Quoc’s Web Journal

11,638

So, I didn’t quite know what to title my blog entry today…  I have three that I would like to write about… However, I am so tight on time, it doesn’t permit me to sit at peace or be conscious enough to write my stream of thought:

1) AA works for me because I am sicker than you are <– Powerful quote I heard in a meeting!!!

2) I-YAAAAH!! <— in response to when I am acting selfishly and in the “I.”  I must remember to follow it up with the chinese expression when one is displeased… YAAH!!!  The complete phrase… I-YAAAAH!!

3) SOBRIETY, SERENITY, SERVICE & BALANCE! <— this is an addition to my daily prayers to ask for my daily decisions be based on:

  a) What will help me stay sober?

  b) What will bring me serenity?!

  c) Make decisions when others are involved based on how I can enhance and contribute to your life and get to be of service to you…  Not based on self and fears and need to manipulate or obsess about a situation so that I get “what I need.”  This applies for work, friendships, romance and family!

  d) Am I finding balance in my life matching living the amazing life I have been blessed with because I have worked hard to maintain my sobriety and now graced with a full life?!?!

4) NEED YOUR ADVICE ON DATING!

So, considering there is limited time; I am gonna do a quick blip and ask your advice on dating… 

First, I need to acknowledge there is still yet work to do in building my self esteem as some guy that I didn’t really know apparently knew of me and has had a “crush” on my for years!  He followed up with using terms like “adorable” and “gorgeous” to describe me.  I found it difficult to accept those and receive it gracefully… As if I get a vote in influencing whether your likes or dislikes are the right one!  hehee

This only happened in the past day…  So, we got to chatting on facebook and via text message…  The ensuing messages were that he would like to “get to know me better” and “asked me out to dinner.”  OH MY STARS!  Did I just get asked out on a date?!?!  Then this guy followed up with sharing with me the type of guy he is…  “nerdy; one man kind of guy; and hopeless romantic” Um…  Has he been reading my blog or done some reconnaissance on me and figured out the very things that literally make me melt like BUTTAH?!  All the meanwhile, he is texting me that he is playing basketball with his nephew or reading a book with his niece; all the meanwhile, taking time off to be with his mother who is undergoing chemotherapy for her cancer!

WHOO HOO!!!  BRING IN THE U-HAUL AND MOVE ME IN!!!  LOL… So, that was the initial impulse… Thankfully I came to my senses and got out of my alcoholic induced impulsive fantasy and came back down to earth and now get to be mature, balanced, NOT overbearing and needy and obsessive, and smothering, not to mention insecure!!!

OK! OK!!  He’s set to come back into town on April 10th…  SO I NEED YOUR ADVICE AND YOUR EXPERIENCES ON HOW TO PROCEED…  Here are my questions and concerns that I need to bounce off ya!

1) When should I share that I have just over 8 months clean and sober?  I know there are some people who get weirded out by some rule that one shouldn’t be dating in their first year of sobriety.  I have prayed about it and talked it over with my sponsor and making very very consciencious decisions!  Do I wait for the dinner date to disclose or do I tell him before we go on a date? 

Reasons to tell him before the date?  So, he doesn’t feel badly that he may be taking advantage of a newly sober man who is shaking at the knees…  Don’t think this is necessarily my case…  But should I extend him the courtesy of getting to make that decision?

2) When should I disclose my HIV positive status to him?  It’s funny this comes up as I just spent two full hours last week in a meeting with a few strangers who asked me about all the nuances about living life as an HIV positive man…  I am part of a Community Advisory Board that is building an interactive on-line website for HIV positive men providing them with tools of successful living!

Didn’t realize I hopped off midthought…  Will finish it later…

To be continued…

11,500

Wow… I am so darn curious about who y’all are that are visiting!!!  Did you know that in just about 3 weeks, over 400 folks have visited this website???  Post a comment folks… I am dying to know who y’all are!!!

Suffice it to say, I am sure you have a lot of content to read and probably know me pretty intimately if you’ve been keeping up and reading my blog regularly…  Here is another plug as it’s been quite a few weeks for me!!!

