MAKING THE CONNECTION

INSIDE THE PINK CLOUD

    BY   Dana DeDolph, MA LPC 

            (WARNING: DO NOT READ IF YOU BELIEVE IN THE CONCEPT OF “NORMIES” WHICH MEANS  YOU BELIEVE ALCOHOLICS AND ADDICTS ARE A DIFFERENT SPECIES FROM HUMANS WITH OTHER ISSUES and therefore beyond understanding).

 If you look in the mirror and can see and not judge the addict or alcoholic inside your skin, you are probably sober or on your way.  If you aren’t drinking you might be in or approaching the PINK CLOUD . However, if you can’t see  the alcohol or addict in the mirror or you can and hate and judge it and believe it is all of you then you might actually be delusional and think you have to get it rid of that part of yourself to be ok.  You are definitely not in the PINK CLOUD, though you may be nearer than you think to the first step in.

If you tell yourself that getting sober means getting rid of the alcoholic or addict inside your skin, you are not in the PINK CLOUD for sure, but you are also in the fog and deluded about reality.  Nobody gets “OK” by amputating part of themselves.  If you believe that you’d be better of to keep using.  People are regularly delusional and for a person with addiction NOT to see the alcoholic or addict in the mirror could mean you have poke –out or closed your eyes, plugged your ears, or are just in the fog where the only thing that makes sense is to drink and use again to feel better for awhile.   The PINK CLOUD is the place to go if you want to feel good and also be sane.  However, you can’t go there drunk or high.  The PINK CLOUD is like the experience of BEING IN LOVE in a marriage.  Heading back to where you could see and accept yourself and the other person makes sense if you think about it.  People, and alcoholics/addicts rarely do what makes sense.  We actually tell ourselves that LOVE and PINK CLOUDS are delusional.  REALLY?

People talk about the PINK CLOUD in early sobriety, when staying sober is easy as if it is a delusional period and goes away when reality sets in.  The pink cloud doesn’t go away, they do.  They leave to wander out of reality into the fog. The pink cloud is the experience of AWARENESS.  Think about it for a moment. You can see clearly in there. You don’t argue about what you are up against.  You don’t buy into the lies your ego tells you. The air inside the pink cloud is pure light and oxygen… clears the mind and heals the soul, and if you stayed there you’d be clear all the time. You’d be sane.  You’d probably be happy AND sober.  You… and I… would be AWAKE.  Human beings, NOT JUST ALCOHOLICS, can see clearly and accept the difference between what they can change and what they can’t ONLY PART OF THE TIME because most of the time they stay out of love and out of PINK CLOUDS. Most of the time we devote ourselves to pain and struggle because the ego hates EASY and AWAKE.   Outside in the fog of what is labeled reality humans have to work hard to stay sober.  Happy is often out of the question. How is it we think what is good has to be HARD?  Because it is?  Not when you can see clearly. How often has it been in your life?

If the alcoholic or addict inside of you has caused enough trouble or pain, or nearly killed you or other people, then you may have gotten into the pink cloud through defeat and surrender… the nice word for resignation. Either way you got there when your ego was out of gas.  Most of us get to awareness through a life of devotion to lies that don’t work but we have decided SHOULD.  Defeat and fatigue do work if they don’t kill you. 

The PINK CLOUD is where you see the part of yourself who will beat you up and become you if you believe you can control it, or if your ego sucks you into believing you can… In the PINK CLOUD you don’t even try… Why bother!  Inside the PINK CLOUD alcoholics and addicts are awake.  Outside in the fog a person gets turned around, confused.

 

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MAKING THE CONNECTION is published by Potentials,LLC who reserves all rights to publication.