory many times over the past 9 years.  Each time you do a step study you need to do this and I’ve done it at least 7 of the 10 times.  As I was looking at my past responses to this question I noticed that I’d put:  “I’d confess and I’d still struggle with the same problem.”  This has been true for the first few years of my recovery in Celebrate Recovery.  I was trying to deal with a habit in those early times rather than dealing with the intense hurt I was still denying existed.  This denial only fed the habit I was trying to rid myself of.

Today when I addressed the question I realized the healing I’ve always desired is now here.  I’m free to face the hurt and it doesn’t own me.  The one thing that I still struggle with is the temptation to continue the habit.  Addressing the hurts doesn’t remove the human element we all face–temptations.  It seems simple, but it sure isn’t simple. As long as I stayed crippled with the hurt in me I was unable to access the strength God so wanted to provide.  Now that God has healed so much of the hurt I can see the habit/s for what they are and how I can use God’s Strength to address them.  I’m still human in this arena as I suppose we all are, but it is a big boost to know that God has been working throughout these 9 years facing recovery.  He is our Magnificent God.  I will trust Him and I encourage you to do the same.