I got to visit Casa De Maria (a community center) in Santa Barbara for the Men’s Retreat the weekend of March 13 – March 15.  I so desperately needed that respite!  I needed to get away from everything that was about home, work, chaos from everything down in the City…  I got to do just that and enjoyed nourishment on so many different levels: delicious buffet style food served all weekend long; wonderful fellowship with most of the guys I got to see the year before at Mt. Calvary; opportunity to meet new friends who are new or returning back to the retreat from a break in the past years; opportunity to enjoy peace and quiet without technology, distractions of television and just the mundanes of chores; enjoyed wonderful mini hike with some of the guys and just breathed in deliciously wonderful fresh air… Lastly, I got to meditate, pray, write a letter to Mom & Dad and receive a letter back in meditation and just sit in peace and quiet… I got to connect with a great new friend who was my roomate for the weekend.  These are some of the highlights…

Then I got to take my Lesbian Mom out to yummy brunch the weekend before… She was celebrating a birthday!  Mind you her birthday falls on a leap year.  It was wonderful getting to spend it with my Lesbian Moms!!!  Happy Birthday Denise and thanks for joining in the brunch festivities Ann Marie!

This immediate past weekend, upon taking my car down for the remainder of repairs to make my car all nice and pretty running and looking, I got to visit with my Sis Chin and my brother in law Micol.  They happen to plan a hiking trip with their friend Craig and his girlfriend Andrea.  All of us had a definite unexpected wonderful treat hiking in the La Crescenta Mountains… I was a passenger, so I wasn’t paying attention where we were going, but I remember driving past Mt. Wilson and driving just past “CLOUD BURST SUMMIT.”  What a spectacular name for a summit… This past weekend was gloomy and chilly.  We drove way above the clouds!!!  We had sunshine…  At the place where we stopped, we were greeted with a fairly nice layer of snow!!!  What fun!!!!

We couldn’t see much of the trail, and as a matter of fact, hadn’t even gotten to the trail yet…  We were literally walking through the drive way for cars to get to the parking lot where the trail started.  We parked along the side of the road, then walked the driveway about 1 – 2 miles through the snow…  We paused to play in the snow, then had a yummy lunch of sandwiches in the woods at picnic tables, then some more hiking to look at the mini waterfalls and streams created by the melting snow…  On our way back to the car, all parties had an opportunity to get their butts super wet from sliding down the snow covered hillside!!!  LOTS OF FUN!!!  FRESH AIR!!!  FAMILY AND FRIENDS!

Drove back down the mountain and got to enjoy a supper at Sam Woo with my sis and brother in law after picking up my car…  I don’t think my car has ever looked or driven this nicely and new since I bought it brand new in December 2000!  Good stuff!!!  Well, I guess I better be driving a really nice ride considering the thousands of dollars I have spent  on car repairs in the past couple months.  I drive with extreme peace of mind… The car even received a very thorough detail job interior and exterior; they even cleaned the engine of my car!!!  Everything under the hood looks brand new, shiny and slick!  awesome!!!!

These past weeks at work have been incredibly challenging… I had applied to another company earlier in the month and have successfully completed the full two tier interview process.  I feel very confident about both interviews.  It’s cool when one is seeking employment while employed; I don’t worry about whether I get the job offer or not.  As a matter of fact, right now I have been praying consistently to God to help me base my decisions off the following premise: where can I be of SERVICE; what will yield the most SERENITY; and finally is my decision based on prioritizing my SOBRIETY!  The rest should take care of itself.  Sure it would be nice to make lots of money; however, I am very clear that I want to continue working at a job that I enoy doing and look forward to going to!  I can’t say my current job is that bad.  I love my job.  I am just having a hard time with the people I am working with… Oh my are they working some of my last nerves!

These are only some freewrites before I go to sleep…  Just this past evening, I took a moment to reflect… FOR THOSE WHO DON’T KNOW.. THESE PAST COUPLE WEEKS MARK THE ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF MY LAST RELAPSE… The relapse lasted for over 4 months… I believe it was March 9 or 10th 2008 when I relapsed… I kept coming in and out creating more and more insanity with the relapses…  The one constant I had was the love of the fellowship and my friends and family!!!!

I couldn’t be more grateful that I stopped and affirmed my new and hopefully last sobriety date is JULY 21, 2008!  Yes, that means I have reached at least 8 months clean and sober in the past week!  Yayee!!!!  I have been able to find balance with my life on every level… Work, family, personal, play, sex, and recovery at the top of the list… All this revolving my priority of staying clean and sober first and foremost and allowing the rest to fall in place and finding balance with the incredibly full life I have.

