The Moment

After years of drinking alcoholically I experienced a car crash that created for me a moment. This was on July 3rd, 1977.

I was returning home after a ‘liquid lunch’ and my car hit a lamp post, shot up in the air and crashed in the middle of a quiet road in East Grinstead, Sussex England. It was reported to me later that two ladies, in a nearby garden, saw the incident and remarked “There goes Father Leo!”

The crash created a moment. It was as if I had stepped outside of myself and was looking at me; an out-of-body experience. And I did not like what I saw. I did not like who I had become. This is not the way I wanted to live. I had a moment of sanity!

When I have shared this story at recovery meetings a lot of people have come over to me and said that they could identify; each having their own special moment.

• For some it was waking up in a police cell, not knowing what had happened, and yet knowing in their soul they were not criminals...only sick people.
• Parents have shared how their children, after years of suffering in the alcoholic home, told them they did not want a relationship; they’d had enough.
• A friend told me that his moment came when he caught himself screaming in a black out at his elderly parents, and tears were streaming down their faces.
• A husband remembered beating the wife he had loved for years...the bruises and broken bones could no longer be denied.

Moments. I believe the beginning of the spiritual journey to recovery begins with a moment...followed by many more moments in the years of healing.

Later in this article I shall give a relatively brief explanation of the Twelve Steps; they are all interconnected with the moment.

What is the moment?

When you see, clearly, that your powerlessness and unmanageability can no longer be denied. When you realize that you are no longer a ‘heavy drinker’ but you have crossed the line into alcoholism. The moment is that God-shot that surely moves you from ignorance or denial...into reality. However, having a moment is no guarantee that a person will remain sober. Tragically many people who have had a moment, or many moments, continue to drink. The miracle comes when we realize the need to keep the moment alive; we realize the need to remember. And this is the miracle of Alcoholics Anonymous.

It is a fellowship of remembrance. And the storyline is always the same; what it was like, what happened and what it is like now. Each meeting has the same foundation and the moment revolves around what happened! In my years of recovery I’ve had many subsequent moments.

• I knew the time had come for me to leave England and come live in the United States.
• I was actually aware of the fact that spirituality and religion were not the same.
• Some years later it was clear that I needed to write a book about my thoughts...Spirituality and Recovery.
• I needed to continue the journey of many oaths to God, experiencing the spiritual gift of variety and diversity.

And so many other moments that are too numerous to write down here; always the moments lead to a change in behavior or attitude; always my new compass was spirituality