by Rev. Leo Booth

Many people refer to the month of February as the “love month”. This is because sweethearts across the western world keep February 14th as Valentine’s Day…named after the Christian Valentine who loved Jesus.

I think it is good to have a “love month” as long as we don’t set aside those caring and giving feelings the rest of the year. But more importantly what, if anything, has Valentine’s Day got to do with recovery? How does this “love month” fit in with sobriety?
At different times I’ve suggested that we need to be willing to be “poetic” in our recovery, seeing beyond the word into the story or feeling. Remember Rudolf? Well, this is also true for Valentines Day.

I’m suggesting that Valentine’s Day becomes a template for Love. And not just a love of another person. It has been my view for many years that you cannot really love another person until you have a real and genuine love of self. Otherwise we can so easily get into co-dependency issues.

Also I believe that God’s love is important because we are able to reflect what we first received. The struggle for sobriety is really the struggle for understanding life. This is not just a question for the alcoholic; it is indeed a question for everyone. But because of the created powerlessness and unmanageability in the alcoholic life it is particularly important in our steps to recovery and healing.
Love God: Love ourselves: Love others. As you will see in this article, the order is not so fixed…but we eventually get there.

When I hear a drunk’s story I never hear about love. “What it was like” is usually a gradual awareness of a very sad life. The words we hear are usually despair, prison, violence, blood, divorce, hospital, black-out, vomit, fear, rage…I’m not hearing love! Indeed, I’ve often said that the disease of alcoholism is really about the decline into becoming a negative and destructive person. The alcoholic carries shame for a reason; we earn it! When I hear stories at recovery meetings, and I’ve heard thousands over the years, it is not unusual to see tears and contorted faces that remind me of an audience watching a horror movie. Aah.

Here in my article it’s not so much about “what it was like” but it’s about “what it is like now”. We have moved from being incapable of love, and depending upon the level of co-dependency in our family and friends…to being caring, reliable, responsible, generous and (yes), loveable human beings. Recovery is about love; recovery (poetically speaking) is about every day being Valentine’s Day.

No recovering person can speak for everyone but it has been my experience that sobriety brings (firstly) a love of others. Our first love in AA is usually the recognition of the undeniable kindness of other people. People begin to talk to us; offer a ride to a meeting; are willing to sponsor; they share something of their true nature; they help to make us love again. Our first love is the kindness of other people.

Our next love is probably finding a God or Higher Power. Now anybody who has been reading my columns in the newspaper know that I’m not stressing religion but spirituality. Our God in recovery may not be Christian, or male or biblical…but slowly emerges a God or Higher Power who is loving, accepting and forgiving. Having had a “spiritual awakening” we realize that we are not alone in this Universe. And just like our recovery will grow, just like our sobriety is an on-going journey with peaks and valleys, so is our understanding of God or Higher Power. But most of us find a God who we can love and, more importantly, who loves us.

The last love, and this has only been my experience, is a love of self. With all the shame and guilt that inevitably comes along with the disease of alcoholism, it is hard for us to love ourselves. Certainly that was true for me.
And then it happened. In my recovery my personal “divinity” was revealed and I suddenly discovered my relationship to everything; to you, God, the universe…everything. I had found me.

Poetically I had been the prodigal son, the complaining brother and (yes) the loving and accepting father. Real love was revealed in my recovery!

So I say, on a daily basis, to my recovering family: Be My Valentine.

Reverend Leo Booth is a Unity minister, a published author and conference speaker. He is the Spiritual Advisor to Sante Center for Healing in Argyle, TX. For more information, please visit his website: www.fatherleo.com. Email him at fatherleo@fatherleo.com.