Just in the past week I get to keep practicing affirmations of telling myself:

1) The guy I have been having no strings sex with… The reason why he hasn’t replied or suggested hooking up lately doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with me… It’s just the nature of whatever our arrangement was no longer works… Doesn’t mean I don’t work…

2) I had an argument with my best friend… He lashed out pretty harshly and used some very blaming harsh words and took it to the extreme of abandonment of this friendship over some simple argument.  I get to remember that I am not responsible for making sure I am in a position for everyone to like me.  I get to maintain integrity and stay on my side of the street!  Own my faults and move forward.

3) Newcomers are like buoys for me… They are the life blood that helps me stay sober one day at a time.  I get to reach out and be of service to these people.  They carry a message of how it doesn’t work out there and model courage and surrender and humility in asking for help.  In getting to be of service, I get to feel good about myself and pay forward the debt that I owe to those who have helped me.

4) I got to find lots of balance with my life… with incorporating a fun-filled and rich life incorporated with recovery as a priority!  Having a good understanding that too much of a good thing or too many good things can lead to just clutter and end up being useless stuff for me…  What am I doing to maintain and open up space for new gifts and experiences into my life and my home? 

5) Completed 6th step and now working on 7th step and actively working on removing my defects of character.  Good stuff!!!

I have to go to sleep now as I have a training tomorrow and Wednesday…  I sleepy!!!  Until soon, I have lots of pictures to share with you all!!!

Love you!!!

Quoc

11,042

It’s terribly important for me to blog tonight to remember how I am able to get some relief from my bad attitude or what I’d like to coin it “baditude” as a result of staying sober one more day and see and hear the miracle come true with solution!!!  As you folks have been reading, my life has been riddled with challenges as of late…  Challenges that I don’t quite know how to handle…  I have experienced a lot of angst, anxiety, anger, resentment and feel placed in the position of a victim…  I have responded with vengeful, vindictive, arrogant, and judgemental thoughts of those I feel are perpetrators!

Thankfully, I have been able to share and share and share about it and get out of self by reaching out and being of service to others by just calling them!  Well, tonight, I took time to call a couple very important people…  The first one was my sponsor to check in with him as I haven’t spoken with him on the phone for quite a spell!  I got to catch him all up with the drama of my life what with J***, my boss at work, and Sean contacting me…  Argh…  I heard extend love and tolerance without compromising healthy boundaries and enabling others and co-signing their insane behavior…  I felt so much better having checked in with him.

I made a phone call to my last sponsor just to say hello to him and send him love.  I did just that and asked him how he was doing and how work is going and life in general…  Of course my last sponsor with all his wisdom shared some very very powerful experiences and framed it in such a way that I was able to apply it and see the similarities within the scope of my life and how I can take his solution and graft it onto the resentful, angry and hurt wounds on me…

Here is a summary of what he shared that literally transformed me from baditude to GRATITUDE deep to the core!  He just started sharing about how work is going and how the place that “hired” him had totally taken advantage of him and played him…  As he shared, I became angry for him and was baffled at how calm he was about the situation.  I asked him how he was able to remain so calm considering what they did to him.

He eloquently framed that they didn’t do anything to him; rather they did something to really lose the skills and services of an incredible person!  That what their actions are really none of his business.  WOW!!!  I was still baffled and answered honestly about hearing his serenity but not quite understanding that he was in every right to feel angry and resentful.

He shared that about the very traditions of the program of recovery… One of which is that our primary purpose is to stay sober and to carry the message and be of service!  He followed by imparting the tradition that this is a program of attraction, not promotion…  With that being said, he imparted with me how attractive would it have been for him to act out and be immature, vengeful, unforgiving and merciless to them.  It not only removes one personal serenity, but it further aggravates the situation rather than trust that these sorts of actions by other parties that are not spiritually fit will eventually catch up with them.  It’s not our hook they need be concerned with being let off of; it truly is understanding it’s getting let off God’s hook based on their actions depending on how selfish and harming they were!

He shared an anecdote with me that left me watery eyed with emotion to drive yet another moral to this story and provides me with more solution and serenity with my current dilemma… He shared about hearing a speaker earlier in the week who once had over a couple decades sober and relapsed and had come back clean and sober a few years again.  This person with a few years sober shared about how proud he was of his teenage son coming into recovery and having just a few months clean and sober and pulling his life together and going into college and just really making the father proud…  A few days later, his son was in a car accident where he was hit by another car head on!  The son was rushed to the hospital where he may die or worse yet experience brain damage if not needing to go through extensive physical rehabilitation and may not ever be fully recovered.  His son had everything going for him and just out of the blue, some horrific event like this happened out of nowhere!

The moral of the story is to be mindful of how fragile and short life is and can be.  Knowing this TRUTH, am I mindful of how I spend my time…  Am I spending my hours and days obsessing over the troubles that others like my boss or J*** create and cause in harming themselves?  Sure, I have been impacted and I have no control over that.  What I do have control over is how much time I am willing to let it reside with me mentally and emotionally.  In spending my time obsessing about the problem and negativity, I am dishonoring yet another important tool that the big book of AA imparts on page 96… That the hours I squander on negativity and on people that I cannot help or will not accept my help, I may miss out on a precious opportunity to help and be of service to someone who is desperately ready, eagerly willing and urgently ready to receive the first aid I have to offer…  By the way, this person may be just right in front of me or right under my nose and I may not realize or notice them and overlook them because I am unwilling to let go of my powerlessness over changing people, places and their self manifested misery and problems!!!  I don’t need to wallow in the misery of others when I have done the work to clean up my side of the street and maintain a clean street!

I get to see pray for their best interest and continue to show up and be of service to those who are open to receiving the service and love I have to offer.  I get to let go of those who continue to harbor negativity and act on unhealthy and spiritually poisonous intentions!  It’s possible to co-exist with others who are unhealthy and not allow their negativity to be my negativity!!!  It’s not mine to have unless I allow it in and invite it in.  I don’t get to be meanspirited, vengeful and hateful and arrogant and feel better than because I work a spiritual program that demonstrates gratitude for the serenity that I have been graced with.

I get to demonstrate my respect for the disease of alcoholism and gratitude for such a powerful support group by doing the following:

- suiting up and showing up and being of service to those who want it!

- going to meetings daily (work & health permitting)

- doing stepwork

- praying and asking for God’s help, then relax and let God handle the results… I get to continue doing the work

- NOT DWELLING ON ISSUES THAT need not my attention!!!  A lot of the times, the problem goes away if I just don’t pay it any attention.  I don’t have to force it out or away as by forcing it, I am creating stronger roots for the problem to dig deeper into my mind!  In order to let it go, I must surrender it up to God!

- reaching out and asking for help and sharing honestly about what is going on; immediately followed by strenuous, constant and painstaking effort in reaching out to others and being of service!

- staying sober just for today and not worry about whether I will tomorrow…  What I get is today, right now…  What I get to worry about it today and right now and what I am doing right now to stay serene and sober!

My last sponsor concluded after I shared that by this job not coming through means that something better must be in store for him… His response… OR NOT!  He is accepting of the possibility that this was just a crappy situation he went through because other people are spiritually sick and him being impacted had nothing to do with him inviting it in.. He just happen to be caught up in the wake of it… He can continue swimming and fighting the wake, or just let it pass and remember that his primary purpose is to stay sober and to carry the message of love, tolerance, compassion, mercy, patience and utter service to others!  I get to practice modeling a program of attraction rather than one of promotion and trying to control and force others how to act or make decisions on.  Lastly, regardless of how the others person is acting, IT’S THEIR BUSINESS and when I choose to partake in it to any degree, I am being MEDDLESOME!!!

I get to butt out and stayon my side of the street!!!  So, in this given moment and with the understanding that life in incredibly short and fragile, where am I placing my attention and focus on?  The problems and woes and trials and tribulations of my life?  Or am I focusing the lions share on gratitude, optimism, a spirit of curiosity openness to new experiences and how wonderful this is a learning experience and opportunity TO DEMONSTRATE GOD’S GREATNESS IN WALKING THROUGH TROUBLING TIMES WITH COURAGE AND FAITH!

Cheers,

Quoc

PS – In my daily interactions with others, am I asking myself what do I stand to get and take from this person place or situation or am I asking HOW CAN I BE OF SERVICE, GIVE AND CONTRIBUTE TO THIS PERSON, PLACE OR SITUATION?  Each decision will determine the level of sobriety I currently stand in… Understanding that I cannot strive and outgrow being “human.”  I get to extend to myself that which I so generously extend to others!

Here is a picture story of my road trip to San Francisco the weekend of February 27 – 29…  It was a whirlwind trip to celebrate a dear friend’s 60th natal birthday party as well as an opportunity escape the craziness that has been going on in my life in the past weeks…  I am thankful to have my easy going baby Sister Judy to join me for  the trip…

As time doesn’t permit me to share about all the happenings over the weekend, I would like to impart with you some highlights on my trip out to San Francisco: Union Square as a mecca for shopping especially for shoes; Haight Ashbury as a fun place for those who really wanna relax at 420; an opportunity to enjoy the historical landmark at the Trocadero Sigmund Stern Grove Clubhouse amidst a forest of some mighty old and giant redwood trees; a brief trip through the San Francisco Golden Gate Bridge ($6.00 toll fee); finally the Oakland Bay Bridge ($4.00 toll fee).

ENJOY THE PICTURES AND THE MEMORIES THAT I GOT TO SHARE WITH MY SISTER, MY FRIENDS NEW AND OLD…  YOU MAY CLICK ON THE PICTURES TO SEE THE FULLY EXPANDED VERSION…

(TAKE NOTE THAT I HAVE NOT INCLUDED CAPTIONS/DESCRIPTIONS FOR EACH OF THESE PICTURES YET… I WILL DO IT THE FIRST OPPORTUNITY I HAVE FREE TIME… FOR NOW, ENJOY THE PICTURES AND USE YOUR IMAGINATION!)

11,001

Before I start to blog about my San Francisco trip over the weekend, it’s important for me to acknowledge what all has been going on in the past few weeks…  The clarity for me or rather lack of clarity for me is learning how to interact with other people who act alcoholically… Meaning people who act selfishly, inconsiderately and in a fashion that is harming and not helping…

It’s all come to a head in the past few days as I reflect back…  It’s been manifesting itself in the following categories:

1) Work… I struggle to reconcile between extending love and compassion to someone I consider my best friend who happens to be my boss as well; the challenge is that she is a terrible boss!!!  She doesn’t know her head from her *ss when it comes to managing and logistics and taking care of the minute details of business!!!  I have been maintaining a professional relationship as she has placed great strain on my life and my emotional, mental and physical health by her lack of ability to lead and manage!!!  It’s very very sad!

2) Romance… I struggled for a moment trying to restrain myself from replying back to “Sean” who sent me a message via facebook to let me know how he is doing and follow up with informing me as to whether he “wants to” or “can” contact me…  It was a very very rude message!!!  As much as I wanted to focus on the little parts that were positive and as desperate as I was to fall all googly eyed over this guy I want to be with so bad, but know I CANNOT BE WITH THIS PERSON because it is indeed the last thing I need…  It’s been hard not to reply to him and NOT think about him and want to be in touch with him and touch him, hug him, kiss him, make out with him, make nice with him and make it all go away…

3) Friendship…  I struggle with not knowing how to proceed with someone I considered a friend and tried to help and ended up enabling him to the point of him taking advantage of me and stole from me.  I know how I need to be in support of him and his sobriety… Since he stole from me, it is very very clear that I cannot do any more for him than to maintain my distance and to pray for his sobriety and that he finds peace within his life…  I spent over 4 months with him staying in my home and I was lead to believe that we were the closest of friends.  I valued him as one of my closest friends and let him into my home and allowed him to see the most vulnerable parts of me.  I don’t know how to proceed if/when I see him in a meeting… Do I greet him or not?  How do I ask for my money back?  Money he probably doesn’t have.  Sigh…

There have been many of these paradoxes with my life… Or counterpoints in my life… I can’t quite put a finger on what I am going through.  What I DO KNOW IS THAT THIS IS CERTAINLY NOT A FUN EXPERIENCE!!!  I have heard the following thing which is helpful…

- Acceptance doesn’t mean I have to like it; I get to accept the fact that I cannot control what has gone on…  Sometimes bad things happen to good people.

- Acceptance is letting go of control!  Knowing that there is a God and understanding that God is NOT ME.

- I feel like I have been standing on my pink cloud and still remain on there these past 7 1/2 months!!!  The challenge is trying to keep others from blowing their charcoal and smog filled smoke in my direction and polluting the air around the pink cloud I stand on!

- Remembering that when it comes to my work or any other thing I want to control, The President of the World is not named OQUOCMA… IT’S OBAMA!!!  Until I get to be President, I don’t get to make decisions for others.  I get to be a worker among workers and show up for the work I get to do!

I still sit here tonight completely baffled by the decision that was made by management with regards to my Manager who had a complete meltdown and snapped at everyone and verbally abused them and was completely inappropriate!!!  How many more opportunities will be extended?  I just don’t understand it.  The bottom line is that it is not in my job description to understand it.  What I get to do is show up and do the work to the best of my ability and be a good employee…

Sigh…  I need to join Alanon… I clearly have multiple qualifiers that I may use in working my program to love others and still be able to detach and remember that loving others and being generous with others doesn’t mean I get to be a doormat.

I AM NO ONE’S DOORMAT!

Quoc